For home gardeners, the wide array of lighting products on the market can be difficult to navigate if just starting up a new indoor growing situation. If deciding to go with fluorescent lighting, this presents another choice from all the different types and sizes available. One of the most popular choices is CFL grow lights, which offer a number of benefits to the small-scale home gardener. These combine several fluorescent bulbs into one, easy-to-use cluster of light and energy, that helps plants flourish under the simulated sunlight, without creating a large output of heat.
The main advantage of CFL grow lights is their low heat levels, which makes them ideal for gardening on a smaller scale, such as on shelves, without having to worry about the lighting setup being a fire hazard. This makes them extremely versatile. This type of CFL grow lamp is available in any hardware or home store, and fits into a normal light socket, with no special adapters needed or anything. The usability makes them extremely popular for small scale growth projects.
Another advantage of CFL grow lights is the fact that they come in all different color spectrums of the rainbow, making them useful during all stages of a plant’s growth cycle. During the first phase, the vegetative phase, the plant will require a cooler, blue color scheme to allow it to flourish. During the second, reproductive phase, a more mature plant will wish for a warmer, reddish-orange hue that stimulates flowering and budding. This can be achieved by switching out the fluorescent bulbs from cool to warm, making this a very versatile choice from among all the different possible growth lights on the market.
If there are any disadvantages to CFL grow lights it may just be that they are not as efficient as other growth lamps. One cluster of fluorescents, involving several bulbs, uses the same amount of energy as just one high pressure sodium bulb. So while they are cheap and easy to use, they are not the greenest option for those who are conscious of their energy output levels. To maximize the use of fluorescents, an indoor gardener can add a reflector to the setup, which will reflect the light and heat, effectively doubling it for the plants below. Simple placement can help optimize the output as well with a lower wattage, by placing the bulbs closer to the plants themselves. All of these factors can help a simple lighting setup perform at its best.
