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lighting Lighting AGAIN ! !

slyone1000

slyone1000

I did some experiments this year with Shop Lamps.
I had 4 levels of Shop lights. 2 Shop lights on each level.
Each level is 2 ft deep, and 4 ft long.
1st level - All grow light Bulbs - Growing Tomatos only
2nd Level - 2-6200 Bulbs & 2-4100 Bulbs staggered set with Ulta Hot peppers only
3rd Level - 2-6200 Bulbs & 2-4100 Bulbs Staggered Set with Bells, Seranos & Jalapenos
4th Level - All Grow Blubs - Ultra Hots, & Specialty Peppers.

After 2 months under the lights. my findings ! !
Level 2 with the staggered lights. They were the smallest, with a lot of the plants being under 2 inches tall. Naturally the Tallest plants were the Tomatos with the Grow Bulbs. The Tallest Pepper plants were the 4th level with only the Grow Bulbs. With Almost all the plants 5 to 8 inches tall. Level 3 Peppers are between 4 & 6 inches tall. But they are the Cool Peppers. I think the Tomatos & Cool Peppers will grow in any type of light.

So Next year, I will be rethinking on using Only Grow Bulbs. I dont know if it was just a thing or not. But they seem to work.

And I thought it was just a Myth ..

Sly
 
That is not a fair comparision. Your annuum peppers will definately grow faster and taller than your chinense super hots. The tomato plants will outgrow any pepper so I think your "experiment" is misleading because of the inherit growth of annuum vs chinense. What you needed to do is place the same type of plants under different bulbs.;)
 
It was easy for me to see the difference in growth rates for the different species and varieties since all were grown with the mix of 6500K and 4100K bulbs. Not comparing different light sources but comparing different plants grown with same lighting. Tomatoes outgrew peppers naturally and annuums were next then the small chinense...even the chinense are small as compared, they are very healthy...
 
if it's the same varieties of ultra hots on the second level as the fourth level it's probably a fair comparison, but if they're different then i'm not sure what you can say. even among the chinenses there is a huge difference in growth rates. i have short bih's and tall fatalii's started the very same day under the same conditions.

POTAWIE said:
Tallest is often not the best, are they stalkier too?
Click to expand...

yes, i have always felt width was much more important then length ;)
 
Same Peppers on the 2nd shelf & the 4th shelf.......all the Chinese on the 4th shelf are a lot bigger & healthier looking
 
I am kinda glad I didn't use grow bulbs then since I would be more out of room than I am....

But your comparison is good to know....
 
You want the truth? different wavelengths encourage production of different things. eventually too much blue or too much red will give you unworthy plants.
No matter what type of lamp you use, it's all about the actual color.
 
Understand about the light color Omri...good article on lighting you put up on the new website by the way...

That is exactly what I am trying to recreate in my grow box...a good spectrum for growing year round...since I added the 2700K lamps, the plants seem to have really taken off and grown about 2" in 3 days...I no longer run the lights 24/7, 16/8 now...
 
Sly,

I'm sold on the 20 watt, 2700K CFL lights. More expensive to buy, plus I have to build the platform, but I've seen the difference in plants. I'm curious to see how AJ's blinding light works on his plants. I figure eight bulbs will cover 12 sq. ft., especially if I use reflectors or paint the walls glossy white.

I don't have unlimited funds to give to Duke Energy and I plan on starting some plants in September (maybe outside) so I can have fresh produce year-round. $4.00 per pound for tomatoes is highway robbery - that's about $200 per bushel. I calculate that it would take 80 watts per hour, for 80 days @16 hours per day to produce a bushel. If my math is correct, that's $10.40 or so in electricity costs

You know, I may have to look into moving my table saw, router and other tools to a different place and growing tomatoes this winter. If I can sell them to a store at $75/bu., I could afford more seeds, pots and even convert the basement, my son's and in a year or two my daughter's rooms into greenhouses! Replace the roof with triple insulated glass panels, add an eight by 16 foot sunroom on the side of the house (with lots of glass), and get into gardening big time.

Vine Ripened, Organic Grown, Cincinnati Ohio tomatoes, only $3.00 per pound!

Happy Easter.

Mike
 
Mike you sound like me with the projects...I got a 12X16 tuff shed for storagework shop last fall and have already been thinking about conversin to partial green house....don't think I could afford lighting for a 12X16 grow room....wife would absolutely kill me...
 
AlabamaJack said:
Understand about the light color Omri...good article on lighting you put up on the new website by the way...

That is exactly what I am trying to recreate in my grow box...a good spectrum for growing year round...since I added the 2700K lamps, the plants seem to have really taken off and grown about 2" in 3 days...I no longer run the lights 24/7, 16/8 now...
Click to expand...
Thanks AJ. the bulb's color doesn't necessarily mean you have the right wavelengths, but you're plants are looking good so I guess you're lucky.
 
Understand about the light color Omri...good article on lighting you put up on the new website by the way...

That is exactly what I am trying to recreate in my grow box...a good spectrum for growing year round...since I added the 2700K lamps, the plants seem to have really taken off and grown about 2" in 3 days...I no longer run the lights 24/7, 16/8 now...
Click to expand...

Maybe I'm oversimplifying things but from what I remember from High School Biology classes - plants use sunlight and CO2 as part of their phtotosynthesis process. Not all the spectrum in sunlight is of use to plants - one could hit a newly sprouted plant with the wavelenght that encourages blooming a fruit production and if that plant ain't ready to produce fruit, it ain't gonna to, anymore that a four month old cat is gonna have kittens.

The idea, from my readings, of artificial lighting is to stimulate photosynthetic activity. At the appropriate time in its life, the plnat will start producing fruit, just as at a certain time it will go dormant or die.

Extrapolating that, the more PAR lumens that can be delivered to a plant, the faster the plant will grow and go through its life cycle. By adjusting heat, water, fertilizer, humidity, etc., it may be able to increase the lifespan or production to an extent, perhaps just a little to a significant amount.

Then again, I may not have a clue about any of this and little green men on Mars may be sipping their version of beers and eating peppers that would make a Bhut Jolokia seem like a Bell pepper!

Mike

Not quite a mad scientist, at least yet.
 
I guess you haven't read my "Light & Plants" articles, eh? :lol:
Plants can only absorb certain wavelengths, and they absorb all of them all of the time. the trick is that each wavelength encourages production of certain "elements". when the plant is in a certain growing pase it needs more of a certain element, meaning more of that light. so a variety of light would be better.
That's why I usually recommend 6500K for seedlings. they have both ends of the spectrum quite respectively.
 
So what would be the best option for someone that just wants to start their seedlings off before spring? I am thinking fluros? Will that be enough to get a good head start?
 
Would be just intill i could move them out, so if i was to grow them to say... 6inches or so? I was thinking 4ft Fluros, 2700k, and 6500k in shop fittings, and covered with panda plastic?
 
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