Is 2 wpg considered low or moderate?

[Nautilus29]

I have a 20g high tank with a 40 watt t-5 light fixture. Is this considered low or moderate for lighting? I have Aponogeton crispus in the tank and it says its a moderate light plant, and I'm a little worried that my lighting wont be enough. Ive only had it in there for a couple of days and it grew a new leaf, but all the rest are dieing and im not sure if I should cut them off or leave them on.

[Wild Turkey]

2wpg of t5 is usually considered medium. Its a good deal of light and you shouldnt have problems growing most stuff you like if you fert dose and use a co2 source

[Nautilus29]

Right now I haven't been injecting co2 or adding ferts, since I just added the plants is that alright? I didn't want to over do something and have everything fall apart.

[Wild Turkey]

Right now I haven't been injecting co2 or adding ferts, since I just added the plants is that alright? I didn't want to over do something and have everything fall apart.

Of course, it all depends on how heavily planted the tank is, what substrate you are using and what other types of plants you have. If you have a tank full of java moss and anubias adding ferts could do more harm than good like you say.

IMO, its very unlikely co2 could hurt you, I would go ahead and hook that up if you were planning on it later, it will help you get things stable and get into the swing of changing it out (if you diy) or dosing (if you use a carbon source like excel)

Ferts are another story, especially if you are using plant substrate or something, you may not need to dose them at all, 2.0 t5 is "walking the line" so to speak but the co2 will help your plants eat up the nutrients faster which is the idea

[PostalPenguin]

Speaking from experience, set up CO2 and a fertilizer regimen now. If you wait and see if you need it, usually when you notice your plants start falling apart and algae taking over, it will take months to correct it with proper CO2 and ferts.

My experience: In about early June I noticed my plants weren't doing well in both my tanks and I was having algae explosions. My swords were dying, BBA was growing everywhere and all sorts of algae was growing on every plant. I started dosing dry ferts and upped my pressurized CO2. I ripped out a lot of plants, treated with an entire bottle of peroxide and had to do a lot of glass cleaning. Just now are my tanks starting to turn around and be what I want them to look like. So it took about 2 months of almost daily fiddling to correct.

With the lighting you have I would definitely start a CO2 system whether DIY or pressurized and start dosing ferts. Look up the EI method of dosing for a good way to do it.

[Nautilus29]

I have a florite substrate covored in sand. The plants I added are anubiss coffefolia and nana, aponogeton crispus, cryptocoryne lutea and marsilea quadrifolia. If I need to I'll add a sit co2 system. One anubias is in thesubstrate and one is on a piece of driftwood

[Lady Hobbs]

I have shop lights (80 watt) on two of my 55's and on another a coralife 130 (2.36 wpg) I see no difference in intensity or growth between these tanks.

Last month I decided to increase the wattage some on the one tank from 2 to 3 watts per gallon, added DIY CO2 and within two weeks was getting hair algae. Go figure! I put the tank back where it was.

The more reading I do, the more claims I read that substrate pellets instead of liquid ferts reduce the algae problems. I keep thinking I will do just that but haven't gotten around to it yet.

[Nautilus29]

That's what I'm trying to stay away from, I'd hate to add ferts right now while the plants are still new to the tank and then have algae all over them. I'll add co2 and see what happens. I am adding ammonia every day right now to keep the cycle going which should also help the plants.