Will 10g hood with two 13w cfls grow these plants?

1084 Views 10 Replies 7 Participants Last post by AGUILAR3, Mar 29, 2014

rcs0926

Discussion Starter · Mar 25, 2014

I don't plan on doing anything special with the hood other than replacing the incandescent bulbs with 13w cfls. For the substrate, I'm planning on capping dirt (MGOCPM) with Petco black sand. I will be dosing Excel, and I may use modified EI dosing as necessary (not sure if dirt will provide all necessary nutrients in the water column). I'm looking to plant this tank heavily from the outset, so I'm looking at a few different plant packages on Aquabid:

First Package:

25 dwarf sag
25 val (will probably look to swap this out since I already have plenty)
25 ludwigia repens
25 pennywort

Second Package:

70 dwarf sag
30 val
50 ludwigia repens
30 pennywort
8 oz. cup of guppy grass

Third Package:

75 dwarf sag
25 pennywort
40 val
35 ludwigia repens
25 moneywort

I'm kind of leaning towards either of the two 200 plant packages since that will give me more plants to work with and give me a higher probability of getting numerous healthy specimens. I just don't know if 200 plants would be overkill for a 10g. It appears that all of these plants should be able to grow well with my lighting set-up, but I just want some confirmation. Thanks.

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Raymond S.

· #2 · Mar 25, 2014 (Edited)

I thought that Dwarf Sag was too big in my 10g. Plants in bunches should be seperated but leaving three in a bunch seems common. Otherwise there's not enough room for the roots. That having been said I can't see plantng all of 100 plants in a 10g.
In fact I can't see any open water from top to bottom of the tank not to mention
wall to wall with any 50 of the plants in there after they grow a bit.
BTW: ONE 13W CFL is enough to grow those plants in a 10g.

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rcs0926

Discussion Starter · #3 · Mar 25, 2014

Thanks. So I should probably stick to the 100 plant package then, correct?

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JwDiedrich16

· #4 · Mar 25, 2014

yea possibly lesss

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talontsiawd

· #5 · Mar 25, 2014

Two 13 watt CFL's will grow just about anything. That is way too many plants for a 10 gallon though.

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Raymond S.

· #6 · Mar 25, 2014

Petco often has Ludwigia bunches and you might try say three bunches at first to
see what they cover before buying more plants that you may not be able to fit.
I added something to my reply above and saw your second question.
Draw a line from one front corner on a 45 degree to the back wall. That is just a bit more than three bunches will cover of stemmed plants if they have small leaves like Ludwigia given that you give them some space in-between. With three stems in each
plantng spot, about half that.

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rcs0926

Discussion Starter · #7 · Mar 25, 2014 (Edited)

Raymond S. said:
Petco often has Ludwigia bunches and you might try say three bunches at first to
see what they cover before buying more plants that you may not be able to fit.
I added something to my reply above and saw your second question.
Draw a line from one front corner on a 45 degree to the back wall. That is just a bit more than three bunches will cover of stemmed plants if they have small leaves like Ludwigia given that you give them some space in-between. With three stems in each
plantng spot, about half that.

Will two 13w cfls be overkill? For the time being, I plan on using the hood, so I'd like to use two bulbs if possible. Should I go with two 9w bulbs instead? I think one 13w cfl in a brooder lamp will work for my tank, but that's because the bulb would be vertically-oriented and have an effective 10.5" in diameter reflector. Like I said in my original post, I don't plan on modifying the hood (painting the interior white or using aluminum tape to improve the reflector), so I'm thinking that two 13W cfls that are horizontally-oriented will be about as effective as one cfl in a brooder lamp.

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jrman83

· #8 · Mar 25, 2014

No, two 13W bulbs will not be overkill.

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rcs0926

Discussion Starter · #9 · Mar 25, 2014

jrman83 said:
No, two 13W bulbs will not be overkill.

Cool. I'm going to go with that then, and if I run into any problems, I'll just go down to the 9-10W cfls.

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The Big Buddha

· #10 · Mar 29, 2014

I run 2 9watt CFL's in each of my 2 10 gallons. I find I need CO2 when I run the 13's. Also heat becomes an issue with the 13's. 9 watt is the sweet spot for my tanks with low-med light plants.

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AGUILAR3

· #11 · Mar 29, 2014

rcs0926 said:
so I'm thinking that two 13W cfls that are horizontally-oriented will be about as effective as one cfl in a brooder lamp.

I was just about to say the same. Since your lights will be horizontal, you should be ok.

I'm running a single verticle 10w cfl 6" above water line and I find that it isn't enough light spread to cover the edges of the tank. I'm actually thinking of raising the lamp a few inches and switching over to a 13w.

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