lighting in an teranium for orcids, help!

[reefmale]

hiya guys, i was wanting some clarification on the hole artificial light topic. i am intending to use 2 30 w t8 light tubes from juwel, 1x daylight 1 x warm light. do u think this will be sufficiant to grow phalenopsis under. the tubes will run the length of the teranium. seems to be a lot of differing infomation on using light tubes with orchids. please help, any advice would be appriciated.

[King_of_orchid_growing:)]

The differing advice about lighting is because not all orchids grow under the same intensity of light.

Some, like Phals, grow in shade.

Others, like certain Vandas, grow in very bright indirect light.

There are even some that grow under full sun.

If you don't intend on mixing other groups of orchids in with the Phals, then the advice for lighting should be relatively straight forward.

However...

If you intend to add other tropical plants in the terrarium, then it can complicate things. As the same thing applies. Not all tropical plants grow under the same light intensities.

Things to consider when planning for the use of artificial lights are:

1. type and brand of light
2. length of light tube
3. wattage
4. Kelvin temperature (rating)

It would also help to have a good light meter and refractometer. As you would need to change out the bulbs regularly. Light intensity and Kelvin temperatures decrease with time.