Wattage of light bulbs

Connie_MD · Post by **Connie_MD** » Feb 02, 2003 6:57 pm

ok, so I thought I was make a change for the good, now I am double thinking myself..

Last year I had a 2-shelf set up (made ds's old changing table into growing station)....had 2 grow lights 33watts each. One light over top of each shelf.

Well the problem was, I found that one light didn't seem to give enough of a lighting range..meaning that I had to rotate plants every 1-2 days (or at least I felt like I had too) because I had areas on the stand that was less bright than the middle of the stand.

So this year (today actually), I decided to use them both on one shelf..spread apart of course to cover more of the shelf.

Now my question...is this going to be too much lighting for seedlings? will it be too warm? it will be basically 66 watts.

I have reflective covering all around station (aluminum foil)..should I still use this or take it down so that it won't hold too much light ? or reflect too much light?

TIA..

Gardentoad · Post by **Gardentoad** » Feb 03, 2003 11:02 am

I used a shelf with 2 tubes of florescent lights, a shop-light fixture. I also used aluminum foil to help reflect it and had the fixture on chains so they were 2" from the top of the plants.I had 2 flats end to end and all the plants got sufficient light except for the 4 on the outer ends.They were smaller than the others. I started turning the flats around every morning so the end plants were in the middle every other day.
Are you using florescent lights? I used 1 cool white and one warm light. With turning the flats around they were switched from the cool, blue end of the light spectrum to the warm red end of the light spectrum each day.

Patricias_herbs · Post by **Patricias_herbs** » Feb 04, 2003 12:49 pm

Hi Connie,
You don't have to worry about making too much light. My set up uses 4' x 4 bulb fixtures, with 40 watt grow tubes alternating wide spectrum & low spectrum. So I can place 4 flats side by side. I agree, it is important to keep them just a couple of inches above the plants & height ajustable for growth. Also a timer, I set mine for 16 hours on.
Good luck,

Connie_MD · Post by **Connie_MD** » Feb 04, 2003 2:19 pm

Phew! thanks everyone for your advise!

hostaanita · Post by **hostaanita** » Feb 17, 2003 5:26 pm

This has been a great discussion for me . I'm just getting set up . I have 3 shelves . Top with expensive grow lights and fixture from my son's aquarium days and two more shelves with regular flourescents 4 feet long and 34 watts two tubes ) . So you think this will work out . I was going to buy a couple of more sets of fixtures .

Patricia M · Post by **Patricia M** » Feb 18, 2003 9:26 pm

It sounds like it should be OK. The other folks pretty well covered the basics. The only things I would add to someone just starting out is be careful about moisture. Keep your seeds(seed starting mix) moist but not wet. Mold, bugs, sickness can all happen when things are too soggy.

Good Luck,

Keep us posted on how your babies are doing!

kidzdad · Post by **kidzdad** » Oct 30, 2005 7:56 pm

If I had a moisture meter to stick in the soil, what kind of reading should I have to prevent the soil from becoming too moist? (Don't have a meter yet but may buy one)