Wpg

[SLIM]

Hi

At the moment im currently using 2 39W T5s over 260Litres.
I need to know if this is enough light to use with the addition of CO2?

Iv been told on here in the past that i have enough lighting to grow anything, but after some research online im not very convinced and need some further advice.
From what iv read online, injecting CO2 with my WPG is "fighting a losing battle"
Apparently my WPG will cause a CO2 spike as the plants wont have enough light to absorb the CO2 fast enough??
So the CO2 will have little if any effect. Is this correct?

I know the higher the light the harder it is to balance and the more likely il get algae,
i just need to know if what i have IS indeed fine or do i need to upgrade my lighting?
If i do, what would be the perfect WPG to grow plants such as...

Red Ludwigia
Ambulia Aquatica
Elodea Densa
Bacopa Caroliniana
Cabomba Caroliniana
Water Wisteria
Creeping Jenny(Lysimachia Nummularia Green)
Red Ambulia

Also is WPG UK gallons or US gallons??

Sorry for all the questions
Thank you all for your time and help Its greatly apprechiated
The quicker i can solve this little problem of mine the better as i plan to finally turn my CO2 on this weekend but want to make sure everything is right

Thanx once again

 

[lljdma06]

What did you read online? Can you show me what you read?

Your light is plenty and you'll do well to inject CO2 to a tank with that lighting, especially if you go pressurized. You can grow everything on that list with the lighting you have.

Again, I'm really curious to see what you've been reading.

llj

 

[SuperColey1]

.
I need to know if this is enough light to use with the addition of CO2?

This is the wrong way around. There is no need for 'enough light to use with CO2. There is no lower end for CO2 addition within reason (0.4/0.5WPG ish)

The phrase should be:
Is this too much light without CO2 addition

Iv been told on here in the past that i have enough lighting to grow anything, but after some research online im not very convinced and need some further advice.

Therefore this forum is giving you sound advice

From what iv read online, injecting CO2 with my WPG is "fighting a losing battle"

CO2 allows you to go both lower and higher with the light. A non CO2 tank cannot go as low as a CO2 enriched tank because with CO2 enrichment the plants can use more energy to utilise the available light better. Therefore with CO2 you could push as low as 0.4WPG where without CO2 you would be struggling to go lower than 0.6WPG.

At the other end of the scale if the light is higher than say 2WPG (I would suggest lower at about 1.5WPG unless you are using tubes saved from the eighties ) then the light drives the plants faster than natural CO2 can supply and addition becomes a necessity.

So don't ever think of needing X amount of light for CO2 to work. Thats incorrect. Having too much light makes CO2 addition necessary. Having lower light means CO2 addition is optional.

Apparently my WPG will cause a CO2 spike as the plants wont have enough light to absorb the CO2 fast enough??

This is laughable and is a site/forum you need to discard from your research YOU control the CO2 adition. therefore YOU provide the CO2. You are aiming for a ppm in the water (Y). If the plants can only consume X amount then you will set the injection rate to achieve Y ppm in the water. If the plants can consume W amount then you increase/decrease the injection rate to reach Y ppm.

The ppm is the constant. You are controlling how much is in the water. So you target Y. You then maintain the ppm at Y. Doesn't matter how much the plants are consuming or how much is being lost. You alter the injection rate to maintain Y. So its not about judging consumption or gassing off. Its simply about maintaining a level within the water.

So the CO2 will have little if any effect. Is this correct?

Nope, the exact opposite is true. A 0.5WPG CO2 enriched tank will beat a 1WPG non CO2 in plant growth and health by a large margin!!! CO2 increases the growth massively. Doesn't mean the 1WPG non CO2 tank will have inferior health, just that the CO2 enriched one will grow much faster.

I know the higher the light the harder it is to balance and the more likely il get algae,

This is more to do with CO2 addition being hard to achieve effectively. The more light you add, the faster uptake is and the harder it gets to maintain a decent level of CO2.

i just need to know if what i have IS indeed fine or do i need to upgrade my lighting?
If i do, what would be the perfect WPG to grow plants such as...

As above. yes its fine, no you don't NEED to upgrade. Something for the future maybe but not needed and not recommended until you get to grips with this plant growing malarky.

Can't give experiences with the plants listed however they have all been grown very well with lower light than you have.

Also is WPG UK gallons or US gallons??

US

Andy

 

[SLIM]

Thank you both for your quick responses.

