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lights

cliff

Seedling
Joined
11 May 2009
Messages
3
First of all hi every body.

Ok here it goes ive just bought a fluval 190 corner tank, this comes with two power glo t5 24w tubes. Im looking at having a heavyly planted tank, so i assume i would need more light in there? so ive been looking at putting in two strips of the tmc aquabeam white light. I looked at these as they would be easier to fit than tubes. Ive got the caribsea eco complete as the substrate and will be using co2 and ferts. would just like some thoughts and comments from some more experenced guys/girls.

Thanks in advance
 
Hi,
I'd leave the lighting alone and learn how to grow plants with what you have. More lighting usually means more troubles. I would only upgrade the lighting after successfully growing plants with the existing lighting configuration. Concentrate more on your CO2 injection techniques as well as your filter flow rate. Follow the 10X tank volume per hour rule and you'll be OK.

Cheers,
 
ok could you suggest some plants for that type of set up, i like the look of broad leaf plants and stem plants,also crypts. thanks alot.
 
Well, there is nothing unusual or bizarre about that particular setup. Any plant that you like can be grown, especially the ones that you mentioned. The implication of your lighting configuration merely means that the speed of growth in your tank will not be outrageously quick but that also means that if you implement the techniques described in the Tutorials Section properly the tank will mostly stay out of trouble. Is a Fluval 190 a 190 gallon tank? If so that means you'll need a water turnover "rating" of about 1900 gallons per hour. If this is a 190 Liter tank then you'll need 1900 liters per hour turnover. This can be a combination rating of filter(s) only or filter(s) plus powerhead(s).

If it's a 190 gallon your problems will be flow/distribution and CO2 saturation so you'll need to consider what type of injection methods to use, i.e internal or external. You'll obviously need to have a robust nutrient dosing scheme. Please review the articles in the Tutorials Section of the forum. Lots of info there.

If you optimize flow and CO2 then the choice of plants is the same as in any other tank. Everyone seems to be hot-to-trot on lighting and rarely ever consider the ramifications. All plants can do well in medium and sometimes even low lighting, they just grow slower, but other factors in the tank make a big difference. Check Ed Seely's article on setting up a high tech tank in Tutorials.

Cheers,
 
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