Lighting Question

[hoyfoys]

I have my lights set to turn on at 4pm and off at midnight for my plants. Is there any kind of light you can use to illuminate the fish at other times but not bother them or cause the plants to grow, LED for example? I hate seeing my tank dark! I've reduced it to 8 hours due to algae.

Thanks

 

[STEWARDSONS]

i have my lights on a timer for 10 hours a day and have never had algae, have you checked your water readings?

 

[hoyfoys]

Yeah water is all fine (Ammonia and Nitrite 0, nitrate 10), I think it's because it's newly cycled, apparently you get the brown algae due to the bacteria bloom I think? It seems to have get less since.

 

[StandbySetting]

There's no need to have them on for more than 8 hours, if you you want to illuminate your tank you could use a really low powered light.

 

[Caprichoso]

I have a moonlight that also has the white LED option on it. I turn it on in the evening before the moonlight to represent sunset lol.

 

[hoyfoys]

I've read about the moonlights but have a couple of questions about them. My tank has 2 bulbs in the lid, if I replace one of the daylight bulbs with a moonlight will that provide enough light for the plants? Secondly, I have no way of switching each bu;b on individually so how would I switch the daylight off at night? Sorry for the stupid questions!

Thank

 

[StandbySetting]

You wouldn't be able to switch the lights off independently, 8 hours of light is fine, you can always adjust the 8 hour period so that it starts and ends earlier so that you will see the tank illuminated more.

 

[hoyfoys]

One issue is that I have glass catfish and they only come out at night so I was hoping there might be something to illuminate them too.

 

[Caprichoso]

I have my LED moonlight as a separate entity from my other lights. Basically, I turn the LED strip light on and turn my main lights off. I have glass cats as well and they come out for the "sunset" lighting and they look really cool in the moonlights too!

 

[hoyfoys]

I have my LED moonlight as a separate entity from my other lights. Basically, I turn the LED strip light on and turn my main lights off. I have glass cats as well and they come out for the "sunset" lighting and they look really cool in the moonlights too!

Brilliant, thanks Caprichoso, I found some on eBay and I'm looking forward to it arriving