Just as a heads up to everyone, so not OP obviously; Never buy lamps that are marketed as grow lights; that is just a scam to sell you way overpriced lighting. You also generally don't need to buy these purple lights, because white lamps include these colors already, so unless you go for very specific effects, just buy a full spectrum light. I usually just do a search for suitable light temperature etc for my plants, probably around 4000 K or so, and then buy a led light. Don't buy lamps that can become hot, so as not to burn the plants.
Houseplants
Welcome to /c/houseplants @ Mander.xyz!
In between life, we garden.
About
We're a warm and informative space for plant enthusiasts to connect, learn, and flourish together. Dive into discussions on care, propagation, and styling, while embracing eco-friendly practices. Join us in nurturing growth and finding serenity through the extraordinary world of houseplants.
Need an ID on your green friends? Check out: [email protected]
Get involved in Citizen Science: Add your photo here to help build a database of plants across the entire planet. This database is used by non-profits, academia, and the sciences to promote biodiversity, learning and rewilding.
Rules
- Don't throw mud. Be kind and remember the human.
- Keep it rooted (on topic).
- No spam.
Resources
Recommendations
Health
Identification
- PlantNet.org (see also: [email protected])
- Seek from iNaturalist
Light Information
- GrowLightMeter
- PlantLightDB
- HouseplantJournal (Scroll down.)
Databases
- Catalogue of Life
- Perenual.com
- The Garden.org Plants Database
- Useful Tropical Plants (Interactive Database Version)
- WorldFloraOnline
- USA-NPN
- Tom Clothier's Garden Walk and Talk
- Plants for a Future
- USDA Datasets
- Permapeople.org
- Temperature Climate Permaculture: Plant Index
- Natural Capital Plant Database
- Colorado Plant Database
- SEINet
- North American Ethnobotany Database
- BCSS Field No. Lookup (collection site IDs for cacti and succulents)
- U Michigan Native Plant Database for Michigan by Region
FOSS Tools
- Common House Plants API
- HappyPlants (Monitoring App)
- PlantGeek (Care Info App)
Similar Communities
DM us to add yours! :)
General
Gardening
- [email protected]
- [email protected]
- [email protected]
- [email protected]
- [email protected]
- [email protected]
- [email protected]
Species
Regional
Science
Sister Communities
Science and Research
Biology and Life Sciences
Plants & Gardening
Physical Sciences
Humanities and Social Sciences
Memes
As long as you give your plants enough light they (usually) don’t care about what type. Some do need the higher part of the spectrum to flower, but plant based chlorophyll can transform wavelengths from 400-700nm (PAR spectrum) In general led gives you about 3 micromol per watt while HPS gives 2.15
So a 600w hps gives you about the same mol as a 420w led lamp. This is not important for maintaining a plant over winter but if you are growing lettuce it’s crucial
Interesting. Is that why I see hydroponic setups using those magenta lights for lettuce?
As the plants look green they reflect green light. So when being efficient you’re better off not producing that, and as some plants like the upper parts of the spectrum red is good. Also blue is good as it’s high energy and not green. For lettuce they wants lot of photons. This is measured in MOL - https://hortamericas.com/blog/news/monitoring-is-crucial-for-growing-lettuce-and-leafy-greens-year-round/
So you do not really care about watt, but photons. This is why HPS was the shit up until led arrived. You needed many photons and HPS had more photons per watt than “normal” household lamps.
@Naja_Kaouthia I use LED shop lights from the home improvement store. They were one of the cheapest options I’d found. They aren’t powerful enough to promote vigorous growth but they work well enough for starting seedlings and keeping anything alive.
I’ve got some Barrina T5 1ft grow lights that everybody on IKEA Greenhouse Club recommends. I checked the PPFD with Photone, directly under the centre of the light strip: 72.9 at 20cm away, 47.5 at 30cm away, 34.8 at 35cm away. They’ve served me very well; I’ve got plants in a living room that get very little natural light but with these lights they’ve been thriving!
For other plants, I’ve got some GE grow light bulbs. These ones I’ve screwed into table lamps for my smaller plants. For these bulbs, the PPFD measurements I got were 300 at 10cm away 100 at 20cm away (directly under the bulb).
Nothing useful to add here other than I'm in the same situation as you and I'm interested in hearing what people suggest! Also, I've heard that you can use just regular LED bulbs so I'm curious if anybody has experience with this and/or can recommend some cheap lightbulbs/clip-on bases.
Personally I use E27 PAR (38 degrees) LED lamps, 17 watt power. I have a mix of 3000 K and 4000 K. The reason for these specific lamps is that I found them at a discount and so I bought a large amount. It is nice that they are somewhat directional, so I can aim them at specific plants.
I have a few different ways of hanging the lights by the plants. Most recently, I have set up a rack this way:
The E27 clamps I bought 12 off Ali-Express: https://nl.aliexpress.com/item/4000793927858.html
The rack is a simple light weight plastic rack that I found in a discount store for $12.