Sunlight is one of the most important factors for plant growth and development. Plants will not be able to survive without sunlight for photosynthesis and metabolism every day.
However, the growth of tall buildings and the limited space is making many plant species less exposed to the sun. In particular, plants in the home or office will have fewer conditions to be exposed to sunlight every day.
Therefore, using LED strips as grow lights is becoming more and more popular to stimulate the growth of indoor plants. Is using led strips effective for plant health? What kind of LED strips are capable of producing light like the light of the sun? All details will be answered in this article.
Using LED Strips As Grow Lights – Reasons You Need To Know
As you know, plants need three basic elements to sustain life: water, light, and soil. In the natural world, plants will absorb direct sunlight to carry out photosynthesis and metabolism. So when you grow plants indoors, you need to create an environment that is as close to the natural environment as possible for the plants to grow well.
If your space cannot receive direct sunlight, you can use LED strips to create artificial light that resembles sunlight. Especially, for the development of young plants, light is an indispensable factor in this period.
LED strips light can support the growth of indoor plants and produce a quality light source like light from the sun. However, if you only use LED strips of light, it will not be enough light to stimulate the growth of young plants. Therefore, many gardeners often use different types of bulbs of different intensities and sizes.
During the entire life of a plant, the amount of light a plant need is at least 2,000 lumens per square foot. In addition to yellow light, you should ensure the full spectrum of colors from LED strips light to bring out the best effect for plant growth and development.
Most LED strips light only emit about 450 lumens per foot. So, for each plant, the amount of light they need is different, you need to use LED strips of light with the right intensity for them.
For example, plants need illumination with an intensity of 2,000 lumens, you will need brighter strips of 5050 or above. LED strips light 5050 has a size of 5.0 mm x 5.0 mm with three LED chips in one that will be more suitable for plant growth. In particular, LED strips light does not emit much heat, so plants will not burn leaves or dry leaves, so you do not need to worry about high-intensity light.
Can LED Strip Light Emit A Color Spectrum?
Natural light will provide a full spectrum of colors to stimulate the growth and development of plants in the natural environment. So indoor plants also need a full spectrum of colors to thrive in their natural outdoor habitat.
Normally, plants will need blue light for growth and development. The red light will help plants to flower and fruit naturally. If you don’t provide blue and red light, your plants will have a hard time flowering. Even some plants cannot grow without these two types of light.
Blue light does play an important role in stimulating plant growth in the early stages, especially for young plants. Plants will grow fast and healthy in 6500K light like the light from the sun. Meanwhile, plants need about 3000K of light for budding, flowering, and fruiting.
Most of the LED strips available today are full spectrum colors with red and blue light to encourage plant growth. Single color bands will typically emit white light from 2200K to 6500K. This amount of light is ideal for all stages of plant growth.
Alternatively, you can also purchase auto-adjustable light strips to set both high and low wavelengths automatically. However, you can also buy multiple light strips with different colors such as red, blue, yellow, and white, and arrange them alternately.
What Are The Advantages Of Using LED Strips?
As you know, the growth and development of plants do not depend on the amount of light they receive more or less. Instead, the full-color spectrum is what will help plants thrive and stay healthy. Therefore, LED strips have all the important elements to meet the growing conditions of plants.
LED strips light is very energy efficient and has a full spectrum of colors. What’s more, they don’t give off excessive heat to burn the leaves or dry them out. To stimulate plant growth, you need to buy the right lamps with a full spectrum of colors instead of strips of lights with separate colors.
You can also buy single-color bands because they contain the entire spectrum. Or you will need lights that cover both red and blue waves. If you use a single RGB strip, you should buy the 5050 strip, which is brighter than the standard LED strip. You can adjust to purple (A combination of blue and red) to stimulate the growth and early flowering of plants. You can also set the RGB lights to white, but you should focus on blues and reds more.
However, some plants will grow and develop well when there is high temperature from the sun. So if you use LED strips light for lighting, the amount of heat that plants need is not enough. For example, tomato plants, will not be able to produce many flowers and fruits if they only depend on the light of LED strips light. However, most plants that don’t need heat to grow will do just fine under 5050 full-spectrum LED strips.
The Last Word
LED strips are one of the ideal choices to replace sunlight for plants in the room. This type of lamp can produce light of all colors such as red, blue, yellow, white, and purple to stimulate the growth and development of plants.
LED strips light doesn’t give off too much heat so you don’t need to worry about burning leaves or water shortage in plants. You must buy the right LEDs of the right intensity with a variety of colors to stimulate growth and flowering in plants. However, you should still expose plants to sunlight when possible to ensure plant growth.