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Indoor Gardening and Organic Herb Garden LightingLight Requirements Before you rush out and buy an expensive organic herb garden lighting system, you need to know what your herbs' light requirements are. All plants need light for photosynthesis. Animals eat food; plants manufacture all of the food for any ecosystem by combining carbon dioxide and water in the presence of chlorophyll and sunlight to make sugars. These sugars provide the building blocks for all other nutrients. Different plants have different light requirements. Some plants prefer to grow in the shade and burn easily in full sun. Some prefer full sun and don't grow well in shade. Most herbs prefer full sun, but there are exceptions. Check with a local gardening expert or a good organic gardening book to see what the light requirements are for the herbs you plan to grow. Plants also need dark periods for optimal health. Most plants will grow under 24/7 lighting, but they do better with several hours of darkness every day. Incandescent Lights Incandescent lights are a poor choice for organic herb garden lighting, even if they are called "grow lights." Incandescent lights have the wrong type of light to stimulate plant growth because they are too "hot." Incandescent lights are an excellent choice for display lighting on your indoor herb garden, but they must be placed at least 24 inches away from the plants to prevent burning. Fluorescent Lights Fluorescent lights are a good choice for your indoor organic herb garden lighting. Fluorescents are inexpensive, easily available, easy to set up and they have full-spectrum lighting. Fluorescents need to be placed no more than four inches from the plants, so you have to keep moving them as your herbs grow. High Intensity Discharge (HID) Lights Even better for organic herb garden lighting are high intensity discharge lights. These are very affordable and more efficient than fluorescent lights. There are two types of HID organic herb gardening lighting: MH (metal halide) and HPS (high pressure sodium). MH lights give off energy in the blue end of the light spectrum. This is similar to the light at midday in midsummer. This light stimulates plant growth, especially of leaves. It is ideal for many herbs and for leafy vegetables, like lettuce or spinach. HPS light gives off energy in the orange part of the spectrum and is similar to evening light or fall light. Orange spectrum light encourages flowering and fruit production. An HPS organic herb gardening lighting system will help herbs like nasturtium, calendula and lavender to bloom. You can get combination and convertible HID organic herb garden lighting systems, so that you can start seedlings under MH light and then switch to HPS light to encourage flowering. Adding an organic herb garden lighting system to your indoor herb garden will ensure that you have plenty of fresh, healthy herbs all year long. |
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