I'm wondering if I can use the aquarium light from my small fish tank as a temporary grow light for a single plant?
I've used my aquarium as a terrarium, with great success. I just used the aquarium light bulbs in it. Hope this helps!
When you use professional grow lights like High pressure sodium or Metal halide lamps make sure there is a good ventilation system because they produce some heat. If you plan on growing very sensitive plants the ventilation has to be set up like a closed system, with good filters in place. Most plant and garden centers have them, but you can also find them in most electrical/hardware stores. Do a search on those stores near to you. Good luck.
It depends largely on the plant, low light house plants will do fine, however, full sun plants will need something much more powerful. I'm assuming you're using just a single standard fluorescent bulb in your aquarium light? If you have stronger lights, such as to support a reef tank, pay close attention to the color spectrum. 10K bulbs result in bushy, compact growth. If you had metal halide system, then you may try a different specialized bulb, or see if you can find a compatible HPS bulb. (most are not). If you use t5 bulbs, you can try to find bulbs in a lower range, and swap half of them out for red spectrum (4-6K) bulbs). Also, keep in mind aquarium light systems were designed to penetrate water, so you may want to set the bulb a little higher above your plant.
1. Incredible Energy Cost Savings A 90W LED UFO Grow Light produces as much light as a standard 400W HPS (High Pressure Sodium) light. According to the US Dept. of Energy, the average price of power is 10.7 cents per kilowatt-hour. For one year of use (12 hours per day) a 400 W HID light adds $187.46 to your bill while a 90W LED Light adds ONLY $42.18!! That’s nearly 80% less!! 2. Little or NO Heat Produced Unlike traditional lights, LED Grow Lights produce virtually no additional heat. In a side-by-side study, a single-unit LED light had NO significant impact on room temperature after 2 months of continuous use! 3. Eco-Friendly Unlike HPS and MH (Metal Halide) lamps, LED lights do not contain filaments and other toxic metals which are difficult to recycle and harmful to the environment. 4. Last Longer than Standard Lamps An average HID light lasts an estimated 10,000 hours (2.3 years) compared to an LED Light’s extended life of 60,000 hours (11.4 years). 5. No Ballast Needed Unlike other lighting sources that require ballasts that have limited life spans of 3-4 years, LED Grow Lights are fully functioning units that require no additional ballast 6. No Need for Heavy Reflectors Built-in directional adjustments mean no need for costly, hard-to-install parabolic reflectors. The result is a lighter weight, convenient and versatile LED Grow Light. 7. LED Grow Light Outlet EXCLUSIVE While Tri-band spectrum lighting is superior to dual-spectrum, LED Grow Light Outlets offers an amazing 4-Band Spectrum: red-blue-orange-white… ALL IN ONE LIGHT!
