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Thanks to Hoppy for his help.
Before you look at the picture, don't think UGLY, think INTERESTING
This is my 10 gallon looking kind of bare. I did get a lot of new plants recently. I just changed it over to a substrate of MGOCPM with a sand cap, but the two Compact Fluorescent Lights (CFL) have been there since near the beginning. I had bought 13Ws but I decided they were too bright for the 10. I forget now what made me decide that - maybe algae. But even the 10Ws were too bright.
I've had my problems with algae. Strong light and only Flourish Comprehensive and Seachem Root Tabs ferts, and the algae take off. Plus, IME, the plants don't grow without NPK and with high lights.
I've also been reading some advice from forums that tells mostly the same thing.
Now that I have the new substrate, I won't have fertilizer problems. I may try bringing down the 10s a little or even try the 13s.
Well, thanks for reading. Oh, I forgot the main point of this post - different fixtures produce different amounts of light. In my picture below, we're looking at two 10W CFLs in somewhat battered aluminum brooder dome reflectores. The bulbs are pointed down, so we can say that the orientation is vertical. Between what I think is a very efficient reflector and vertical orientation, we're getting a lot of light.
A stock incandescent strip or canopy has typically 2 incandescent sockets oriented horizontally which can accept CFLs. However, the horizontal orientation is supposed to be less efficient than the vertical, and the reflector in those fixtures are pretty bad, so more CFL watts are needed.
So, when you see someone running a lot of watts on their 10 gallon tank, I think this has something to do with it.
End of story.
Before you look at the picture, don't think UGLY, think INTERESTING
This is my 10 gallon looking kind of bare. I did get a lot of new plants recently. I just changed it over to a substrate of MGOCPM with a sand cap, but the two Compact Fluorescent Lights (CFL) have been there since near the beginning. I had bought 13Ws but I decided they were too bright for the 10. I forget now what made me decide that - maybe algae. But even the 10Ws were too bright.I've had my problems with algae. Strong light and only Flourish Comprehensive and Seachem Root Tabs ferts, and the algae take off. Plus, IME, the plants don't grow without NPK and with high lights.
I've also been reading some advice from forums that tells mostly the same thing.
Now that I have the new substrate, I won't have fertilizer problems. I may try bringing down the 10s a little or even try the 13s.
Well, thanks for reading. Oh, I forgot the main point of this post - different fixtures produce different amounts of light. In my picture below, we're looking at two 10W CFLs in somewhat battered aluminum brooder dome reflectores. The bulbs are pointed down, so we can say that the orientation is vertical. Between what I think is a very efficient reflector and vertical orientation, we're getting a lot of light.
A stock incandescent strip or canopy has typically 2 incandescent sockets oriented horizontally which can accept CFLs. However, the horizontal orientation is supposed to be less efficient than the vertical, and the reflector in those fixtures are pretty bad, so more CFL watts are needed.
So, when you see someone running a lot of watts on their 10 gallon tank, I think this has something to do with it.
End of story.
