Concerning lighting, stay away from anything bought at pet stores!



On most of my tanks, I use 2 48 inch shop lights ($7 a piece at Walmart). With these, I use a combination of 2 GE Plants and Aquarium bulbs ($6 each at WM) and 2 GE Sunshine bulbs, rated at 6500K for the same price. This combination produced wonderful plant growth and is very pleasing to the eye; not too red and not too blue. The 48 inch fixtures fit my 50 gallon perfectly, but with the smaller tanks, I have arranged them on my rack so that two tanks are illuminated by the fixtures. Originally, I was using a repti-glo 2.0 and 5.0, and it is my opinion that they are a COMPLETE waste of money...my plants grow better with the combination I use. I now use the repti-glo bulbs for my carnivorous plant terrarium, which isn't a show piece like my frog vivariums.



On my 30 gallon imitator tank, I use two Lights of America security lights that put out 6500k and the fluorescent hood fixture that came with the tank with a red Fritz marine bulb to offset the blues. The Lights of America fixtures were an experiment, and $25 each from Home Depot...the quality is similar to that of power compacts, and growth is superb; I've had to elevate them from the tank with egg crate as they do run a little warm.



My suggestion is to set up your tanks to utilize the 48 inch shop light, the most popular fluorescent light fixture available (check the price of a 2 bulb 48 inch fixture at the aquarium store, about 80 bucks), and therefore the cheapest. You can easily hide the white of the fixture with spray paint or get a little creative with wood paneling. The 48 inch bulbs are also the cheapest. The Plants and Aquariums bulbs are in a blue and white package and the Sunshine bulbs are in an orange package.



Ahh, something else I just remembered, Home Depot sells screw in daylight (6500K) fluorescent bulbs to be used in incandescent fixutres for about $9.



Sorry about the long rambling post!



David

Tempe, AZ

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