Confused About Lighting

[Fraoch]

Ive just set up my first proper low tech planted tank and im just really confused about lighting. From what ive read i should have 2-5 watts per gallon but i dont know if thats US or UK gallons or what my tank is in eiher of those(300liters). But i think its 80 gallons so working on that i dont have enough lighting since ive only got 2x30watt bulbs.
But where do i buy bulbs that have more wattage than that? i think mine are T8s but i dont think you can buy other bulbs that fit those fittings with higher wattage...?

 

[minnnt]

You will be fine with what you have for a low tech setup. providing you choose undemanding plants.

 

[Fraoch]

You will be fine with what you have for a low tech setup. providing you choose undemanding plants.

ok phew
well i have a few swords, an aponogeton, marimo balls, some floating plants, small crinkly plnat(cant remember the name atm and vallis.
Im just worried about the vallis cause it wont stop melting and i thought maybe it was the lighting. In fact heres a link to the start of my journal My Journal

 

[KittyKat]

The wpg guideline is based on old T12 lights, T5 and T8 lights are considerably brighter for the same wattage. For the T12s, the general rule of thumb was 1-2 watts per US gallon.

You should chose the lighting based on the plants you want to grow, circulation/surface movement, hours of light, aquarium depth, etc.

Your aquarium is about 80 US gallons, which is about 66 imperial gallons, or so Google tells me.

Currently, the most efficient lighting you can get (per amount of light produced) is T5 bulbs with an electronic ballast. The electronic ballast is the important bit and I recommend that you try bulbs which don't have "for aquarium use" written on them. I prefer colour 865 (cool daylight) by Philips/Osram/whoever. Recently, I saw some of the Philips T5 bulbs claiming that they will produce 90% of the original light output after 30000 hours, which is over 8 years… would be interesting to see if that is true. My experience is that a noticeable difference is visible with the same T8 bulbs if they are changed after about 3 years.

I guess it would be fair to say that I run only "low tech" setups and I like to have about 1.5 wpg of T8s for a 2 ft deep tank, which I think is not too far off for 1 wpg of T5s. So, 60w of T5 bulbs over a the 300 litre tank should be fine and if you feel you need more, add reflectors. For 1 ft deep tanks, anything around 1 wpg of T8s works well for me.

Having said that, I have run 2 ft deep tanks with 0.5 wpg T8s and 1 ft deep tanks with 6 wpg T5s, both "low tech" and with long term success.

For me, the best trick is to go heavily planted with fast growing plants right from the start and long photoperiods (10-14 hours), but this doesn't work for many people because they don't go for enough plants to start off with, which ends up with algae infected tanks. So if you don't want to start with heavily planted, then 6-10 hours is a more realistic photoperiod.

 

[Fraoch]

The wpg guideline is based on old T12 lights, T5 and T8 lights are considerably brighter for the same wattage. For the T12s, the general rule of thumb was 1-2 watts per US gallon.

You should chose the lighting based on the plants you want to grow, circulation/surface movement, hours of light, aquarium depth, etc.

Your aquarium is about 80 US gallons, which is about 66 imperial gallons, or so Google tells me.

Currently, the most efficient lighting you can get (per amount of light produced) is T5 bulbs with an electronic ballast. The electronic ballast is the important bit and I recommend that you try bulbs which don't have "for aquarium use" written on them. I prefer colour 865 (cool daylight) by Philips/Osram/whoever. Recently, I saw some of the Philips T5 bulbs claiming that they will produce 90% of the original light output after 30000 hours, which is over 8 years… would be interesting to see if that is true. My experience is that a noticeable difference is visible with the same T8 bulbs if they are changed after about 3 years.

I guess it would be fair to say that I run only "low tech" setups and I like to have about 1.5 wpg of T8s for a 2 ft deep tank, which I think is not too far off for 1 wpg of T5s. So, 60w of T5 bulbs over a the 300 litre tank should be fine and if you feel you need more, add reflectors. For 1 ft deep tanks, anything around 1 wpg of T8s works well for me. Having said that, I have run 2 ft deep tanks with 0.5 wpg T8s and 1 ft deep tanks with 2 wpg T8s, both "low tech".

For me, the best trick is to go heavily planted with fast growing plants right from the start and long photoperiods (10-14 hours), but this doesn't work for many people because they don't go for enough plants to start off with, which ends up with algae infected tanks. So if you don't want to start with heavily planted, than 6-10 hours is a more realistic photoperiod.

ok so i should really get more plants, any suggestions? the tank has got quite a bit of algae atm but its more because its still cycling i think. the lights are usually on for about 14 hours but i realise now that they should be on for less so will take it down to 10?

 

[minnnt]

My current planted 180 is about 18" deep I think and has 2x24w t5's running for 8 hours a day, algae is still a slight issue so will have to add more plants soon. My current 35 litre high tec has no algae issues at all and is running a 8w t5 for 8 hours.

 

[Aquamaniac]

The wpg guideline is based on old T12 lights, T5 and T8 lights are considerably brighter for the same wattage. For the T12s, the general rule of thumb was 1-2 watts per US gallon.

You should chose the lighting based on the plants you want to grow, circulation/surface movement, hours of light, aquarium depth, etc.

Your aquarium is about 80 US gallons, which is about 66 imperial gallons, or so Google tells me.

