Yes, unfortunately for the budget, the more light you can provide, the better. If you can't locate any inexpensive shop light fixtures locally (Walmart has them for about $9 here) then check out some of the other inexpensive fluorescent fixtures available. Another poster last week had pics of some round ones they found at one of the home centers for about the same price but with more lumen output. Good luck. Dave

Jerry sorry about the delayed response hee hee been way to busy to remember where I post, lol. Some things that need a warm cool warm season like helebores I started those in september but I wonder if I was to late for those. Most of my containers I have started on december 21st to february. I have several things I need to get going but sometimes life just gets in the way, hopefully I will have time this weekend to get in the dirt. As for information the winter sowing forum has a ton of info under the faq's and then Trudi has a website also it is called wintersown.org. There are a ton of people willing to help with any question you may have in regards to winter sowing for the first time, though pretty much you have the concept down. I use water bottles but most use milk jugs. I use whatever I have, whether it be cottage cheese containers or grated cheese containers to water bottles or juice bottles. I think I have in the picture one of those rotisserie chicken containers that is in use also even an ice cream bucket. I use my containers as I would a starting seed tray, just make sure there is plenty of drainage and of course ventilation. For the water bottles we just toss the lid for the cottage cheese or rotisserie chicken containers we just cut some holes in the top. I have even used a lasagna pan inside a comforter bag. I have drainage holes in the bottom and I cut ventilation holes in the top. This is the most recent picture I have of the lasagna pan, I think it was taken a few weeks back. As for the pictures I know there is a link somewhere how to add pictures. Though a simple way to tell you is upload your pictures to a third party photo client. I have been using photobucket some use flikr. They will provide you with an html code and just simply copy and paste the code into the message box. inside the brackets > insert height="500" width="600" for the size of pictures here in this message. I sure hope that helps. People on the wintersowing forum are extremely eager to help and extremely friendly, they love questions don't be afraid of them. They will welcome you with open arms!! Oh and there are several from canada that winter sow!!

I'll take a guess that your ballasts won't work as expected on a shorter tube. Zink will know for sure. My advice, as it usually is, is to discard crappy old fixtures and get something designed within the last five years. You'll get more light, save a bundle on your utility bill, and your plants will thank you. When you start looking for something shorter than 48", look at compact fluorescents. You can mount your components on anything you want, the temperature of any individual piece shouldn't be hot enough to harm wood unless you start overdriving. As an extra safety step, prevent any components from actually touching the wood with suitable spacers or mounting blocks.

"Warm" lighting would be 2700K if you can find that in lamp that will go in a U/C fixture. 3000K is widely available, but somewhat "cooler" than most incandescent lighting. Most U/C fixtures take either T5 or T4 lamps; there are a few around that take T8 or T2 lamps. I haven't actually seen any 2700K lamps in the T5 or T4 size. I think they are available in T8, but fixtures that take T8 lamps are thicker than what most people want for a U/C fixture. (T2s are oddballs--you probably don't want something that may not even have replacement lamps available down the line.)