Indoor lights for orchids

[Nicolasdperez]

Hello,

I recently moved with some dendrobiums, neofinetias, a cattleya, two paphs, and some phals. Unfortunately my room does not receive much light as it is under a big tree. Does anyone have recommendations for some affordable and effective indoor lighting for orchids?

Thank you for your time,

Nicolas Perez

[estación seca]

LED shop lights from a hardware store work for many people. A hydroponics shop will have a lot of options and the staff can explain them to you.

There are many recommendations here on the Growing Under Lights forum.

[Dimples]

If you’re starting from scratch I second the suggestion to look at LED options. The prices have come down and they’re much more energy efficient compared to older tech so your electric bill won’t go up as much.

[Eli Vizsla]

Originally Posted by Nicolasdperez

Hello,

I recently moved with some dendrobiums, neofinetias, a cattleya, two paphs, and some phals. Unfortunately my room does not receive much light as it is under a big tree. Does anyone have recommendations for some affordable and effective indoor lighting for orchids?

Thank you for your time,

Nicolas Perez

I’m using viparspectra xs 2000 which I bought from Amazon. Brightness can be adjusted (dimmable) and does not emit heat.

[rhodo]

I second Viparspectra lights. I currently use a Viparspectra p1000. This light is more than powerful enough, and can be adjusted via a dial on the side of the unit. The PPFD values are nice. This light is more affordable, and also stronger, than what I previously paid for at Home Depot.

[Grim Tuesday]

I use the Monious-L lights, which are cheap (they go down to $55 on Amazon occasionally, I think I got them at $60, or $10 a strip): Amazon.com

They're not unpleasantly bright, have a nice golden yellow color (which I am sure is slightly less efficient for photosynthesis, but also I'm growing indoors so the whole point is they should not make my house look worse) and are the right shape to put in a window to augment outdoor light if you have a window that doesn't get enough. And they are also easy to mount to a shelf. You will either need to position them so they are less than 12" away from your plants for a medium/high light plant. From my basic measurements with smartphone, I found their advertised measurements to be about accurate.

[skirincich]

Based on a recent talk dealing with orchids and LED lights, I would not recommend shop led lights. Clearly better than nothing but the spectral output is questionable. The other message from the talk was that the brightness of an LED light as judged by the human light says nothing about how much photosynthetically-useful light is being produced.

[Eli Vizsla]

Originally Posted by skirincich

Based on a recent talk dealing with orchids and LED lights, I would not recommend shop led lights. Clearly better than nothing but the spectral output is questionable. The other message from the talk was that the brightness of an LED light as judged by the human light says nothing about how much photosynthetically-useful light is being produced.

Do you have the source? Would be interesting to see the study done. And what does it mean by “.. judged by the human light…”? I’m open to other indoor grow lights if it will help improve growing orchids indoor with consideration to costs.

[skirincich]

Sorry. I meant, "judged by the human eye..."

The High Desert Orchids website has come good information on LED lighting:

Growing Orchids Under Artificial Light
– High Desert Orchids

The owner has written articles and given talks through the American Orchid Society.

[Eli Vizsla]

Originally Posted by skirincich

Sorry. I meant, "judged by the human eye..."

The High Desert Orchids website has come good information on LED lighting:

Growing Orchids Under Artificial Light
– High Desert Orchids

The owner has written articles and given talks through the American Orchid Society.

Thank you for the source.

Now I understood you were talking about shop LED and not LED grow lights.