Help with a Getting Started with Planted Aquaria talk

[Dave Millman]

At our last fish club meeting, a member proudly described how he had
just
put 110 watts over his 20 gallon plant tank, because an LFS employee
told
him, "The more light, the better." He doesn't have CO2 or dose
nutrients-the same fish store told him that "We don't do that in our
tanks,
and the plants are fine." A few of us tried to explain his mismatch
light
with nutrients, but he was too excited about his new light kit to hear
any
of it.

So I am writing a talk on "Getting Started with Planted Aquaria," with a

focus on picking the right combinations of these important issues. Tom
Barr
has done a great job recently of describing successful low-light setups,

and his Estimative Index method is a great starting point for
high-light.

I have tried to create one diagram describing the relationship of light,

CO2 and nutrients, specifically to show where the "success zones" are.
Please take a look:

http://www.svas.info/Newsletter/success-zone.html

Please note, this is the first draft of the diagram. I am looking for
input
on the whole concept, and on the shape of the "success zone" itself, and

the right values for the vertical and horizontal axes. Or feel free to
say
the whole thing is wrong!

Thank for your help.

[w]

"Dave Millman" > wrote in message
...
> At our last fish club meeting, a member proudly described how he had
> just
> put 110 watts over his 20 gallon plant tank, because an LFS employee
> told
> him, "The more light, the better." He doesn't have CO2 or dose
> nutrients-the same fish store told him that "We don't do that in our
> tanks,
> and the plants are fine." A few of us tried to explain his mismatch
> light
> with nutrients, but he was too excited about his new light kit to hear
> any
> of it.
>
> So I am writing a talk on "Getting Started with Planted Aquaria," with a
>
> focus on picking the right combinations of these important issues. Tom
> Barr
> has done a great job recently of describing successful low-light setups,
>
> and his Estimative Index method is a great starting point for
> high-light.
>
> I have tried to create one diagram describing the relationship of light,
>
> CO2 and nutrients, specifically to show where the "success zones" are.
> Please take a look:
>
> http://www.svas.info/Newsletter/success-zone.html
>
> Please note, this is the first draft of the diagram. I am looking for
> input
> on the whole concept, and on the shape of the "success zone" itself, and
>
> the right values for the vertical and horizontal axes. Or feel free to
> say
> the whole thing is wrong!
>
> Thank for your help.


Well i'm fairly new to the aquarium world, ive just started adding plants
and i'm in the process of building my own canopy. one thing i think you
should mention is the type of light. if you have 2w/gallon of incandescent
i dont think youll have much success. i just bought a combination of
flourescents, two cool whites and two 41k 'designer' tubes. i'm hoping it
will work better than my one power glow.

[xtr396472]

This is a good example of lighting requirements
http://faq.thekrib.com/plant-lighting.html
Takes your tanks measurements and multiple by plant requirements then divide
by 11 hours gives watts per hour. Measurements in inches

heres some more ref with other web pages

http://www.cichlidtrios.com/articles/view/index.cfm?aID=20


Mike
"w" > wrote in message news:nhv4c.55234$n17.29092@clgrps13...
>
> "Dave Millman" > wrote in message
> ...
> > At our last fish club meeting, a member proudly described how he had
> > just
> > put 110 watts over his 20 gallon plant tank, because an LFS employee
> > told
> > him, "The more light, the better." He doesn't have CO2 or dose
> > nutrients-the same fish store told him that "We don't do that in our
> > tanks,
> > and the plants are fine." A few of us tried to explain his mismatch
> > light
> > with nutrients, but he was too excited about his new light kit to hear
> > any
> > of it.
> >
> > So I am writing a talk on "Getting Started with Planted Aquaria," with a
> >
> > focus on picking the right combinations of these important issues. Tom
> > Barr
> > has done a great job recently of describing successful low-light setups,
> >
> > and his Estimative Index method is a great starting point for
> > high-light.
> >
> > I have tried to create one diagram describing the relationship of light,
> >
> > CO2 and nutrients, specifically to show where the "success zones" are.
> > Please take a look:
> >
> > http://www.svas.info/Newsletter/success-zone.html
> >
> > Please note, this is the first draft of the diagram. I am looking for
> > input
> > on the whole concept, and on the shape of the "success zone" itself, and
> >
> > the right values for the vertical and horizontal axes. Or feel free to
> > say
> > the whole thing is wrong!
> >
> > Thank for your help.
>
>
> Well i'm fairly new to the aquarium world, ive just started adding plants
> and i'm in the process of building my own canopy. one thing i think you
> should mention is the type of light. if you have 2w/gallon of
incandescent
> i dont think youll have much success. i just bought a combination of
> flourescents, two cool whites and two 41k 'designer' tubes. i'm hoping it
> will work better than my one power glow.
>
>

[Michi Henning]

"xtr396472" > wrote in message
...
> This is a good example of lighting requirements
> http://faq.thekrib.com/plant-lighting.html
> Takes your tanks measurements and multiple by plant requirements then divide
> by 11 hours gives watts per hour. Measurements in inches

Hmmm... That seems to be a somewhat dubious formula. Working this
for my 6' x 2' x 2' (approx. 150gal tank):

Surface area = 24" x 72" = 1728
Distance of light source to gravel = 33"
Watt hours = 1728 x 33 x 0.18 = 10264 (for moderate to bright light plants)

Total watts = 10264 / 11 = 933W (!!!)

So, 933W for a 150gal tank, or approx 6W per gallon.

We are out by about a factor of 2 here, which is serious.

Cheers,

Michi.

--
Michi Henning Ph: +61 4 1118-2700
ZeroC, Inc. http://www.zeroc.com