FlytrapCare Carnivorous Plant Forums

Hello all,
I'm very, very new to this hobby. I'm so new, in fact, that I haven't purchased any venus flytraps yet, as I really want a solid knowledge base before bringing any plants home.
I've come to learn that VFTs prefer being housed outside. However, this really isn't possible in my situation, so I'm looking into the logical alternative: housing them inside. I have a series of very simple (probably very dumb to most of you) questions, which I'd very much like to ask here.
So, first question set first:
From my understanding, the "k" (kelvin) number given to a light refers to its wavelength (eg: red light, yellow light, blue light, etc), and 6500k (the ideal, so I've learned, for VFTs) is blue light.
If this is so, I assume that one can't place a 4000k light next to a 2500k light and get a 6500k output as a result. As the k value refers to wavelength, you can't add two together and get a third. Am I correct in this assumption?
Lumens, on the other hand, refer to light intensity, so you CAN add the numbers of multiple lights together. In other words, the more lights, the more intensity produced. Am I correct in this assumption?
My third question is pretty simple: what is the mimimum amount of lumens required to successfully raise VFTs indoors? And for that matter, what is the optinum number?
My fourth and last question is, are there any other "features" of light - aside from wavelength and lumens - that I should be concerned about?

There, all done with my questions about light. Hopefully these questions didn't sound TOO stupid, but it's actually pretty tough to find answers to these questions - believe it or not!

You could get away with the 2500k but they'd need to be super close. 6500k is optimum. No other features except footpint which is how much area the light covers. There is really no bad fluorescent light. You should get a T5 HO fixture and a rack and put your lights just over a foot away(aprox. 14") from your plants. Wherever you order your plants, stray away from Bug biting Plants and Cooks Carnivores for flytraps. Everywhere else is fine(that I can think of) Try some other Cp's too. Like Drosera (mostly super easy and hardy) and Sarracenia. For indoors try Sarracenia Purpurea and Psittacina.

Good Growing!

Thanks alot for the advice. How many lights would you recommend?

You can't stack lights because one will block the other. One T5 4" fixture with 4 bulbs or 2 fixtures will make enough room for a few plants. I'd say start with 1 T5 with 4 bulbs or 2 T5's with 2 bulbs. T fixtures are the simplest. You can also use LED's and HPS but you should probably get the hang of the plants before then.

Ok, I think I've got just about every question about lights answered. I want a high output (HO) T5 lamp, 4", with 4 6500k bulbs.
My only other question is this: I've read that such lamps have different wattages. Which is the best - or failing that, minimum/maximum - combined (i.e.: adding the values of each bulb together) wattage I should be looking for?

I'm not sure, but the T5's HO only come with one wattage as far as I know, get the T5 HO and you'll be fine.

What about lumens? I don't think jamez touched base on Kalos' question about lumens (or maybe I just missed it ). I am interested in knowing what part they play in artificial lighting for VFTs.

Kalos wrote:So, first question set first:
From my understanding, the "k" (kelvin) number given to a light refers to its wavelength (eg: red light, yellow light, blue light, etc), and 6500k (the ideal, so I've learned, for VFTs) is blue light.
If this is so, I assume that one can't place a 4000k light next to a 2500k light and get a 6500k output as a result. As the k value refers to wavelength, you can't add two together and get a third. Am I correct in this assumption?

Correct. A 2500K and a 4000K do not make a 6500K. A 6500K's blue spectrum is stronger than a 4000K and 2500K combined.

When it comes to color temp, you have to get the color temp you need; there's no "math" that can be done with those Kelvin numbers to attain a different desired spectrum output.

In other words, two reds don't make a blue. Although I know you only meant 4000K as an example, 4000K is not a recommended plant light. It has a poor chlorophyll-reactive spectrum.

Commonly used ranges for CP's:
2500K-3100K - red spectrum for flowering and redder coloration
6400K-6700K - blue spectrum for foliage/traps/pitchers
5000K - red/blue mix - not as effective as a 3000K/6500K mix, but some people still use it; you won't find this color temp in any high end bulbs as far as I know.

An ideal setup for CP's will be 50% 3000K and 50% 6500K lights. The red isn't just there to help with flowering; it also makes a huge difference in plant coloration. Red light = more colorful plants; redder traps, more pronounced veining on veined plants, etc.

Kalos wrote:Lumens, on the other hand, refer to light intensity, so you CAN add the numbers of multiple lights together. In other words, the more lights, the more intensity produced. Am I correct in this assumption?

