Lighting for planted tank

[puncak82]

Hi All,

I am setting up a 75 gallon planted tank with an iwagumi layout theme. Currently, I have:

foreground plant: Dwarf hairgrass, glossostigma.
background: valisneria nana
light: 150w Metal Halide 8000k
Co2 addition: PH controller with aqua medic 1000 reactor.

I am thinking of adding (2) 6500k 110w flood lights from home depot / walmart. The actual wattage would be 30 watt for each bulb. This way, I will have a total of 210w (almost 3 watt per gallon) on my tank.

Is it necessary to add more watts into my tank? If yes, would these type of bulbs work for planted tank?

Thanks

[wesleydnunder]

I use 6500K lamps from HD on several tanks and the plants do well. My initial suggestion would be to bump the light up to at least 3WPG, but your glosso and hair grass will tell you if you need more light. MH is more intense than fluorescent so you may be fine with what you already have. Tom Barr has been suggesting lower light levels and it's working out for lots of folks. Most of my planted tanks are in the 1.5 WPG neighborhood.

Mark

[puncak82]

Thanks for the response...I think I will monitor my plants for now and buy the bulbs if they need more light.

[kwc1974]

On a 75 gallon tank I perfer two MH lights, not so much for the increased wattage but to help acheive a more even spread of lights. One MH on a 75G will give you darker areas in on the sides. This may be desired in some applications as you will have a spotlight effect.

Do as Mark suggests, keep an eye on it, if you feel like you need more light then approach the problem.

Given a choice I would add some 4ft t5 bulbs into the mix, this would give you a more even look and you could back off the MH photoperiod a little.

What flood light ant Home Depot are you talking about?

[puncak82]

HD has a R40 120 watt (23 watt actual) 6700k flood light. It has also a philips plant bulbs but the color is too yellow I think (3000k).