how long do I leave the lights on?

[Tomatoes&Things]

I have florescent lights on my plants and I was wondering if it is ok to leave them on all the time? They do really good and are nice and green when I leave it on all the time but is this OK for them? They are vegetable plants.

 

[Tomatoes&Things]

Oh, and they are also four inches away.

 

[silkiechicken]

Not sure what the "right" way is, but I leave the light on 24/7, put them out 2-3 hours a day after they spout, (if weather is not below 40F to harden them up as they go), and have a fun running on them for an hour or two a day (in attempts to make them stockier). Done this for 3-4 years now and it works fine for me.

 

[patandchickens]

I wouldn't, but with many plants you will often be able to get away with it.

Some grow better with a period of darkness. Also, the bigger problem is that some things are daylength sensitive in terms of bolting. If you raise them from pups believing that day is infinitely long, then put them outside where suddenly the day is shorter (and unless you live above the Arctic circle, the real world WILL have a shorter day than that ), they may run to seed earlier than they should, giving you less production time and smaller plants before they become inedible.

I do not remember exactly which plants this is relevant to, but I am thinking cilantro and lettuce at least... it's too early in the morning for me to have to rack my memory for these things

Note that I was raised to believe that lights should be set at a 12-14 hr duration, and thus have never actually *tried* 24 hr lights myself, the above is just What They Say. I will tell you that aquarium plants, and some houseplants, do distinctly more poorly in 24-hr light.

Dunno if that helps any,

Pat

 

[SewingDiva]

I have our lights set at 16 hours on/8 hours off right from planting because there are usually both sprouted and yet-to-germinate seeds on the same rack. Un-germinated seeds get a heat mat treatment until they sprout, and then the mat is turned off. A heat mat will increase the temp about 10-20 degrees above the air temp.

It works well and we have nice stocky seedlings. Our racks are in the garage and the air temp right now is about 60 degrees. I started our cool weather seedlings March 1, and then the air temp was only 40 degrees, but that was fine because they were cool season crops anyway. The lettuces, kale & broccoli grew just fine with grow lights even in 40 degree temps.

I like my seedlings to be stocky and not leggy; I think a cooler growing temp for seedlings is just as important as how much light, even for hot season plants like tomatoes and peppers.

~Phyllis

 

[Tomatoes&Things]

Thanks, I germinate our pants in our basement and had a really good germination rate. Almost 100%. The temp is around 65 degrees and I put plastic covers over the flats until they germinate. This was the first time I started my seeds instead of buying them and a wasted a whole flat of plants because I had the lights to high. I now keep them real low because I would rather have them stocky also.