MD Fish Tank Lighting Choices

[ItsaDreamFrodo]

Hello All, 

 

I have some plants doing well right now such as sword & dragon lilys with regular lights. But I have noticed that MD and other people love to use cheap option from places like Lowes or Amazon that are just standard 6500 Kelvin lights for $15-20 rather than something that has blue & red. I do have a nice light for my reef tank, however would using only white lower plant growth? How does he also manage to get items like hair grass to grow with no Co2 and such a low tech light? His plants are doing well enough to grow, propagate and even sell, but I thought plants were similar to coral in that they need color diversity to grow wide (blue) or tall (red). 

[modified lung]

Most white LEDs give out a wide enough spectrum and plants are more flexible than people think. You don't have to maximize growth rates to grow healthy plants. It just takes longer without all the tech people like to say you need.

There's no CO2 in this tank, for example. But if there was, I probably would have gotten the same growth in half the time.

A lot of the types of lights MD uses aren't designed for continual use though, so they won't last as long as an aquarium light. I looked into getting some of those cheap lights but decided it wasn't worth replacing them every year-ish.

[Beardedbillygoat1975]

In regards to MD I would concur with @modified lung, MD is MD, he has perfect water out of the tap which gives him a leg up on any of us. I want to live in that village! As for his lighting choices, the outdoor lights he uses on his bigger builds are pretty durable. The cheap LEDs he uses a drip of water in them and poof they aren't working, trust me I have dropped a few of those. 

I have grown plants using shop lights, outdoor spot lights, can lights, reptile lights, cheap LEDs like Aquaneat and Beamsworks, Finnex and Fluvals (planted 3.0, nano and Aquasky). 

For plants you are trying to bring the reds, pinks and oranges out of white lights like out of shop lights will work but I have found them to make the plants a leggy - lots of distance between the nodes of the leaves and plant. Under higher intensity light particularly different white, red and green light spectrums they will be more compact and color intensity will be improved. Blue is fairly useless other than for growing algaes, most of the experts use less than 10% blue if not 5% if at all. 

In terms of green plants, easy category plants it really doesn't matter - the usual easy to get swords, apongogetons, typical wendtii crypts, crinum etc. they just need light, any light and they will grow like crazy. Now with certain more moderate to difficult to grow plants particularly carpeting plants like hair grass, HC, microwsword you need the light intensity and the color to keep them compact and to create runners. Certain crypts like flamingo, nurri maiden, jacobsonii etc have been bred most of the time to be CO2 and high light plants, now some hobbyists do use low amounts of CO2 or none and if you can get those plants then it will be a lot easier. It will take more than a white light to get them to their best.

For me I use shop lights in my breeding room and they do great for guppy grass, vals, hornwort, crypts, anubias, and buce. In my displays I use RGB lights of varying costs - Finnex 24/7, Finnex planted (wRB), and the aforementioned Fluvals. I like the plug a play aspect of the Finnex's - they are what they are, adjust if you want but if the power goes out the program is gone so I just use them at 100% for less time. The Fluvals be prepared for months of adjustments which is not a bad thing really but it is a thing. I have not found a tank yet that I have used them over 75% and mostly 30-50%. 

[ItsaDreamFrodo]

I am thinking of an African River tank similar to what MD did, some reds and hair grasses etc, mostly medium-easy plants in 2/3rds of the tank though. I don't mind putting some CO2 on in place of having the best light, but overall I want to spend a lot more on plants/fish/hardscape and spending $250 for a 6 foot light doesn't seem appealing. This is going to be a standard 125 gallon or possibly a 100 gallon acrylic, trying to keep it to a 21" depth but might end up being 24". Would love to keep lighting at $100<

[modified lung]

On 7/26/2022 at 12:32 PM, ItsaDreamFrodo said:

I am thinking of an African River tank similar to what MD did, some reds and hair grasses etc, mostly medium-easy plants in 2/3rds of the tank though. I don't mind putting some CO2 on in place of having the best light, but overall I want to spend a lot more on plants/fish/hardscape and spending $250 for a 6 foot light doesn't seem appealing. This is going to be a standard 125 gallon or possibly a 100 gallon acrylic, trying to keep it to a 21" depth but might end up being 24". Would love to keep lighting at $100<

It all depends on your priorities. Personally, I have a hard time being very interested in plants. Also, I'm cheap. So I mostly buy what I consider mid-range lights. 

If you're interested in plants and want them to be the main focus of your aquarium, then buy the expensive light. If not, then you don't have to.

 

Edited July 26, 2022 by modified lung