Brenda, If you can fill the aquarium with water from the barrel, the more the better. If you were to totally fill the aquarium with pond water, in theory you could just net the fish right away and drop them in the aquarium because the temperature and chemistry of the aquarium water would be the same as the barrel pond. Less stress on the fish. If you half-fill the aquarium with pond water, when you transfer the fish you may have to put the fish in zip loc bags and float them in the aquarium for a bit, to equalize the temperature (like you do for store bought fish). I assume you dont have a fish filter in your barrel but if you do, the suggestion to run this in the new aquarium for a few weeks is a good one (at the same time you are running the new aquarium filter). The pond filter and pond water have beneficial bacteria in it. In a nutshell, fish produce ammonia as waste. This bacteria helps break down the ammonia into less harmful substances. You can search on the net for Ânitrogen cycle or Âaquarium nitrogen cycle or Âaquarium cycling for more detail. The gist is, in a newly set up pond or aquarium this beneficial bacteria doesnÂt exist yet in sufficient amounts to handle the fish waste, so if you add 3 fish the ammonia levels might rise to an unsafe level and do harm to the fish. Transferring the pond water to the aquarium as well as transferring the pond filter to the aquarium temporarily may help transfer this good bacteria to the aquarium. You should probably buy a water test kit (from a pet store) to test for ammonia and nitrate especially. For the first 4  6 weeks the fish are in the aquarium, check for ammonia and nitrite every two days. If the level is extremely high, do water changes. ItÂs as simple as removing some of the old water (25 to 50%) and refilling with new tap water, at the same temperature and dechlorinated of course. I read that better to be safe than sorry, so I suggest you buy some dechlorinator. Other than that, however, you really donÂt need anything fancy in the world of fish supplies. I guess part of how much light to give the water lettuce will depend on the maximum wattage bulb your light fixture can handle. DonÂt exceed this. If you find that the water lettuce still yellows and dies donÂt be disappointed. ItÂs very hard to overwinter indoors unless you have a very bright, warm greenhouse. The only hope is that it floats on the water surface, so right under the bulb it might be better light. I was able to overwinter hornwort this way, though it did look scraggly and not great. Oh, for the first bit donÂt overfeed the fish. You donÂt need them producing excess amounts of waste (ammonia) until the aquarium filter is cycled and can handle the ammonia they produce. Good luck. My goldfish and koi will be coming inside shortly as well. I have a small inground pond. They can take cold water, even ice on top, just not a pond that freezes solid as mine would eventually do over winter (18" deep ponds freeze solid in our winters.) Glen

Yes it can be used, however keep in mind that feeding 400 watts into a 150 watt bulb will shorten its life. You will also need a mogul to medium reducer socket as the lamp you linked uses a E26 socket which is smaller then the standard E39 used in higher wattage high intensity discharge lamps. https://www.1000bulbs.com/product/5840/ELEC-242515.html Piece of advice from a very experienced indoor grower, get the 400 watt version at minimum. Youll be disappointed with the 150 watt, slow growth and no canopy penetration, small footprint, etc The most efficient HID in terms of lumens per watt is the 600 watt high pressure sodium. I stricly use 600w hps, 1000w hps and 1000w metal halide lights, anything smaller doesnt grow much...

