25 plants, need help on how much light I need and what kind?

All depends on your goals really, and how you will be growing and training your plants as well as the container size and grow space. I think it would be best to get the lighting you want and work the plants to the light and grow space and not the other way around. Say for instance you have 1 gallon pots you will be using. You could easily fit them all under one light. If you were to use say 5 gallon pots and do a bit of training, you could use 1 light per 4 plants or even a light per plant.

As for the type of light, well that also depends on your goals. I must say tho if you wanna cheap out you will likely end up regretting it later. Main options are hid, led, cfl, or fluorescent lighting. Led lights are alright if you want to spend 1k per unit for a good one. I spent $1200 on mine just to have it fail a year later. Not impressed with that at all. Now I'm back to hid lighting. For $300 you can get a ballast, reflector, and bulbs. However it produces more heat and definitely requires better ventilation. Cfl or fluorescent in my opinion is not a very good investment if you are looking for a good return. However if you are on an extreme budget they will grow bud for you, but with that many plants you are likely to require a large quantity of them.

 

More info on your grow area, final container size, or your goals would allow for a proper recommendation but overall I would recommend to anyone an hid of 600w or better. 1000w if you can manage the temps. If its just fun and mega budget then get as many cfl as you can afford.

Hope something in there helps.

 

The lighting you use is the most important part of your grow setup. The better the lighting, the better the yield. If this is your first grow, for God's sake, don't try to grow 25 plants at once. Just use the run to learn the plant and learn how to grow. There is a process to it and the more you know about the correct way to do it, the better your outcome will be. The words "cheap" and "marijuana grow lighting" do not coincide. The best bang for your buck is going to be using HPS. We run 4 1000 watt lamps per flower room and the most I put under a light is 4 or 5. The stronger and better quality light you give the plant, the better it will grow and the better buds it will produce. The only thing with the HPS is that it gets HOT so you have to put in ducting, in-line fan, etc. to pull some of the heat out of the grow space. LEDs are great, but it would cost you thousands to grow off very many plants with the things because they don't have any reflectivity from the fixtures and the cheap ones aren't worth wasting your money on. Get on the net and do the research. Don't let somebody else pick what light you grow with. Lots of people use the forum, but not everybody knows their stuff and like I said, your lighting is the key component that will determine what you get in the end. TWW

 

no for 25 plants i would say 4 1000W HPS would be ideal anything less and your not getting max wattage per sq foot

 

Short answer : yes

Long winded answer :
It does a good 4x4 coverage depending on reflector shape. I get about a good 4x5 - 4x6 area with a hood style reflector. Whatever fems you get out of the bunch would surely be happy under a 600w. You could fit all 25 under it if going for a single cola no training. Example is I can grow a pound with just one plant trained or I can get that pound with many smaller plants in the same space with the same light. What I mean is that the number of plants really doesn't matter. Your yield is directly related to space and light. A 600w I think is a good place to start to get excellent results and get used to hid lighting with minimum investment. However a 1000w setup is not much more than a 600w but does of course cost more for hydro to run and to cool as well as good ventilation. This of course gets offset by greater yield. Another thing to consider is amperage. I forget but I think 1000w is around 11amp so you pretty much need a dedicated fuse just for your grow after everything is hooked up. Talking standard 15amp fuse.

I could give a more definitive answer with more definitive information. Like if they stay in solo cups 600w is more than enough. Either way you won't be disappointed with the results especially when you look back on those cfl days.

The widow white is right about more light and quality light being core to a grow, naturally. If you are looking to be a professional like the widow white and production is your main goal, then you will want those 1000w Shining down on your girls. The choice is ultimately yours and I would also advise you to check out other grows similar to what you want to do as well as peoples setups for both 600w and 1000w systems, just to get an idea of what it is going to take to run each. Factor everything in and then pull the trigger.

Best of luck.

 

Never judge the amount of light needed for 25 plants.

Judge the amount of plants needed for the lighting and space you have.

J

 

9 x 3usgallon pots to one 600w is about right ...thats to 3 feet tall in 2 months flower

work from that

good luck

 

i do 20 under two 600 watters each in 20 gal bags in a 8x4 tent