If theirs one thing iv never truely understood, its the whole wpg thing.
Seems iv just spent over £50 on the above plants and more, i just wanted to be absolutely certain i had adequate lighting for them as i dont want them to die off or lose colour.

On Java-plants.com most of the plants iv ordered say they need "bright" or "very bright" lighting
That got me thinking if my light was indeed bright enough for these plants as i think i only have something like 1.1wpg.
Iv read that some people are using 4wpg+ and thats what got me researching.

I totally trust you both tho and will definately take your advice and stick with what i have at least for now and see how i get on. I just wanted to be absolutely certain my lighting was good enough
Thanx for the reassurance.

Il try and find those sites i was reading and post them below

Thanx again

 

[SLIM]

Below are links to the stuff i was reading which all seem to suggest the higher wpg the better

Minimum Light Threshold
1.6wpg+co2 waste of time
Aquarium advice

This last link i was reading the section under lighting which suggests 3wpg.
little grows in 1pwg

I do totally trust both of you and like i said will be taking your advice, im just providing the sites i read as suggested.

 

[ian]

wow, there is some outdated rubbish on the intermacweb!

BTW the second link, is nearly 10 years old as well, things have moved on from then.

 

[Ps3Steveo]

Intermacweb lol sounds like a mc donalds burger

 

[SLIM]

Lol

Lol I didnt think to check the dates lol Derrrr

 

[SuperColey1]

Lol. I tend to call it Interweb from Andrew Neill saying that on the daily politics and this week. No idea where Ian's Intermacweb comes from

On Java-plants.com most of the plants iv ordered say they need "bright" or "very bright" lighting

If there is one thing that always rings alarm bells when talking about lighting for fish plants it is the use of the word 'bright'. Bright means little when we are talking about actual light. Bright is a human perception. Light is an actual. Therefore there can be lots of light and it doesn't seem bright to us, or there can be less light and it does seem bright

Iv read that some people are using 4wpg+ and thats what got me researching.

Many will use 4WPG. Most because they are myth believers. Many because they believe and article written years ago suggesting Amano uses huge amounts of light when he freely admits he does and always has used low light. The small amount that don't fit into the brackets above use high light because they can or they want to. Meaning they are able to master their CO2 and chose to grow their plants faster. Doesn't have much to do with plant colouration though above a certain level (which is pretty low).

The articles:
Minimum Light Threshold
Rex knows his onions and is pretty good for info however I stopped reading after a paragraph when he started talking about Lumens and Lux. That is brightness not light His intention is pretty good in that smaller tanks do need more than larger tanks however I would question how large the difference is. I would say it is nowhere near what many people suggest i.e. 6WPG+ on a small Nano.

co2-watts per gallon
I did read this because I couldn't believe the statements This is one for you to bookmark so in a few years time you (as an experienced planter) can chuckle about it with your 'planter' friends

How many watts/gallon and CO2
As if by magic. lol. I just said about the 6WPG+ small tanks and up pops a thread saying just that Notice a theme with most of these people in that they are virtually ignoring CO2. Yes they are talking about using it but they should be concentrating on CO2 first. Get the CO2 stable, get it mastered then you can choose whatever level you want to be at lightwise (within reason) The better you get with the mastering of CO2 the higher you can go. Much more leeway at the lower end and much easier to master it.

Basics to starting a Planted Tank
Here is where the success or the failure of your planted tank can happen. The Aquarium Lighting supplied to you when you first purchase your tank is only intended for viewing your tank , the lighting is very much under powered to successfully grow a majority of plants in.

Nope CO2 is where the success or failure of your planted tank can happen. This doesn't mean you need to add it. However if the CO2 is not right (natural or injected) then doesn't matter what the lighting is....you fail, algae wins.

As for the statement on stock lighting that is utter garbage. If you got 1 full length tube then you are in the low light area. If you got 2 full length tubes you have enough for anything. If you got a new Juwel tank you'ld better know how to use CO2 and get it on there fast because the plonkers at Juwel have read the myths above and put 2 x full length T5HOs in the top. That makes it a lot of light

I can show you a couple of examples now of my low light use with pressurised CO2:

This is 0.9WPG T5HO with pressurised CO2

This is 0.9WPG t5HO with pressurised CO2.

So both the above tanks are using 0.9WPG for a 9 hour photoperiod.

Both are using fully pressurised CO2 and full EI dosing.

Some reds in there Kind of makes the above articles look a little foolish, although many 'highlight' believers will suggest all my plants are actually 'low light' plants.

