Understanding The Important Effect Of Light On Your Plants
Like our bodies, plants needs light to be able to grow
. We need plants to be able to survive--thus, light suddenly becomes one of the most important parts of existence for everything living.
One of the major external factors affecting plant growth and photosynthesis is light, as mentioned previously. The intensity and duration of the light supplied has a tremendous influence on plant growth.
Plants grown with insufficient lighting will exhibit tall, spindly, elongated stems. Leaves, if they develop at all, will not properly expand.
Without sufficient light, a plant's ability to produce chlorophyll and utilize nutrients efficiently is impaired, causing leaves and stems to turn pale yellow. It is impossible to bring fruit or flowers to their full potential without adequate sunshine.
Photosynthesis is directly proportional to the intensity of the source, meaning that the number of photons absorbed is the most important factor for photosynthesis. This means that as the intensity increases, the rate of photosynthesis in a plant also increases.
In the past, crop production has been limited to environmental conditions and seasonal changes. Even in glass house cultivation, the amount of natural light delivered in short daylight seasons was not sufficient to adequately flower and fruit crops.
Supplemental bulbs were necessary to simulate a longer day period to enhance vegetative growth or trigger flowering. High Intensity Discharge lamps are a type of light that uses electric arc to produce a shine.
Metal halide and high-pressure sodium lamps are part of this group of lamps. Used in combination, these two types lamps can be a complete substitute for natural sunlight.
Mercury vapor lamps were popular, but proved inferior to the more efficient metal halide and high pressure sodium lamps. They are virtually obsolete in the plant growth industry and not recommended by professional growers.
A lamp or bulb must be run by a remote ballast and requires a special light socket called a mogul socket. The ballast consists of a transformer and a capacitor, and in the case of high pressure sodium lamps, an igniter.
All these components are housed in a vented, galvanized metal box, which is wired with a power cord and plug. There is another cord that reaches from the ballast box to the mogul socket and assembly.
The mogul socket is a large ceramic socket designed to accommodate the oversized base of a lamp and conduct the high voltage. A light reflector is attached to the mogul socket assembly and shields the lamp in setup.
The reflector is essential to ensure that all the light is reflected toward the plants, and not wasted throughout the room. The style and size of the reflector will depend on the size of lamp, desired light intensity, and area of coverage.
Reflectors are designed to accommodate lamps that burn horizontally or vertically, and are available in a range of reflective materials, the most popular being white powder coated finish made from cold rolled steel. Some reflectors are enclosed and vented with fans to exhaust built up heat that occurs with the high wattage lamps.
Lumen output slowly and gradually declines over the life of the bulb. Technically, a bulb can last twelve thousand hours, but the efficacy will be substantially diminished after about one year of continuous use at eighteen hours a day.
Metal Halide is the technology that brought the sunshine indoors. By carefully blending specific halides and metals in an arc tube, scientists were able to develop a line of metal halide lamps that are designed specifically for plant growth.
The new metal halide lamps deliver the desired spectral output of color and the necessary intensity to generate photosynthesis in plant life. An abundance of blue light emitted by a regular metal halide makes them the best light for propagation and vegetative growth, promoting short internodal length.
High Pressure Sodium lights do not emit as broad a spectrum as metal halide lights, but have some advantages, especially when used in conjunction with halide. Sodiums last longer, and burn brighter, but are significantly more expensive.
High pressure sodium lamps are used primarily in the flowering cycle of a plant's life as they emit a red/orange light that is typical of autumn's harvest sunlight. Glass house production incorporates high pressure sodium lamps to supplement daylight.
If you have indoor plants that aren't doing very well, you may not want to utilize one of these bulbs to get the results your foliage needs. Talk to profession gardener today about what bulbs would be best for your needs.
by: Tom Selwick
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