Planted Aquarium Lighting

mpertz

I have a 15 Gallon planted 24" X 12" aquarium. I purchased a 24" T5 Fixture that has 4 x 24W 6700K for a total of 96W. Do you think is too much light for a 15 Gallon Planted Aquarium? I have NutraFin CO2 Natural Plant System setup as well. I have low to medium light required plants

BarbH

Hello, yes I would say that this is more than enough light. With low to moderate light plants you can do a low tech set up. With the higher lights and CO2 that would be putting you into the hi tech set ups. Depending on the type of plants that you are wanting to grow will depend on the type of set up you will want to go with. Also if this is your first experience with doing a planted tank you may want to consider doing a low tech/ natural set up. In the plants section here on the forum there is a four part series on natural planted aquarium which can be found at the top of the section. This has good information in it and would be good to read through if you have not already.

Byron

Just to add to what Barb has mentioned, you will almost certainly have algae issues with that much light, even with CO2. Low and moderate light plants can only grow (photosynthesize) so fast, and algae is always waiting to take advantage of excess light. This is explaqined more in the series of articles Barb referred you to.

Byron.

JoeFish80

4 t5's is entirely too much light really specially if High output. You would have been fine with a T8 most likely or at the most a single T5 light. If you have your reciept and want to save yourself some bank, I'd look to trade it in for something a little smaller. I only run 2 T5 HO lights over top of my 55 and my old 20 gallon and only for 6 - 8 hours a day depending on if the plants are established or not. 4 is more than over kill.