There are a few of us (not many) who are leaning these days towards plants actually being high CO2 plants, rather than high light plants. When lights are pushed a lot higher people also increase CO2. For some reason they always come to the conclusion that it is the higher light that these plants needed and that is the reason for their new found success. They seem to reason in that they actually increased CO2 as well. However this is theory. Doesn't really bother me whether they want to call them highlight or not. As long as I can grow something, doesn't matter if I am being an exception to the rule

Andy

 

[Geoff-]

The other parameter that is crucial and often overlooked is the light spectrum. The colour temperature in Kelvin tells you absolutely nothing about the overall spectrum, I keep seeing references to 20,000K lights. 20,000K out of a black body radiator would be violet in colour!! The lights are anything but violet to the eye so Kelvin can safely be ignored.

The actual spectrum - how much light is being produced at each wavelength - is important for plant growth. If you have an ordinary shop fluoro with a massive spike in the green part of the spectrum then it's useless for plant growth. Your plants will look amazing at first because all the fluoro light is being reflected off the plant into your eyes (that's why plants appear green, because they reflect green light). But very little useful light is being absorbed for photosynthesis. Ignore any "plant" bulbs that say enhances plant colour. Enhancing plant colour is exactly what you DON'T want. You want the plant to absorb the light not reflect it into your eyes.

Use a light that's got a lot of blue and red wavelengths and your plants will grow much faster.

Lumens and lux is only relevant if you know the output spectrum.

What is probably more useful is PAR - a measure of how much light is available for photosynthesis. It's not perfect, but it's better than WPG or Lumens.

 

[SLIM]

Thanx supercoley and geoff, thats just the information and reassurance i was looking for
Great tanks too supercorey
Infact i want to say a huge thanx to everyone whos helped me through this.
I think my lighting for the mean time will be absolutely fine as iv never had trouble growing anyting as a low-tech set up and after speaking with yourselves, am very confident it will be more than enough with the addition of CO2.

All my plants arrived yesterday
Altho i didnt finish work until 10pm so i stayed up until 2am planting my tank
This hobby is becoming an obsession lol
CO2 get turned on tomorrow (saturday)
Below is some before and after pics. Please let me know what you think as this is my first REAL attempt at a heavily planted tank.

Before-lowtech

After-Hightech

Many thanx to everyone once again

 

[ian]

love that Tank Slim! Great textures and colours. Well done!

 

[SLIM]

love that Tank Slim! Great textures and colours. Well done!

Thank you That exactly what i was trying to achieve.
They've only been in now for around 12 hours so they still have some stretching and settling to do.
This is my first ever tank only started in January this year. Alot of time, research and money has gone into this and i have to say, Im really pleased with it!
I wouldnt of got this far tho if it wasnt for all the helpful people on this forum.
I probably would of given up in the cycle process back in the day lol.
So yes, thanks to everyone

 

[SuperColey1]

The actual spectrum - how much light is being produced at each wavelength - is important for plant growth. If you have an ordinary shop fluoro with a massive spike in the green part of the spectrum then it's useless for plant growth. Your plants will look amazing at first because all the fluoro light is being reflected off the plant into your eyes (that's why plants appear green, because they reflect green light). But very little useful light is being absorbed for photosynthesis. Ignore any "plant" bulbs that say enhances plant colour. Enhancing plant colour is exactly what you DON'T want. You want the plant to absorb the light not reflect it into your eyes.

Use a light that's got a lot of blue and red wavelengths and your plants will grow much faster.

Lumens and lux is only relevant if you know the output spectrum.

What is probably more useful is PAR - a measure of how much light is available for photosynthesis. It's not perfect, but it's better than WPG or Lumens.

Geoff. This is old old myth. Disproved a million times and huge swathes of planted people are these days using shop lights in the green spectrum!!!

I myself used to solely use green lights. Thes days I solely use white LEDs. Barely any red in there at all.

Andy

 

[Geoff-]

Slim, tank looks great!! I spy a GBR in there too, my favourite


Andy I was a bit harsh saying "useless" as although the green spike is rejected by the plants there's enough other wavelength light to keep the plants going. Should have said the green component is useless for growth. It is well documented that chlorophyll uses red and blue wavelengths only, white LEDs tend to have quite a strong blue peak with not much red. Since you have optimised CO2 and nutrients your lighting demands are not so high, certainly getting some good results with low light!