# Plants and lighting for my first build!!



## swbernstel (Jul 10, 2012)

So, I'm doing my first real build and want to include plants. I'm having trouble finding out what lighting I need for my tank and plants that I want, as it seems to be different for every/plant/fixture combination. 

I have a 75g - 48"x18"x21". I currently have 2 18" 15W hood lights from Petsmart, which will probably be getting returned today. I'd like to just be able to use a shop light fixture with the T12 plant/aquarium bulbs. The current substrate is about 1.5" of sand and an inch of pea gravel.

I'm gonna start off light to light/med planting. The plants I have found to my liking and supposedly need low to medium lighting are:
java moss
java fern
Anubias
Crypts
Aponogeton
Vals
Wisteria
Hornwort (my fav so far, followed by the vals)

I'm not saying I want to have all of these plants in there, but would like some of them in there. I would rather not mess with a CO2 system. As far as fertilizing, I'd like to keep it simple. From the bit I've read, none of these plants demand a whole lot of attention or high lighting, nor are they very delicate. This is my source. 

Common Aquarium Plants | 74395

I would most definitely want the hornwort, as I want a school of guppies, tetras, and platys, and would like them to have lots of babies. I love the look of the vals and would like a wall of them somewhere in the tank. From what I can tell, my tank is tall enough for some of the larger breeds.

Thanks for any and all help,

~Sam


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## jrman83 (Jul 9, 2010)

I would definitely return the two lights if you can. They won't do much for you in the way of plants anyhow. You can find numerous shop lights out there for a 48" tank. I got this one for a my kid a while back 4 Light Heavy Duty Shoplight-1284GRD RE at The Home Depot It has done a pretty good job for him and has 4-32W T-8 bulbs. He doesn't use CO2.


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## swbernstel (Jul 10, 2012)

Yeah. I saw that one and almost grabbed it, but I only have 9" of flat unobstructed space to work with (current filter and canopy lids). I don't want to suspend the lights above the tank unless I have a full canopy because it'll bleed too much light into the rest of the room (it currently all goes into the tank). I got the 2-bulb equivalent w/ daylight deluxe bulbs. 6500K, 82 CRI, 2750 lumens per bulb. I was hoping this would be enough for javas and vals (those are all I'm really interested at the moment. I'm still contemplating crypts for color pop.)

So, the ultimate question, is what I've got adequate for my current gameplan?


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