Yes, lumens are basically light intensity - how bright it is. Some bulbs have more lumens than others; T5 bulbs produce more lumens than T8's and T12's.

The "T" in these fluorescent tubes' designations represent a diameter measurement of 1/8 inch, followed by the number of T's. So a T12 is 12/8 of an inch or 1.5 inches in diameter, a T8 is 8/8 of an inch or 1 inch in diameter, and T5's are 5/8 of an inch in diameter.

For plants, T5's are best, followed by T8's, and the low-efficiency T12 is last. T12's can still grow CP's, they just won't do it nearly as well as T5's, especially if you compare distance from plants (CP's that are 12" below T12's will grow poorly, while plants 12" under high-output T5's will do fine).

Kalos wrote:My third question is pretty simple: what is the mimimum amount of lumens required to successfully raise VFTs indoors? And for that matter, what is the optinum number?

This is not a simple question.

It depends partially on color temperature (an all-red setup will produce different results than a red/blue mix, or an all-blue setup), distance between light sources and plants (an inch makes a difference when it comes to fluorescent lights, LED lights, plasma bulbs, etc.), and type of light.

For a single plant:
The recommended is a single 42W compact fluorescent light (CFL), with a color temp of 6500K. People have grown a single plant/pot with as low as a 13W 6500K CFL, but they had it about two inches from a pot with only very small plants in it, and wrapped the area between the pot and the lamp with reflective white paper. This isn't an ideal setup as the plants won't grow as well and you can't enjoy them without removing the reflective paper. As for a realistic minimum, I'd say somewhere in the vicinity of 20 watt CFL at no more than 4-5 inches from the plant's canopy is a proper minimum where the plant(s) will grow but will probably not thrive. They may even be a bit spindly and weak, with thin leaves and trap walls, but they wouldn't die.

For a small area such as a 24" by 12" grow area, the wattage depends partly on whether you're going with CFL's or fluorescent tubes (like T5's). For a grow area this size you'd want something closer to a 100W to 200W CFL (min to max) as a CFL is smaller and more wattage/lumens are needed to push the light to the "outskirts" of the grow area, or 2 to 4 (min to max) 24" T5 standard bulbs, but T5 HO will produce even more light.

You said you were thinking about 4-foot/4-bulb T5 HO. I heartily agree with this decision. At 10-12 inches from the plants, this will be an excellent setup.

I highly recommend THIS fixture from THIS store: http://www.plantlightinghydroponics.com ... -3351.html. They have a deal with Quantum and can sell Quantum equipment at very low cost (the next lowest price you will find is about $150 or $175). I'm not affiliated with that store or anything, I just shopped around a lot to find the best price and found this jewel of a deal. Best bang for your buck, and man, these things really pound the light down on the plants. T5's aren't generally recommended for "fruiting" (making fruit/veggie plants produce well-formed edibles). The Quantum Badboy is the first and only T5 HO setup that can fruit fruiting plants (other T5 setups of similar output like HydroFarm run too hot - in comparison Quantum Badboys/bulbs run pretty cool). Proof: http://thehotpepper.com/topic/28857-qua ... dboy-t5ho/

Ideally, don't get the bulbs from the above page's drop-down list of bulb options unless you're on a budget. Order the fixture with NO bulbs, and get the Quantum bulbs that were built for this fixture directly from this link instead: http://www.plantlightinghydroponics.com ... 3_995.html - they are slightly higher output than the default Topstar bulbs.

Change any bulbs you get after 12 months to 24 months. T5's don't drop lumens as quickly as T12's, but they still drop lumens. This means as the light gets used, it "ages". If a light was 1000 lumens when you bought it, it's not 1000 lumens anymore after a year. T12's should be replaced annually, and T8's/T5's should be replaced every other year at the longest; every year is still generally recommended. CFL's vary quite a bit, so I err on the side of caution and change CFL's annually as well. There's no way to tell exactly what the status of the lights are unless you are using an accurate light meter.

Kalos wrote:My fourth and last question is, are there any other "features" of light - aside from wavelength and lumens - that I should be concerned about?

CRI: Color Rendering Index. Means nothing to plants, but the closer to 100 this number is, the better the plants will look to human eyes. A CRI rating of 75+ is good, 85ish+ is best and will reflect the truest colors of the plants (especially helpful for picture-taking). However, a CRI of 75 does not mean your plants will grow poorly.

Wattage (W), and lumens per watt (L/W, or LPW): Wattage and lumens go hand-in-hand when it comes to measuring a bulb against another same-type of bulb. In general, more wattage means more lumens. Keep in mind what the wattage of the light you want *should* be (E.g. while CFL wattage varies, a T5 HO should be 55W, although there are higher wattages, e.g. T5 VHO), and it will help you ensure that you don't get a pitifully under-wattage bulb for your fixture.

