# WOW!!!!! You wont believe this….



## Walker_ (Mar 24, 2006)

WOW!!! Ok everyone, some of you may already know this secret, but for those of you who don’t Id like to fill you in on what happened the other day… Now first off I live on the west coast of Canada and it may be very possible that this phenomenon is isolated to this specific geographic region. (For those who don’t know this area of the world is somewhat famous for the “other” types of plants that are grown indoors; in 2003 Forbs said pot was a $7 billion{us} industry in this province alone.) ANYWAY to get to the point there is a hydroponics store down the street from my house, I needed some calibration solution for my PH probes and it was suggested that I try at the “pot” store. Needless to say they have some very interesting toys in there; however the thing that blew me away the MOST was their prices for Metal halide lights! Ok so for a 1000w 10k bulb, canopy WITH fans and a ballast take a wild guess what they were charging…….?

$98


yes that’s right……


$98

They do have smaller lights, and other color temps available; but the fact remains that the pricing on NEW lights at the local hydroponics store is a good factor of TEN less than anything you will find at the LFS or the internet. How they can sell at this price I have no idea, perhaps the hydroponics industry moves a LOT more volume than the aquarium industry. Perhaps they are trying to get people in the door so they will buy their fertilizers, CO2 generators (they burn propane for CO2), computer controls etc… or maybe we are just getting royally hosed because we mention the word “aquarium…” Regardless of the reason I just thought people may want to know the ridiculous prices if you buy your equipment from another industry.


PS id like to know if this is isolated to this part of the world or not? Are lights for the “other” industry even SOLD openly in the US of A? For those who have never lived up here there are billboards at the bus stop advertising fertilizers with pictures of several hundred plants in the backdrop, the radio is constantly advertising competing products to “get the best yield.” And people smoke up in front of the police station on a daily basis; it is a MUCH different world than last time I was in Florida… it would just be interesting to know if this microcosm is isolated or not….

-walk


----------



## John P. (Nov 24, 2004)

Cool. Did you catch any brand names?


----------



## Walker_ (Mar 24, 2006)

Non that I had any familiarity with; they were all like Grow master, and Super Grow etc… now that doesn’t mean that they didn’t all come off of the same factory floor in China and just get different labels stamped on them….


----------



## dennis (Mar 1, 2004)

Was it true MH or High Pressure Sodium? given that it is 10000K I doubt HPS but I am suprised tehy woudl want 10000k as teh spectrum would not be as good, more attractive but less condusive to some growth habits.

Its really interesting that you're so liberal up there. Kudos No wonder Bush wants to close the border Sad.

Anyway. less we start a political conversation, here in New England we have lots of Hydroponics stores but they are "geared" toward people who want tomatoes in the winter. Even in fairly liberal Massachussetts (where it is basically a small misdameanor, small fine only for personal use quantities) there would never be open use, advertising or actual photos.

Got any links to local buisness with those products and prices?


----------



## Mjproost (Nov 17, 2005)

There are several hydroponics stores near me also in Minnesota. They are geared towards people who want er.."green tomatoes" year round. It is thinly veiled what their main client is. We have very little advertising for actual products, but I have heard ads for the stores themselves. But, even though there is nothing illegal about it, law enforcement routinely "monitor" these stores, taking down license plate numbers, following people home, etc. The laws here are realitively liberal for possesion, etc. It is really sad. I wonder in the era of Bush is someone did that a store that sold something actually dangerous like a gun store? The NRA and Bushies would be irrate. Anyways....

I checked the prices and they were somewhat better than Aquarium prices, but not cheap like you quoted. But, the fixtures and reflectors and somewhat different than what we would need and I inquired about K ratings of their bulbs and they had to look them up, they had one 6500K MH that was expensive all other bulbs were much lower K. What was more interesting to me were the Compact Flourescent and T5 fixtures they were moving towards. Very nice fixtures with excellent reflectors for a good price. Not real aethsticly appealing for display. They had something called a "growth spectrum bulb" in some. Supposedly, it is a bulb that has only the spectrum of light that plants need to grow. So, you get for effiecent use of the wattage. They looked really funky and they had no idea what K they were, nor did they have a spectral graph. Also, all the fixtures came with bulbs I did not want, so they became too expensive having to replace the bulbs. But, its been almost a year since I have been there. Maybe I will stop down soon and see what they have. Walking in or riding my bike of course, my privacy and civil liberties are still important to me. Even if I am not doing anything wrong, I think law enforcement may still put me a on list somewhere.

I used to use a 250 watt Metal halide from Sunlight supply. the reflectoir was not so good for an aquarium and the ballast was huge and hot. But, I paid like $40 for it at a pawn shop, so the price was right.


----------



## Walker_ (Mar 24, 2006)

They are definitely Metal Halide, I was talking to the fellow for a while. Apparently they use both MH and HPS depending on what time in the growing cycle they are in. As for the 10K bulbs apparently they are a new thing, they normally use 4500-7500K for growing, but there are supposedly some new strains that can make more money if they expose them to 10K in the last week or so before they harvest&#8230;&#8230; (or something like that) From what I have gathered people are always mucking about with new ways to grow etc&#8230; Ill see if I can find some places that sell online; or maybe this could be an interesting business to get into; buy lights from the hydroponics store and sell to the aquarium community! However id bet the mainstream aquarium light people would get a tad touchy&#8230;

Here's a link to an article about it if anyone is interested&#8230;
http://www.forbes.com/forbes/2003/1110/146_print.html
And I think your right lets not let this thread go political


----------



## gnatster (Mar 6, 2004)

Not only can you find lighting supplies but other items that are handy for emersed setups. SHops like this usually have nice trays with lids used for sprouting that are great for emeresed growth of foreground plants. You can also find pH probes and supplies and sometimes test kits. For those that want to experiemtn with soils and nutrient mixes these shops usually have many different varieties on hand to play with.

Not far from me is a shop that also has a web presence. www.homeharvest.com I vist there often jsut to see what new high tech goodies they have.


----------

