Hi Mike, thanks for your input. Are your plants scattered throughout the house or mostly in one area? I have 4 shop lights that I have alternated grow lights and even flourescent lights in at times for my seedling racks (2 cheap black wire shelves). I used to grow a few plants on the shelves when I wasnt sprrouting seeds or just kinda stick smaller plants in between seedlings for the winter. The shelves arent really big enough for larger plants. I dontvhave a lot of floor space for plants so I want to utilize ceilings and upper wall areas.

I am planning to do a half wall in our bedroom (yes bedroom haha) for some plants. Also in several other areas of the house as well, near windows..However, when I say windows there is not much light at all coming in due to deep porches and low eaves. ( I think old southern house were built like that to stay cooler.)

I was thinking of being able to hang some led plant lights from the ceiling in certain areas . Either like some spot lights or the flexible desk lamps with clamps etc.

DH is pretty handy with construction so I am sure we can hook it up if we found the right lights.

I keep reading how the desk type led with the flexible arms and timers burn out quickly and you cant change the bulbs, which is wasteful.

If I could find a multi-armed desk light that I could screw led bulbs into, that might work.

Hmmm I was on the Home Depot site and saw some flexible Track Lighting lol. It would look weird but might actually work if I could put it on a timer.

I wonder if wall sconces with led light angled up towards hanging vegetation would be okay.

Anything with proper light will work. Just get the best bulbs you can. I would be looking for bulbs with high kelvins (4000k would be minimum, higher is better). LED bulbs are very economical - they last long time and use less power. Light should be close enough to plant to be effective. Keeping light source too far is not going to help much.

If you get shelves installed, it may be best to use 1 longer tube rather than few solitary bulbs. That way you can have many plants under same light. Tubes can be 2, 3, 4' or even longer, LEDs are available (for example: 48" LED tubes - 12W, 5000k, 1550lumens. Or 19W, 4000k, 2200lumens and many more). T5HO (SunBlaster) bulbs are 6400k, just over 5000lumens, 54W. Of course, there are many 'round' LED lightbulbs available. I have also used CFL (spiral) lightbulbs, in a vanity strips (most I have are 3' long) - they work quite well too. Track light fixture will work too, as long as you use proper bulbs.

I've been using lights indoors for orchids for @17 years. I've tried almost everything over that timeframe and definitely prefer LEDs. I'm a fan of 20-27 watt LED flood/spot lights as they have good penetration and are easily adjustable for different heights. I've been looking at several plug-in track light fixtures to hold the floods/spots to 'pretty' things up a bit in the orchid room.

I currently use T12 flouros on an old light cart, 4 2' 2-light LED shop lights and 6-7 LED floods, all in a spare bedroom.

Good luck,

Bob

I am using standard, T8 I believe, 4 foot shop lights rated daylight 6400k, I think thats about as cheap as you can get. I like them and I see no reason to change.

I hear yah. By the way. Bob and runs both are doing well. Their plants ate amazing. I’ll take a few shots of mind for you. I like regular florescent but they cost so much money to use compared to led. I like them because they would produce good heat at the same time but then most of my plants like cooler conditions anyways. Yup. Spot lights are great for smaller area. That’s what I use also. The flood lights , Bobs idea I am yet going to try. I like that idea too.
Mike

In the last two months switched out my two Roleadro 300W LED for two MARS HYDRO TS 600W LED Wow! what difference. The Plants love the new lights. There colour is much better. They are growing tighter. The Mars has NO FAN!!! My spouse hates the sound of fans and I started to dislike them myself. It has Cool White, Warm White, Red and IR lights together they look like pure white light. The last ones definitely a yellow hue.

Just today I bought MARS HYDRO TS 1000W LED to replace my last Roleadro 600W. It's pretty much the same as the Mars 600W, with a larger foot print. I need it to cover almost twice the distance as the others cover. After this installation the only fans are the ones I use to give the plants a breeze to help keep down on bugs.

Based on Bob's recommendations when I was transitioning from HIDs to LEDs, I have been using the 26 watt (250watt equivalent) spots at K3000 for about 16 months. At one point, I installed track lighting in another room and used several smaller MR16s, "sunlight" balanced at approximately the same distance, recommended for a "paph garden." . I find that the household 26 watt, 3000K are far superior and more flexible for producing normal growth and flowering than the MR16s, and I have replaced all of those with the larger spots. The MR16s were specifically recommended for lower light orchids. The plants certainly lived and grew under these smaller spots, but I found that the growth was not as lush as I would like. The exception to this was Paph. venustum var. alba. The plant grew handsomely, but atypically. The leaves were broad, but the stem was abnormally long. Also, it went past a blooming season without blooming, which would have been expected given the overall health of the plant. A rather attractive foliage plant. The great thing about the 26 watts is that you can vary number, spacing and distance and feel that you have a little more wiggle room to experiment. I have a lovely standard cattleya now in bloom with these bulbs,. The window does receive a little supplemental light but it's only a northwest exposure, and certainly not very much at all during winter. I'm sold on these large spots, At 3000K though, NOT the bluer ones.

John hello. Is there any way you could send me a link to those lights or a few pics ? I would like to know what they look like or where to get them. Thanks so much for helping and your post )

Mike,

I get/got almost all of my floods from home improvement stores. Usually in the $20-$25/bulb cost range. Don't necessarily believe the 20 year's worth of use, I've blown at least 2 or 3 in the past 2 years.

John,

You think the blue is bad, try the older pink (orange/white/blue) ones that are just hideous as far as enjoying your orchids under lights, plus I do just as good or better with the more natural colored floods. I do mix my K's, usually 3000 or 5000, whatever is cheaper or available at the time.

Bob

I have used the IKEA VÄXER plant light, Philips cool white 13W LED bulb and the usual red/blue LED plants lights off Amazon.

I found the red/blue plant lights to work best, helping high light requirement plants like succulents keep their colour, without generating too much heat. The IKEA and Philips lights prevented etoliation, but the former was generating too much heat while the latter led to the succulents losing their red colour gradually.