Thanks to all of you for the additional thought. We bought this house at the "dried in" stage, so we're sortof stuck with the way they designed the rooms. There is a huge "playspace" above the 3 car garage, but it has no windows and is in an "out of the way" space. It has sloped ceilings and a dropped floor...... you can tell it's not my favorite room. LOL. Anyhoo, I'd have loved a laundry room on the 2nd floor. But since there isn't a good spot to have it there, I'll have to just do the 2 sets on the main floor and make the kids tote their things around. Same goes for having a laundry room by our master. OUr closet isn't large enough for me to want to put it in our closet. And the only other nearby room is dh's study (which I already tried to steal for an even larger closet.... he said "NO". he, he. :o) gs~ I don't know of any downsides to having a stackable near your bedroom. You can just do the laundry when you aren't trying to sleep. :o) I'd put one in my master closet if I had the space. Wouldn't that be awesome?! Solie~ Yep, we're having 2 dishwashers in the main kitchen. There's a kitchenette on the 3rd floor for the bonus room and guest suite up there. We'll have dishwasher drawers for that one. Thanks for the thought.... we definitely have backup problems with our current house and only 1 dishwasher! rhome~ You are so funny.... needing room for beds. LOL! You know, I'm with you. I've always wanted a huge laundry room. Call me strange.... I love laundrymats (maybe because I don't have to use them anymore?.... ha, ha). I love to be in the laundryroom and hear the hum of the machines. I always have to be working or doing something with my hands it seems, so even watching a movie I have to iron or something. Thus the tv in the laundry room. I KNOW I won't be watching the ones in the other parts of the house. It's just not really my thing. Okay, I got way off topic...... Salena, I hadn't thought about w-d-d-w. Good idea. I think I'll do it that way! :o) Thanks. Allison~ Good reminder. Can you imagine me getting the room all set up and realizing the doors are all wonky and wrong, and I can't get the clothes into the next machine. Yikes. Thanks. ;o) Gardenspice~ I love machines under the counter. It would be awesome to have the extra counterspace, since it's too tight in the room for the island I hoped to have. I chose machines that are extra tall (dh and I are both fairly tall), so I know they won't fit under a counter. And my cabinetry budget is already thru the roof with 2 kitchens and umpteen baths. But I will think on that. It would give me the extra countertop that I'd love to have. Hmmmm...... Thanks everyone. I'm happy to finally get 2 sets of machines, however they are set up. Wish I could do the 2nd set by our master, and a 3rd set upstairs for the kids. But I'm not complaining about the 2 sets on main floor. It will still be a treat. :o) Just for fun..... here's the fabric for the roman blinds in that room. Cabinetry will be kindof a sage/olive with a dark glaze rubbed into the distressed wood. Machines will be red. HOpefully it won't look like Christmas in there. :o)

well, after a few wks of nothingness (other than runs to the vet and going broke!) the guys came out and filled in the trenches, took away a lot of the trash from it all and showed me which switches to turn on to put the juice to the lights and sockets. I need to buy a bunch of bulbs tomorrow - some are burned out and some are missing. And I can vacuum over there now and suck up a bunch of that dirt! I was tired yesterday but I did go to Lowe's and brought home a few sheet vinyl samples to try out (along with the one I had). and I bought 2 lever handles for the 2 rooms with deadbolts on them. I spent over an hour there looking at stuff - flooring, knobs, cab handles, doors, bathroom cabs and lighting. I think I'll have to get larger light fixtures for the outside doors. those small ones are just toooo small - unless someone knows a nifty way to change out the bulbs. I can't deal with the kind of globes you have to unscrew and rescrew back in. I also don't anticipate the thrill of squeezing my chubby fingers into the tiny opening they usually give to access the bulb on others. Didn't see any lights that I liked for the DR area or bathrooms. I might 'see' differently next time there when I'm not so tired. I should look at lights FIRST on the next trip there. certainly didn't see any cab handles I liked. they did have some unfinished bathroom cabs that were only 30" high (if my eye sight is correct). nothing special, just plain 'ol wood - oak. had some side sections with drawers - to purchase separately. just in case I don't find any at the restore or CL. I didn't like any of their indoor/outdoor carpet on the rolls in back. they did have a few precut rolls (most 5x7, a few were bigger) that looked good for about 26.00 - 45.00 $'s. that's an option in the coming weeks... I picked up 2 area rugs at the new 'used' store in our town last week. both 5 x 7. one solid color and one print with color of the solid color rug in it. might work in the back rooms or together in the DR/LR. Time will tell. I did see a sliding door I liked. It was 3,000.00. So much for what I like! ha! I'm sure dbf has a much cheaper 'model' around somewhere anyway. and free to me is the 'cheap' I like! Not much will get done monday or tuesday (doc appt for me and I have to do another glucose curve on boy Tuesday) but maybe on Wednesday I can make more progress over there. I tried to post this yesterday but every time I scrolled down to about the halfway mark the screen would disappear and it would say 'loading' again! I couldn't even scroll down more than that to read a post.