It actually comes down to the numbers. Phals are commonly believed to need between 1000 and 1500 footcandles on average for an average day. For any number of reasons a day might be less than 12 hours but it can never be longer than that in ANY part of the world where phals grow naturally. So lets use 10 hours and 1000 foot candles to make the math easier. 10(h) X 1000(FC) = 10,000FC/dy. A four tube fluorescent fixture can probably deliver 1000FC so, if phals are all you grow then a 10 hour run time of four tubes year round will be all you need. Thing is, it would be the rare four tube fixture that could deliver 1000fc to all parts of the coverage area. The light out towards the end of the tubes might be only half as much, also, depending on their genetics many phals actually need a skoosh more footcandles than 1000 so if you added a couple of hours and made a 12 hour run time, again year round, you would be in good stead. Now lets take an Oncid as an example. Oncids are commonly described as needing 2500 - 3000 footcandles, again for around 10 hours. 2500 x 10 = 25,000FC/dy. Right away you can see that a four tube fixture will have to run all day and all night to put 24,000 into the plant. Unfortunately plants need a lights out period to process the energy that they collect during the day. If you get from this that you cannot grow Oncids under tubes alone you would be correct. This is the point where the naysayers say: "well, I have only a twin tube fixture and I bloom Oncids all the time". Do you really? Did you actually have the oncid in nothing else other than artificial light from one bloom to the next? Very likely not. Either the plant was purchased NBS with a lot of the footcandles already in the bank or there was additional window light boosting the amount of delivered footcandles or for some part of the year, usually summer, the oncid grew outdoors. But wait, all is not lost. If you can get the output of the four tube rig boosted another 500FC over the spot where an oncid is growing 1500(FC) X 16(H) = 24,000FC/dy. Close enough for government work as they say. You can see that these run times are completely independent of seasonal adjustment. Seasons as they exist in tropical and sub-tropical areas do not involve large changes in daylength the way they do in North America and Europe. They mostly involve changes in the relative amounts of rainfall. I would be remiss, since I've gone this far into it, to not discuss that minority of plants that require changing daylength in order to bloom. Some Cattleya are about all that come readily to mind but there are others. Thing is, they are very, very much a minority of the orchids that we usually grow and just as if you had a Poinsettia or Christmas Cactus you wanted to re-bloom you would probably deal with it as an individual, rather than adjust the light cycle of your entire collection to suit the needs of just one or two plants. So, in summary, if you want to know how long to run your lights you have to know how much on average the same plants usually receive per day, then you have to know how much light in footcandles you lights produce and whatever number of hours it takes to get your lights to produce that number of footcandles is the proper runtime. Of course there is considerable variation, both in the plants and in light equipment. This means you don't actually have to know everything to the last decimal place but it does mean that if you have an Oncid under four tubes in a basement and it isn't blooming after three years it wouldn't be reasonable to blame anything else other than light for the lack of success. I haven't even touched Cattleya's and Cycnodes and other species that are highly variable. Some need tremendous amounts of light and will mandate some kind of CFL or HID or natural light combination to do well. H

You want FOUR foot lamps, NOT 8 feet!!! find out if you can purchase lithonia F40T12 four foot strip light fixture for 2 x F40T12 lamps per fixture online. You can get free shipping if you have a DoItBest store in your area. Now get yourself a Sasi ballast for an 8 foot T8 from ebay, $12 plus shipping, throw out the T12 ballast, and replace with the Sasi: it will overdrive your T8 lamp to make it give out the light of a T5, but at less than half price - and buy either an 850 or 865 series triphosphour T8 lamp - it will fit in the same fixture as for the T12, where the T5 will not. This has lots of blue, and all the spectrum you need for growing, plus they are CHEAP! Your full spectrum lamps are more expensive, but there is no added benefit for the cost. You will be getting 5000 lumens per T8 lamp, driven that way, with NO DANGERS - this method has been used for years with no problem. Make sure you are getting an EIGHT foot ballast to drive these four foot tubes - this technique is called overdriving. you can look it up on wikipedia, but in a nutshell, that is all there is to it. You must get the T12 fixture, because the 8 foot ballast is BIG, and needs the big case of the old F40T12 fixture! T8 fixtures are too tiny, and they have a tiny ballast, so that is the reason. That's what I do, any questions, email ptmozarowski@hotmail.com - I don't make any money in this deal, just giving out the best advice for the money - Paul Moz.

I used to do 18 hours, but I'm in Ontario too and have moved over to TOU. I am currently running 13 hours per day with no ill effects. Still getting vigorous growth. I am using T5H0's though which are more powerful then T12's. I would think 12 hours would probably be ok given sufficient brightness. You won't hurt the plants by testing it out. For peppers, the only side effect if it's not enough would be slower growth. You can rectify it easily if it doesn't work out. Since they aren't photoperiodic, you can split the photoperiods to avoid peak times. I am doing that now with no ill effect.

Hi Nancy!! i don't see why you couldn't keep your trees growing during the winter just as I keep my seedlings and young rooted cuttings active during the winter. Having a few trees will make it easier to keep them growing during the cold season. Rotating them would seem to work.. A gentleman down in Alabama keeps his growing all winter in his greenhouse with lights and fans. He doesn't give them a rest at all as Mother Nature would with the decrease in light. Is it the best for your trees? I don't know.. can it be done? Yes, I believe you could have active trees all year or keeping some active and some semi dormant. My biggest problem that I have experienced is spider mite issues, but that can be controlled. I did adjust my lights to stay on longer when I saw that inflo push on a very special tree. Trying to control Mother Nature can be a challenge, but I think you could if you decided too. I personally love the break, but that's a choice we all make. You start to ponder why the trees in Hawaii take a break as well??? I do think it's good for them to rest.. Hopefully others will chime in to help you.. lots of discussions before on dormancy, sunlight, water all come into play as to why our trees have a rest period Can it be done as you so wish?? I would say it could with your set up that you have posted before!! Laura