New Tank

I want to start a new tank (planted) so now I have seen many people say that you need to have lights in but not a blue light because it spurs the growth of algae on but the blue light helps with water clarity.

So I am going to put a blue light in and want to know is how long should I leave it on for and if I do get a algae problem what way would it be best to get rid of it either by having snails ???(ex apple snails) or is their a fish that could help like a plec or something

 

As far as I have heard you must just buy a Blue light that is under 10000kthen you should be ok.
but I might be wrong some one here will correct me.

 

Well what type of fish do you want to have the tank?
Pleco's grow huge and the make more of a mess than they clean. I know i have 2. Lazzy things.
Try dwarf algea eaters or synodontis type catfish.

I dont know about the light.:bigsmile:

 

Ancistrus make goot algae eaters too.

 

Hi Johan
The light temp is only secondry responsible 4 algae growth. I have two cold white 4700k in my tank and no algae. If there is food for algae you will get them. The best way to avoid algae is to plant higher plants in such quantities that there are no or not enough nutrition, Nitrat, Amonium, Minerals ion and phosphorus in the water. Specially plants like Echinodorus, Rotalia, Hygrophyla, and Myriophylum are excelent as starter plants.
A well planted tank seldom has problems with algae.
Don't believe everything the light manufacturer is telling you:bigsmile:

 

Hi
Synodontis don't eat algae, Otocinclus Otto catfish and Crossochellus Asian Algae eater do.

 

Like has been said before, Otocinclus and Siamese Algae Eaters will sort out any algae in the tank.
The Otos should be kept in groups though, with one able to eat up about a cubic foot's worth of algae. The SAE on the other hand gets bigger and will eat ANY type of algae, but you'll have to do your research to tell the difference between it and a few other similar fish.

Otherwise good luck with the tank!

 

just a correction here the lower the light spec the yellower it gets, i.e 10,000k is white with a bit of yellow, 14,000K is white with a bit of blue.
20,000k is very blue and is just for asthetics will not really get much growth out of it.

you should go for a 3-1 or 2-1 mix. maybe 2x6500K lamps and one 20,000K lamp. then the size of your tank would determine how many lamps you need. hope this helps a bit

 

These days I am of the opinion that you should just add lights that make the tank look good. Forget about plant growth and kelvin ratings. There is no evidence to suggest it has any impact on aquatic plants. Of course, you can't just go and add 3 actinic tubes, because that clearly won't work. 4000K, 6500K, 8000K - show me the evidence where one is better than the other for AQUATIC plants. I don't want to see references to articles where the light was tested on tomatoes. So get what you can afford, as much as you can squeeze in and grow those plants!

Oh yeah, otos only eat diatoms and you need a massive school of them to be effective. Snails are pretty good, but get some loaches to keep the population in check. Or assassin snails! Sorry for the thread hijack - who here has Assassin Snails?

I love SAEs - they do their work and they are cool to watch in the tank. Make sure you get the true SAE. Out of all those that look similar it is the only one with a single pair of barbels. The others have 2 pairs.

 

i use osram cool whites and my tank is growing, just add some other colour aswell, possibly something a bit blueish, as my tank currently has a yellow hue to it that i don't like, i heard the blue makes it alll seem more crisp and white... (adding grolux pink/red in will give the tank a more white appearance as well, but then it has red overtones...

 

I have to agree......:top:

 

so i can just use normal osram coolwhites if i want to and it will help plant growth? because all these k ratings are very confusing etc[/quote]


The osram cool whites are great, if you can get the osram skywhite they are awesome lights and compare to the specalist aquarium lighting.

 

Just for info here, I use a combination of 4000K and 6500K T5HO FL tubes. To the naked eye the colour looks pretty good and my plants are growing just fine.