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I was told by a technical advisor from www.bigalsonline.com that 50/50 lighting can be harmful to freshwater tanks? Is this true? I find it hard to believe...

For those who don't know, 50/50 lighting consists of 1/2 daylight (white) bulb and 1/2 actinic (blue/purplish) bulb.

I'm farily certian that actinic bulbs are in the spectrum that promots algae growth. Meaning you'll be giving the algae a free ride.

6700K daylight bulbs are best for a planted tank. If you don't have a planted tank, like the color and don't mind the added algae scrubbing you may need to do....

^_^



[hr width='40%']"I'm alright, I'm alright
It only hurts when I breathe"

50/50's are just fine for freshwater.

Just don't try to grow plants under them, because they aren't good for that.

I use a 50/50 setup in my Mbuna tank without any ill effects. I get a very normal amount of algae growth, and by most definitions my tank is overstocked (although overfiltered at the same time).

Just be sure to use an appropriate wattage for the tank, and you won't get any algae growth that isn't managed by a regular scrapin' of the glass with you favorite algae scrubber. Less than 1 watt per gallon should be sufficient for a non-planted tank... my 75G uses a 64watt fixture.

Well, here's the deal. I've decided I want to attach a few live plants to the driftwood, to add some greenery and a few more hiding places for the eels. So, this would mean I need straight white or daylight bulbs? Also, how does 50/50 harm the live plants?

The 50/50 lighting wont harm the plants its just that it is not the proper spectrum to promote plant growth(the plants that are kept in freshwater aquaria anyways). In other words they will either grow very slow and splindly or not at all.

For freshwater planted I'd suggest going with straight "daylight" with 5500-6700K bulbs. 6700K is said to be the best for plant growth.

However if you're going lightly planted and really perfer the color combo it may work out okay. You can always change the bulbs out later after all if you want to up the plants .

^_^

[hr width='40%']"I'm alright, I'm alright
It only hurts when I breathe"

hmm just wondering is there a specific reason why you want 50/50's?

i dont think there is any ill effects
atinic lighting is way up in the blue spectrum of the light it wont help plants grow much whereas salt water plants n corals they need intense blue lighting
for use in freshwater tanks all it does is enhance the colours of fish most noticebly in blue fish

I have 50/50 lighting in my 115g Afircan cichlid tank. And I don't have any algae problems.
I currently only have java fern in my 115g and it's seems to be doing alright.

I liek the 50/50 because against the white sand I use the colors are amazing. It just makes the tank look beautiful. And I've had compliments on it too. I'll probably just end up purchasing a set of 50/50's and a set of daylight's and see what happens between the two.

I've got the 50/50 lights with 10,000k bulbs for my freshwater tank. At about 1.2 watts/gal I get almost no algae growth.

I've got actinics and my plants are growing fine. I actually had to add algae for the otos untill my co2 system died. Right now the tank is a bit unbalanced from that but otherwise I had amazing growth on some plants and just a few dots of spot algae. I read blue light causes shorter thicker growth and red lights causes taller thinner growth. My amazon sword has taken over 1/4 the tank and my lotus has taken over about half. The anubias gains a new leaf nearly daily and the apongeton is making a forest around the lotus. The microswords have surrounded the driftwood and the onion plants established their roots in 2days so I didn't have to weigh them down anymore. There's also some monster wendtii crypt motherplants spreading around the caves. This is 4wpg 2 actinic, 2 10,000k bulbs. When my co2 is fixed I'm thinking of pulling out alot of the apono and adding vals as well as some water clover to help fill in the empty foreground spots. I use the actinics because it really brings out the colors in my congo tetras. They look like rainbow blue, red, yellow streaks when I take pictures. It does no harm to the fish and the plecos actually became lots more active when I increased the actinic.

Thanks ALOT everyone for sharing your experiences with 50/50 lighting! I'm going to give it a shot in the 55 gallon and stick with the 50/50 and see how my plants do. Also, what plants would you all recommend to attach to driftwood? And, I'm pretty much new to the method of growing plants from driftwood...any advice?

Anubias, java fern, java moss and several other mosses are all grown on driftwood. You can tie it down with thread which will rot away eventually or fishing line which either gets covered or has to be cut eventually.

Do the roots embed themselves into the wood or what?