Currently, the most efficient lighting you can get (per amount of light produced) is T5 bulbs with an electronic ballast. The electronic ballast is the important bit and I recommend that you try bulbs which don't have "for aquarium use" written on them. I prefer colour 865 (cool daylight) by Philips/Osram/whoever. Recently, I saw some of the Philips T5 bulbs claiming that they will produce 90% of the original light output after 30000 hours, which is over 8 years… would be interesting to see if that is true. My experience is that a noticeable difference is visible with the same T8 bulbs if they are changed after about 3 years.

I guess it would be fair to say that I run only "low tech" setups and I like to have about 1.5 wpg of T8s for a 2 ft deep tank, which I think is not too far off for 1 wpg of T5s. So, 60w of T5 bulbs over a the 300 litre tank should be fine and if you feel you need more, add reflectors. For 1 ft deep tanks, anything around 1 wpg of T8s works well for me. Having said that, I have run 2 ft deep tanks with 0.5 wpg T8s and 1 ft deep tanks with 2 wpg T8s, both "low tech".

For me, the best trick is to go heavily planted with fast growing plants right from the start and long photoperiods (10-14 hours), but this doesn't work for many people because they don't go for enough plants to start off with, which ends up with algae infected tanks. So if you don't want to start with heavily planted, than 6-10 hours is a more realistic photoperiod.

ok so i should really get more plants, any suggestions? the tank has got quite a bit of algae atm but its more because its still cycling i think. the lights are usually on for about 14 hours but i realise now that they should be on for less so will take it down to 10?

If you have algae and you don´t have enough plants go for 8 hours.I had the same experience and i started cutting the hours:

14= algae
12= algae
10= algae
8 = tank stabilized and algae gone

Also if you're running any type of fertile soil or think there's to much nutrients in you water do frequent water changes. This will low the amount of nutrients in the water and cut down the algae's food.
Plants require a balanced mix of nutrients to grow.But algae no they will thrive on wathever is left over from the plants.

About your light for a low tech its fine just make sure you keep to the easy and undemanding plants.
If possible do what was told before add as much plants as possible.There will be point where the amount of plants will be the ideal to consume all the nutrients in your water and leave nothing for the algae.
In the beggining its normal to have some algae it's what you do to keep it in check that determines the sucess of your tank. Most of the experienced guys around here already know from past experience how to prevent it. This knowledge comes with time.

Here's a list of undemanding plant's:
easy plants

 

[Fraoch]

thank you ill keep adding plants till the algae begins to die off and cut the hours down to 8. oh and for the vallis i was think of buying a couple of these to help them?

 

[KittyKat]

Are you cycling with household ammonia? If yes, I recommend you do not use any lighting at all until you finish cycling. Ammonia in a well lit tank only stimulates the algae to grow better. Also, high ammonia levels will kill some species of plants. If you really badly need the lights on for the plants, I recommend 4-6 hours only, until you stop dosing ammonia.

If you have really bad algae problems (and this is not relevant until you stop cycling), first manually remove as much algae as you possibly can, then black out the tank for 7 days (don't even look at it during that time, finally physically remove all algae again. Next (on the same day as you end blackout) either (1) drop the lighting to one 6-10 hour photoperiod per day or (2) change the lighting to be 4-5h on, 4h off, 4-5h on, off for the night and/or (3) add a lot of fast growing stem plants and floating plants.

thank you ill keep adding plants till the algae begins to die off and cut the hours down to 8.

This will not work while you are cycling (adding ammonia to the tank) and if you do it plant by plant. All the plants need to go in at the same time.

oh and for the vallis i was think of buying a couple of these to help them?

Tabs/tablets are unlikely to help anything until most of the algae is gone. Sort out the algae first, then the tabs might help.

 

[Fraoch]

is it possible that i can leave the algae as it is, physically removing it every other day or so untill the cycle is done, which hopefully wont be long now, and then adding a lot of plants at one time and this will get rid of it? There is not that much algae just some which i scrape off the glass and some on the wood.
Or will i have to do the blackout you explained? wont i have to remove my other plants to do this sicne they wouldnt be getting any light either?

 

[KittyKat]

is it possible that i can leave the algae as it is, physically removing it every other day or so untill the cycle is done, which hopefully wont be long now, and then adding a lot of plants at one time and this will get rid of it? There is not that much algae just some which i scrape off the glass and some on the wood.
Or will i have to do the blackout you explained? wont i have to remove my other plants to do this sicne they wouldnt be getting any light either?

You can leave it, but it is more likely to get worse if you do. At least turn down the lights to 4-5 hours per day.

What types of algae are causing the problem? If there's only some spot algae and something on the wood, you could always black out just the wood (outside of the tank). The spot algae is best just scrubbed off the glass.

Most plants can survive for a few days without any light, if they couldn't, how would they get shipped from the nurseries?

 

[Fraoch]

ahh true well ill leave it for now but if it gets any worse than it is now ill do a blackout. yeh its mostly green spot algae but just today there were a couple of spots of brown algae, i just scrubbed it all off

 

[KittyKat]

brown algae, i just scrubbed it all off

Diatoms? Don't worry about those, they're one which will almost certainly go without you having to do anything once there is no ammonia left in the water.

 

[Fraoch]

yeh, ok thank you