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This website documents my experiences with Apistogramma and Discus in a planted tank.
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The Hierarchy of Plant Needs - Light
Light
Light is the top level plant need because of its effects on all other plant needs. The amount of co2 and nutrients to be added if any are going to depend on the light we are using.
There is no way around this your plants will need sufficient light. There are many different paths we follow all beginning with the light. We can do The Natural Planted Tank as an example of a tank that can run off sunlight. We can use "low tech" which describes an aquarium with with natural or low lighting. We can choose the "high tech" tank with moderate lighting or super nova style. The intent of this is not to define the style of planted tank but to give some insight for selection of the light fixture.
The selection of the light fixture depends on many variables. Type of equipment we plan on using, plant requirements, fish preference just to name a few.
It is hard to be pinned down into suggesting lighting for the broad amount of styles one can have. To be brief I suggest normal output T5 for low tech setups. Metal halide for high tech or deeper water setups. For everything in the middle there is T5HO.
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