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Florida Gardening

My new light set up thingie

13 years ago

Well you experts talked me into it. I bought a small shelving unit at Target, bought 2 lights at Home Depot, then put it all together over the weekend. Right now I've just got the lights sitting on the top shelf, and the plants brought up close to the light. I repotted all of those poor tomato plants and used BR's wicking system. Keeping my fingers crossed

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Comments (5)

loufloralcityz9
13 years ago
Very good! That is going to work, just try to keep the light bulbs 1 inch above the top of the plant leaves.
The plants then won't be trying to reach up for the light.
My plants even try to help hold the light bulbs up. LOL
You did a super job of following everybody's input suggestions, yet making it your very own potting station.

Lou
tomncath
13 years ago
Very nice J, you're on your way! Lou's right though, the plants have to be right up on the light or they'll get leggy.

Tom
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Don't use those unless you plan on growing one plant per bulb. They might be cheaper, but definitely not more efficient. The reason is fluorescent light has little effect on plant growth past 6-8". You cover more surface area with strip lights. Especially when starting seedlings in a 10x20" tray. I would buy 2 sets of 2'- 2 strip T-5 fluorescents for each seed tray. That's a total of 4 tubes. You could get away with one set(2 tubes), it depends how healthy you want your plants to be. The T-5's put off more lumens per watt. They cost $25 for a 2 strip light or $17 for a single strip light and sell at Home Depot. When you compare it to the cheapest 2' 4-light system at $120, this seems pretty reasonable. If you want to get fancy, buy a 2' piece of shiny metal ducting, for a reflector. It also sells at Home Depot for around $3. Hope this helps.
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jwahlton
Original Author
13 years ago
OK. I'll put some books or something under the water tray.
jwahlton
Original Author
13 years ago
OK. Last night I put 3 bookes under the water pan and they are almost "touching" the light now. So I guess that will work! WHOO HOO. I'm excited. I hope I get some 'maters now
tomncath
13 years ago
J, Your light setup came with some chains for adjusting the height of the lights, right? If so go to Lowes or HD and get two 1/4" snap hooks, they look like this and are about $2 each. Put the snap hooks in the chrome rack directly above your plants where the chains hook into the light fixture, then hook the chains to the snap hooks and adjust the chains to the light fixture until the lights are just above the plants on the next rack below...no books necessary ;-)

Tom

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