Sorry, another Grow Light Question... How Far from Peppers?
I have installed 2, 4 foot shop lights, hung from the joists.. Total of 4, T-8 bulbs. My question is, I have 2 mature Ghost peppers from this season that are about 16 inches tall. I want to put them under the lights but I'm not sure how far off the plants the lights should be as well as how many hours should the lights be on for peak performance?? Thanks!
You can place them almost touching as they do not put off much heat., Since they are flouros, they need to be as close to the plant as possible as they do not penetrate canopy very well. That is the big drawback of flouros, but they use little electricity. 16 on 8 off should keep them happy throughout the winter.
>>I have 2 mature Ghost peppers from this season that are about 16 inches tall. I want to put them under the lights
oops. problem here:
>>have installed 2, 4 foot shop lights, hung from the joists..
you need to flip the lights so they hang vertically. the peppers are now 16" tall, they're going to get taller.
even at 16" tall, light "from the top" is not going to be sufficient.
hang the lights vertically, install some flavor of reflectors to put as much light as possible on the pepper plants, top to bottom.
I don't wish to be a wet floating row cover, but I had a direct south facing glass to ground greenhouse for almost twenty years. it was heated, had hot/cold running water, automatic ventilation - pretty dang good set up.
I tried growing all sorts of things in the greenhouse over the winter. lettuce
other leaf crops
scallions
worked.
tomatoes, no.
peppers, no
green beans, no
wax beans, no
cucumbers, no
peas, no
supplemental lighting this,
supplemental light that,
timers from zero to twenty-four.
you can't fool Mother Nature and it is a task and a half to supply the necessary light energy for some crops.
oops. problem here:
>>have installed 2, 4 foot shop lights, hung from the joists..
you need to flip the lights so they hang vertically. the peppers are now 16" tall, they're going to get taller.
even at 16" tall, light "from the top" is not going to be sufficient.
hang the lights vertically, install some flavor of reflectors to put as much light as possible on the pepper plants, top to bottom.
I don't wish to be a wet floating row cover, but I had a direct south facing glass to ground greenhouse for almost twenty years. it was heated, had hot/cold running water, automatic ventilation - pretty dang good set up.
I tried growing all sorts of things in the greenhouse over the winter. lettuce
other leaf crops
scallions
worked.
tomatoes, no.
peppers, no
green beans, no
wax beans, no
cucumbers, no
peas, no
supplemental lighting this,
supplemental light that,
timers from zero to twenty-four.
you can't fool Mother Nature and it is a task and a half to supply the necessary light energy for some crops.