In rec.aquaria.freshwater.plants Reel McKoi wrote:
:
: "TSJ of course" wrote in message
: ...
: By the way, unlike like lamps
: specialy made for aquariums, ordinary house lamps would not light up
: the whole aquarium the same way.

There is considerable hype on aquaurium bulbs. The T8 (8/8ths of an inch
wide) fluorescent lamps do pretty good job. At some big bog hardware stores,
you can get a 6500K spectrum bulb at $5.00 per 4 foot tube. It grows plants
really well for the money. Pick up one of the new-style shop lights with
an electronic ballast and a half-decent gull-wing reflector for about
$40.00. This low budget system will do a pretty good job at raising
plants. You might do better by using one 6500K tube and one plant
grow tube (Vitalight, GrowLux, ...) But this is still really cheap.

You could get better results with fancy $30.00 aquarium tubes, but they
won't be twice as good than the cheap $5.00 6500K and $15.00 plant
tubes.

: OK, the sites just sell bulbs. There's no explanation of what's best for FW
: tanks or tanks with algae problems. Now the problem with my buying bulbs to
: help with the algae would be a hard sell to my husband since the Flourish
: Excel fiasco.

I have a better luck with algae by using a 6500K bulb instead of 4100K
"cool white" or the not-very-good 3500K "warm white" tubes.

: I was assured over and over that algae turns white and falls
: off when FE is used. Although I found that almost impossible to believe,
: like a fool I bought the stuff. I bought a lot of it, and it's totally
: useless. Then the same man from the plant group tried to get me to purchase
: some other expensive crap from his friend who sells fertilizers.

: spend well over $100 on bulbs and still have the algae problem. So you can
: see why I hesitate to start buying expensive bulbs when the FE did nothing.

I have had really good luck with Seachem Flourish Excel. It helps keep
my tank that tends to have a moderate algae problems to barely noticable
algae here and there. Please note that it does kill certain kinds of
plants (Vallisneria, Elodia (Anacharis), and Saggiteria. The product
is way too expensive unless you buy it in bulk by the gallon jug.

However, this product is not a cure-all. It's optimal for planted tank
that grows plants pretty well that also has pesky algae. It won't
transform an unsuccessful planted tank where the plants usually die into
an Amano-style masterpiece.