I start flowering stage on 4th January 2016.
I’m still using 400 HPS - white.
It’s a must to have orange- red color or not?
I’m still recivor ph average 5 TO 6 ?
Any advise please
it is not a must hps red tends to put out far more lumens than MH blue
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Like mentioned the "red’ light spectrum helps in bud development
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It is true HPS puts out more use-able light per watt than traditional MH. We like to generalize and use the term lumens to describe the intensity of the photosynthetic active radiation being put out by a light. And I do it myself sometimes.
But just to be clear, Lumens and PAR are not necessarily the same thing at all. Lumens comes from “candle power” and is determined by how bright something looks to our eyes, human eyes. But red and blue light do not really trigger what seems to be bright in our eyes, that is more in the green/yellow part of the light spectrum for humans.
So what looks bright to our eyes is not necessarily bright for a plant, and not necessarily providing enough intensity in the colors that plants will be able to use. And beyond this, the perfect spectrum isn’t even always best, if a less perfect spectrum can provide more actual energy to the leaves, and this is why HPS is used for flowering more than any other reason, becuase it does provide more PAR per watt generally over MH.
However, there is some evidence the red end of the spectrum does influence and enhance flowering/budding. And too much red can cause excessive stretching between nodes, this is generally not wanted for tight buds, and so a light with more blue and less red is used in veg, and MH can create a more “true” white, and this is why it is used for veg.
~MacG
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