Second, do the wattage/lumen math. People often use a "lumens per watt" to determine the general light efficiency of a bulb. Quantum T5's (and most HO T5's) are around 90 lumens/watt, which is good. Most CFL's are bettwen 60-80 L/W. As a comparison to the "standards" for indoor large-area lighting, those super-hot lights like HPS (high pressure sodium) will do 150-200 L/W, and MH (metal halide) will do 120-150 L/W. Standard fluorescent lights are ~40 L/W while standard incandescent bulbs are around 18 L/W.

The higher the L/W, the higher the efficiency of the bulb, especially when it comes to plant growth. The best fluorescent bulbs are 90-100 or so lumens per watt, a few are as high as 120.

Brand: This is one area I generally stress. Brand does mean something. Off-brands are usually a weaker bulb that lose lumens faster than the bulbs from brands that have been doing lights for years. I have bought two off-brand bulbs in my life and have returned them both after seeing that the light intensity was nowhere near what was advertised on the package.
A few of the more popular brands I trust for plant lighting, in no particular order: Phillips, GE, Quantum, TCP, Ushio, Topstar, Sylvania, Feliz, AgroBrite, Agrosun. There are other brands that are trustworthy, but I wouldn't even try to list all of them. Be sure to do research prior to buying.

Wow, there is so much information to take in.

I recently purchased a cheap Hydrofarm 4ft Jump Start Grow Light (http://www.lnt.com/show_product/73871-132). Do you think the stand will be able to support a more advanced light, like the Quantum Badboy you posted above?

I never considered using different bulbs from different light spectrums at the same time. Is this a good practice, or more of something to experiment with? I only have 1 plant as of now, so I don't want to try anything risky.

Thanks so much for all the advice Veronis!

The badboy fixture I linked (4-bulb) is advertised as being 46.25 inches long, end-to-end; when I measured my 4-bulb setup, it measured exactly 46 and 3/16 inches. So if your inside space is greater than than, it will fit.

It's not a heavy fixture; it's surprisingly light for its output power.

It comes with dual-mount brackets (see picture below), so if your "chain" has two rings at the end for mounting like it looks like it does, you just slide the mounting bracket through the hole on each side, and attach to the Quantum Badboy.

The mounting holes (2 holes on each side of the Badboy) are exactly 42" apart.

If it won't fit in that thing, this is the shelf I have mine mounted in:
http://www.lowes.com/ProductDisplay?par ... 184874C-DS


Dual mounting brackets come with the fixture (the upside-down "V" part), but chains/loops/hooks do not:

I get my best growth from a 70W and 100W HPS(high pressure sodium). If you know a lil about wiring imo HID is the best route to go. You can buy 70W and 100W security lights at Lowes for under $30. The smaller wattage HPS lamps dont get too hot either(comparable to an incandescent of the same wattage). I grow some of my nepenthes, nepenthes seedlings, plants out of vitro and sarracenia seedlings under HPS and I can definitely see a difference in them and the plants grown under fluorescents. I want to eventually switch completely over to HPS or MH(metal halide).

Btw, this isnt saying the advice above mine isnt good advice just thought i'd share my experience.

Veronis:

Your post answered every one of my questions in one fell swoop. Unfortunately, I purchased a light fixture before I read it! It holds four bulbs, but it's only two feet long and each bulb held is only 24w.
I'd went with a smaller fixture mainly because I don't plan on buying a ton of plants at first. I'd rather get the hang of this hobby first. I know from past experiences raising terrestrial 'exotic' invertebrates, that many of the 'tricks' to successful propagation aren't things that can be communicated, but must rather be learnt through trial and error.
My only concern now is whether or not four 24w bulbs - assuming each is 6500k, will be adequate?

Dionae:

Are you talking about a single 70w and 100w?

Kalos your fixture should work fine for just a few plants. Yes, I was talking about a single. I have a 100W in my indoor GH and 70W in my seedling room.

Ok guys, so I've got my basic setup. What do you think?
* Steel shelving unit, 36"H x 24"W x 18"D
* Four-bulb T5 high output fluorescent grow light fixture (plus 6500k bulbs/24w each), 3"H x 23.5"W x 13.5"D
* Four large S-hooks, to attach lighting fixture to shelving unit

The only other things I'm thinking of adding to this are three pieces of white cardboard for the back and two sides of the shelf.

Looks good!