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Tips on Choosing Fish Tank Lighting


In the article I’ll tell you about Tips on Choosing Fish Tank Lighting. You’ve been asking your parents to get you a pet for the longest time, but your father is allergic to cats and your mother hates dogs. But when they surprised you with a fish tank on your last birthday you jumped in joy and are wondering how fish tank lighting could improve the mood in the tank.

Tips on Choosing Fish Tank Lighting

They bought you a complete tank set up, which has a set of basic lights, but you want more. You should ideally change the tank and customize a home for your fish you can decorate by yourself. However there are a few things you should keep in mind before you go ahead and light up the tank.

You need to first consider the kind of hood your fish tank has. The hood will decide the kind of bulb you can use to light up the tank. Next you need to figure out the voltage of the bulbs that you wish to use. A regular fish tank would need up to 3 watts of power per gallon of water in the tank. The aquarium lighting should be dim. A very brightly lit tank could stress the fish. They prefer lighting that is subdued and not overpowering. If your light is too bright it could also lead to algae formation and that’s why you should keep the lighting to a bare minimum enough so that one can admire the décor and see the fish.

If you own a fresh water fish tank, you have two options of lighting to choose from: Incandescent lighting and fluorescent lighting. The incandescent lighting offers 15 – 20 watts of power and lights up the tank with a yellow tint. However this type of lighting is perfect for small tanks and does not cost as much as other lighting options. It is not suitable for fish tanks with live plants but works fine if you have plastic plants.

If you have the money to spare you could get your fish some fluorescent lighting. These are available in both tube and bulb form and can be fixed into any type of fish tank. These lights are preferred to the incandescent variety of lighting and are known to give out a whiter and brighter light as compared to the yellow tint that incandescent lights provide. These lights are perfect for the live plants in your tank and you would not need more than 2 – 3 watts per gallon to light up your fish tank.

If you want to take your fish tank lighting to the next level you could insist that you want to check out the options for Halide lighting. However this sort of lighting is not advisable for fresh water fish tanks. The lighting is too bright and requires 8 watts per gallon of water. These are only ideal for huge salt water fish tanks.

You could also add an extra dash of lighting with accent lights to liven up the mood. There are a number of lighting options in the market for fish tank lighting, make sure you choose one that is appropriate depending on the fish and plants that you have in your fish tank.

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