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natural light intensity
Can anyone help me correlate the lux intensity of tropical daylight (no
direct sunshine) with the typical lux intensity we desire in planted
aquaria? We'd be looking at a percentage of the arc of blue sky.
Also, how much does this light intensity vary according to a cloudy day
and a rainy, overcast day?
The place we're interested in is Cebu City in the Philippines. The idea
is to see how feasible it is to use ambient lighting since the cost of
electricity is relatively high and sunshine is virtually free.
How about the idea of placing the tank where it would get shaded
sunlight for a period of half an hour or more? I read stories in TAG
about early aquatic plant pioneers favouring east facing windows. I
expect it was even more of a trial and error process for them than for
us today! ;-)
I setup a tank in the front yard of my father-in-law in the Philippines
using a local soil, gravel and a little bit of shredded coconut husk in
lieu of peat. It gets a few hours of well shaded sunlight each day and
last I heard, the emersed plants were growing quite well. We had to rely
upon daily water changes for minerals.
Steve