Backyard Aquaponics
A place to discuss aquaponics

Hello,

I am a person who is not interested in starting an aquaponics, but I have been doing a lot of research about it over the internet. But one thing unclear to me is the ability to grow plants under florescent lights. Mine question is: Can any type of florescent light grow plants organically? Explain if you must.

well.. there are lots of flourescent lights, ho, vho, (high output or very high output) etc..
i use regular 32watt t8 shoplights with half cool/half warm bulbs... each fixture holds 2 48" bulbs, i'm using 4 fixtures on each IBC growebed, it grows lots of greens, carrots, onions etc..
if you want fruiting plants, there are more options/costs.. LED, HO, VHO, MH, SHP

Organic methods are not based on artificial light, but if you mean an AP plants grown under lighting... properly managed they will grow just as good.
Q; Do you have access to high volume of renewable energy source or just a lack of fresh and tasty produce?

Oh no, I just want to know if you can get the same quality of food from artificial lighting as you can from sunlight, given the proper lighting.

The short answer is yes, "you can get the same quality of food from artificial lighting as you can from sunlight, given the proper lighting". However, for some plants (blooming and fruiting) it's a little harder, and can get expensive to purchase and operate. My AP system is inside so I have to deal with this. Currently, I'm running a mix of T12, T5 HO, and metal halide. The MH does a good job, is easy to work with (doesn't need to be right on top of the plants), but is pricey. I've found out that most of the high end lighting (MH, HPS, LED) is being used for "crops" with a much higher economic value than the veggies I'm growing - if you get my drift.

The zip file attached contains helpful documents I've run across in my research.
Another good one that's too big to attach is UAF-HGA-00336. You can Google that.

Even the circular fluorescent lights can produce decent crops. Have a look at how many lumens are being produced by the bulbs. And also what spectrum they are a part of. The more blue lights are a spring type light (Give more blue rays, cold) and the red light means the more summer time light they produce. During the veg stage you will want red and during grow you will want blue.

Alot of people complain about having headaches in there homes with the new fluorescent lights, thats because you should not sleep with them on. They act like the sun and give off the necessary lighting spectrum for life. Regular incodescent (sp?) lights do not put off the same stuff.

thanks fo all comments what I have are 4 bulb 4 foot fluorescent lights with 2900 lumen bulbs I found some ts grow and bloom bulbs so they may work thankx again