plants lights and growth

725 Views 3 Replies 4 Participants Last post by DarkCobra, Jan 15, 2011

yetti82

Discussion Starter · Jan 15, 2011

For me the biggest reason for going with the high lighting plants was assuming that they would grow slower even with the massive T5 wattage I'm putting out.(5.1 wpg in 14 G BioCube) My educated guess is that a plant would grow under the appropirate CO2 and fert levels about as following:

low lighting plant
(n * 1) in low light
(n * 3) in high light

high lighting plant
(n * .3) in low light
(n * 1) in high light

So following that math would it not be safe to assume that having as much light in my tank as I will have that it won't over grow it's self as fast or require more CO2 to keep the Algae down if the plants are growing at a slower rate?

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offpath

· #2 · Jan 15, 2011

For the life of me, I can't seem to parse out the double negative in your question. But the short answer is that you have way too much light, and no, low light plants like anubias or crypts tend to be much slower growing than high light plants under any conditions.

Unless you enjoy algae, you might consider checking out Hoppy's excellent sticky in the lighting forum.

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SNSDFAN

· #3 · Jan 15, 2011

Yeah just like "offpath" said... but i mean if you have highlighting plants in there then they are going to overgrow the lowlighted plants... if you have alot of plants in there then algae might not be very conserned about... but if theres is too much light and you dont have enough plants, etc... to photosynthesis it then yes algae will grow every where especially with fertilizers... Oh and i believe that low light plants will do fine in a highoutput lighting system its just that maybe some might adjust to it and grow quick or some might not and stay the same... thgh ive read on an article that if you dramatically change the lighting from low to high then CRYPT'S might rot away becuase of the quick adjustment... but i have never seen it happen with my crypts before... so that was just a heads up for those who like crypts alot...

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DarkCobra

· #4 · Jan 15, 2011

The recipe for algae is:

1) Lots of light
2) Lots of organic waste
3) Low CO2

The more of these conditions are present, the more likely you'll have a serious algae problem.

With high light, that's one strike against you already. With low CO2, that's two.

As for organic waste:

Healthy plants, more plants and/or faster growing plants = less organic waste (they eat it).
Unhealthy plants start decomposing and become organic waste.
And unless all other conditions are excellent, slow growing plants tend to slowly accumulate algae, which makes them unhealthy.

Three strikes, you're out!

You will need good CO2, and enough plant growth to suck up the organics to make this work. That means some fast growing plants, or at least a tank packed with slow/medium growth plants.

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