increaseing lighting for orchids and broms

[crittermom]

I have a 44 gallon pent terrarium that I grow several species of orchids and some nice mini neoregelias. Right now, I have a coralife aqualight for lighting, which has 2 65 watt 6700 k power compact lights in them. It is sitting on the glass. My broms have lost most of thier color under this amount of light, and the orchids are growing, but not blooming well. The tank is 24 inches tall, but most of the plants are 12 to 18 inches from the lights. I'm trying to figure out the best way to add more light to the tank, and am considering using t5's. Could it be that coralife bulbs are not particularly good bulbs? Should I just try replacing them with something else? They are about a year or so old, so i know they are losing light from age, but I jsut dont know if I want to just buy new bulbs, or go a different route.

The lights i'm looking at are here:

Amazon

Amazon

or the same setup in the 4 tube model. On the 8 tube, you can run only 4 bulbs at a time, or 8. I would hang it above the tank, and could raise/lower it as needed to adjust the lighting. Do you think this would be way overkill?

[Pumilo]

I'm not going to pretend to know the best lighting for orchids. Perhaps Frogparty will jump in with that.
I do have a long background in Reefkeeping, having owned and operated ColoradoCoralFarm for many years. I can tell you that CoraDeath, sorry Coralife bulbs, are some of the worst in the business. Their color (K ratings) can be very far off, claiming 10K on bulbs that are way too blue to be 10K. Their PAR (Photosynthetically Active Radiation) ratings are some of the lowest in the business when compared to most other similar bulbs. Even just to the naked eye, it is easy to see how dim a coralife is when you plug in any other brand, next to it.

[phender]

I echo Dougs feeling about Corallife lighting. Their ballasts were horrible for me as well.

I think that the 8 bulb fixture would be overkill. I think 4 bulbs would be plenty.

*Be very careful ordering lights from Amazon. I just about ordered a fixture because the price was good, but on checkout noticed that the shipping was 5x what others charged. I just googled the fixture and found many better overall prices.

[frogparty]

2x 65 watts of cfl would be plenty in my opinion for a tank that size. I dont have experience with anything else as far as vivs go, but I find HO T5 bulbs to be comparable in terms of light, but cooler in terms of heat.

Your orchids could not be blooming because they arent getting the seasonal cycling of temp and moisture needed to encourage blooming. The leaves are a good indicator of the amount of light they are getting. Dark green= too little light. Light green =better light. Purple/red tinged leaves indicates antho cyanosis and an indicator of light levels at maximum requirement

[crittermom]

Thanks for the input. I think I"m going to go ahead and just order two replacement bulbs for my current fixture and see if that helps. Frogparty, some of the orchids in the tank have been blooming, but they are lower light requiring orchids. None of the ones up top that require a bit more light have bloomed. If this doesn't work though, I'll start fiddling with other variables to try to get them blooming. Thanks again!

[frogparty]

Knowing what plants you have would help

[crittermom]

Leptotes bicolor
Restrepia dodsonii
Restrepia striata
Trichoglottis triflora
Sophronitis cernua
Dichaea neglecta (squarrosa)
Trichosalpinx rotunda
Haraella odorata
Pleurothallis tribuloides
Coelogyne fimbriata
Paph Laser x Paph Pulsar
2 mini bulbo species
2 warmer growing masdies

Neo Wee Willy
Neo EOZ
Neo Miniskirt
Neo Chiquita Linda

Most of these are in this tank, though a few are going in my new one.

[frogparty]

Ok so which orchids arent blooming, and how long have they been in there? And where in the tank are they?

[fishr]

As an ex-reefer myself, CoralKill (Coralife) bulbs and their fixtures by the brand are only good for pleasing the eye but will never be able to make corals happy. Doubt light-loving orchids would appreciate these bulbs either.

Get some T5HOs with excellent reflectors or LEDs which seem to be the new craze as of late. *shrugs*

Temperature as I learned today visiting Dartmouth's Greenhouse, air circulation and a timed misting system played a key role, but mostly temperature changes. They were using Halides. The room with the orchids who require cooler environments, was a BIG change to the tropicals. It was an immediate blast of warmth.

[crittermom]

The ones that haven't bloomed:
Leptotes bicolor- very top (4ish inches from light, but slighty behind it. it is reaching for the light)
Trichoglottis triflora-top close to leptotes bicolor, but directly under the lights, and about an inch lower.
Sophronitis cernua-very top, but towards the end of the light fixture-this one has lots of new pb, but no flowering yet.
Coelogyne fimbriata. lower in the tank. this thing grows like a weed, and has blooomed previously, but not in about a year.

Like I said, the broms, which are close to the top on the background are faded out. Miniskirt used to be quite red, but now only the center has red in it.

All of those have been in the tank about 1.5 years. I've recently added a fogger which is running 4 times a day for 10 minutes and a small computer fan, which I'm going to upgrade to a larger one to up the airflow soon.

A couple of the others haven't done much either, but I've nearly killed them, so I don't expect them to bloom for me until I give them a bit of tlc =)

Do you think it would help to cover more of the area of the tank if I raised the light up a couple inches?

Last, does anyone fertilze their orchids in the terrarium using something like worm tea? I've got a nice vermicompost going outside and have been thinking about how I coudl utilize it to help out the orchids, without introducing pests or diseases.

Thanks for the help!