Enough light for this tank?

Greetings wise ones,

I am planning on buying a Jebo aquarium, which includes filtration and
lighting all in one unit in the tank cover. It is 4' x 18" x 22", and comes
with 3x30 watt 4' tubes.

I hope to have a heavily planted tank. Is this enough lighting? I have
read that a tank needs about 5 watts per gallon for successful plants. So
my question is: can I simply change the 30 watt tubes for higher wattage,
or is there some reason why the light fixture itself will only take 30 watt
tubes?

T12 Flourescent tube wattage is roughly 5/6 of it's length: 24" = 20 Watts,
36" = 30w, etc.
Dan
"rapdor" wrote in message
...
Greetings wise ones,

I am planning on buying a Jebo aquarium, which includes filtration and
lighting all in one unit in the tank cover. It is 4' x 18" x 22", and comes
with 3x30 watt 4' tubes.

I hope to have a heavily planted tank. Is this enough lighting? I have
read that a tank needs about 5 watts per gallon for successful plants. So
my question is: can I simply change the 30 watt tubes for higher wattage,
or is there some reason why the light fixture itself will only take 30 watt
tubes?

rapdor wrote:
I hope to have a heavily planted tank. Is this enough lighting? I have
read that a tank needs about 5 watts per gallon for successful plants. So

Toss out whatever book or magazine gave you that figure, it's just plain wrong.

--
Victor M. Martinez

http://www.che.utexas.edu/~martiv

"rapdor" wrote:

I have read that a tank needs about 5 watts per gallon for successful plants.

It depends on a number of things. The deeper a tank is, the brighter
light you will need to adequately reach the bottom. Some plants
require very little light, some need a great deal.

In general, 3 or 4 watts per gallon is a good range to shoot for
unless you have an unusually deep tank or are growing very light
demanding plants. I've got 56 watts on my 20 gallon tank, just under 3
watts per gallon, and my plants grow like crazy.

--
www.ericschreiber.com