Low Light = Plant Death?

[gearhead65]

So, obviously some plants require more or less light than others. Unfortunately, I only have one 18w T8 bulb for my 30g tank so I am pretty limited on plant selection. I bought some Cabomba this week and it's still to be seen how well it will do, but my Anacharis and Moneywort seem to be doing well. I also dose 2ml of Leaf Zone daily and it seems to help the plants (and algae) a lot. However, would adding a high light plant just die or would it only grow very slowly?

 

[ajs2294]

Your lighting isn't that low you could get away with most plants they just won't "thrive" like they would under high wattage conditions.

 

[gearhead65]

I'm okay with that. One day when I can afford it, I'll upgrade my lighting.

 

[RadaR]

So, obviously some plants require more or less light than others.

Actually, we now understand that isn't quite true. Most plants that are "high light" will survive in low light conditions as long as CO2 and nutrients are good. SuperColey grew some rotala macrandra in 0.5wpg, if I remember correctly.

Unfortunately, I only have one 18w T8 bulb for my 30g tank so I am pretty limited on plant selection.

As I said before. If nutrients (micro and macro nutrients) and CO2 (whether that be liquid carbon or pressurized CO2) are provided in good amounts then your light should not limit you too much at all. You could keep most aquarium plants.

 

[mtv8dmarine]

So, obviously some plants require more or less light than others.

Actually, we now understand that isn't quite true. Most plants that are "high light" will survive in low light conditions as long as CO2 and nutrients are good. SuperColey grew some rotala macrandra in 0.5wpg, if I remember correctly.

Unfortunately, I only have one 18w T8 bulb for my 30g tank so I am pretty limited on plant selection.

As I said before. If nutrients (micro and macro nutrients) and CO2 (whether that be liquid carbon or pressurized CO2) are provided in good amounts then your light should not limit you too much at all. You could keep most aquarium plants.

That is very good information to know. Thanks for sharing it. I guess it comes down to knowing how much to dose then.

 

[SuperColey1]

Indeed is true. While I won't go down the route of dismissing the highlight myth in this thread so it doesn't turn into an argument I would just say:

Plants+light is like a PC!!!

Buy a 486 oldy and you aren't going to be doing anything hi tec on it. Buy the latest super dooper model and you can do anything.

Now that is not to say you need the latest super dooper machine to do what you want. Indeed much like my lighting levels I have a 6 year old PC with just a P4 processor single core in it. It does what I need and because I keep it super maintained it is a pretty reasonable speed. In fact much faster than some of my friends (unmaintained) quad cores which should blast mine out of the water

So what am I saying?

Add no light (cover the tank up) and the plants aren't going to grow. Use 0.5WPG of poor light then they will grow ultra slowly. Add a reasonable level (0.5WPG of good light to 2WPG of poor light) and you will have a slow but easy maintenance set up. Add the ultimate (2WPG good light+) and you will get super dooper speed of growth BUT you have to then upgrade the other components. CO2, flow, etc Just as you can't just get a super fast processor and expect it to work without adding sufficient memory, graphics card etc to cope with the new capability.

In short there is no easy answer to your setup. I would start low, get easy plants growing, learn the hobby and get your system in balance so that you don't struggle with algae or plant death and then decide if turbo growth and constant pruning is your goal

Virtually all plants will 'grow' under any light and without CO2. The difference is that they may grow differently. i.e. HC growing leggy under low light and carpeting under highlight. Whether it is the light or the increased CO2 injection that comes with highlight that causes the difference I will leave with you people to decide for yourselves

I am one of the few that theorises that itis the CO2 and not the light that is the factor here

Plant up and enjoy

AC

 

[FishyWishie]

Oh i dunno i seem to be doing a pretty decent job of killing a good 50% of anything planted in my low tech tank even with ferts and liquid carbon lol

 

[lljdma06]

I am one of the few that theorises that itis the CO2 and not the light that is the factor here

Plant up and enjoy

AC

Wanna do a write-up?

Oh i dunno i seem to be doing a pretty decent job of killing a good 50% of anything planted in my low tech tank even with ferts and liquid carbon lol

Hmmmm, I will look at your thread. If I can grow plants, anybody can...