Aquarium Lighting for the "Real Thing" by Jules Birnbaum
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his article is addressed to you aquarists who In the tropics, where most of our plants are willing to give up plastic for the real come from, twelve hours of sunlight is common. thing. I’m one of those who started in the Accordingly, I try to give my plants twelve hours of hobby with plastic plants. Most of this article is light per day. One day a week I keep the lights off, from my personal experience, and I don’t claim to be and do not feed the adult fish. Thus I save electricity a lighting expert. If you are using plastic plants you 52 days per year in my fish room. can put your lights on A few definitions only while observing might help to the fish. You will have understand aquarium lower electric bills and lighting: very little algae, which The “T” marked are two advantages of on the bulb stands plastic plants (or no for tubular. The plants at all). If you number is the bulb’s are into this go and diameter in eighthget some plastic fish. inch increments. The In my opinion, real Thirty gallon tank with low-light plants. basic light bulb used aquarists appreciate Photo by Marsha Radebaugh for ceilings is T12, one living, growing things. and one-half inches thick. There is T8, or one inch Each of us has some successes, and some thick, and then there is the very slim T5 bulb, fivefailures with our fish. The same is true for live eighths of an inch thick, which is the most efficient plants. When you leave on vacation you won’t of the three. It’s also the most costly of the three have to worry about feeding your live plants. If a sizes, and some question whether the extra cost is tank is heavily planted and there is a power failure worth it. In this writer’s opinion LED technology the plants should survive and your fish will survive will eventually make all three obsolete. much longer than they would otherwise, as live The “K” stands for Kelvin, and has to do with plants provide oxygen and some nutrients for your “temperature” or color of the light source. 5500K is fish. equivalent to noon sunlight and is considered fullI’m a proponent of low-light plants that don’t spectrum. need any CO2 equipment, which can be costly and Most of us think in terms of watts when we an extra maintenance headache. You can pick refer to a bulb’s brightness, but that isn’t really these plants up at our auctions or at a few local pet accurate. Watt is a measure of electricity’s ability shops, such as Cameo and Zooto do work, and is named Rama, both of which advertise after the Scottish inventor and in Modern Aquarium. I’ve mechanical engineer James found their prices for healthy, Watt. Lumen is the measure of disease-free plants to be very the total amount of visible light reasonable, and their expert emitted by a source. Once you advice and the healthy plants start getting too technical, you they stock make the price even can drive yourself crazy. A more worthwhile. You can see good rule of thumb for keeping what you are getting, there are the “average” aquarium plant no shipping charges, and the happy is to use two watts per shop stands behind the plants gallon of tank size, though they sell. Healthy plants have there are several factors that solid leaves without blemishes must be considered, such or algae, no smell, and have a as the depth of the water. A nice, thick, white root system. Somthing different: An LED bubble-wand. 20-gallon high tank needs 8 March 2012 Modern Aquarium - Greater City A.S (NY)