I also replaced florescent tube with LED.  At first they were about $30 a piece but now they are about $21.  It is not too hard to rewire and remove the ballasts. I created an indoor greenhouse in the house using LEDs.  It is quite bright and is used to winter over the outdoor succulents.  Most of the web searches mentioned red and blue LEDs but the light looks like it came from another world.  This is in the house and I don't want red or blue!  The succulents still look good after a couple of months under white LEDs.  They will go back outside in March.  I may put the African violets under the LEDs at that time. I am curious about other people's experiences with Iris seedlings

 

Scarlett

 

Just in case there's anybody out there who's interested in talking about
growing baby irises from seeds indoors over the winter....

I have been using those wretched inexpensive 48" fluorescent shop lights
for seedlings from seeds stratified in the fridge until they germinate
usually starting in Dec.  The fixtures are junk, but the more expensive
ones are too wide to fit two per the shelves I use.

I've been keeping an eye on the developing LED availability, and found
good directions on line for rewiring the fluorescent type to convert
them for exclusive LED use.  Very simple, except for dismantling some of
the brittle plastic bits on the older broken fixtures (duct tape!).

I re-wired three fixtures that were no longer working, bought a 6 pack
of LED bulbs, and wow, sooo much more light from those things out on the
unheated sunporch.

Some of the LED 48" tubes have labels that indicate they will work with
both ends of the fixture 'hot' and the ballast in place, but they use
more electricity, & since mine were broken anyway, I opted for the kind
that doesn't work with ballasted fixtures.

The LED tubes are still expensive, but not as outrageously costly as
they were at first.  My local Lowe's still doesn't have them, so I order
them online.  If anybody is interested, I will hunt up where I bought
them.  Pretty amazing that they ship just fine via UPS.

Linda Mann
east TN cold and dusting of snow zone 7ish
where most of us still haven't adjusted to wearing shorts, t-shirts and
going barefoot at Christmas, now down in the teens.

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