i'm going out of town to see my parents and eat thanksgiving. i'll be leaving wensday morning and coming back friday at noon. Normally I shut off my grow lights at 8 pm or so and put them on at 7am. daily.


my question is should i leave them all on or turn them all off. or have someone turn them off/off in my absense.

I use a timer for my grow lights. You can buy them from walmart or lowes for less than $10. This way they turn on and off automatically. Highly recommended even when you're home so you don't have to mess with it (or risk forgetting to turn them off or on)

Timers are awesome! I use them for the fans in my greenhouse and the lights for the plants in the utility room.

Okay will look into that.

I also use them on lamps when we are out of town. It makes it look like someone is home. We set them to come on & off at the times we normally turn lamps on & off in different rooms. Example:
On in the LR when you normally would turn them on & then off when you would normally move to the BR where you have those set to come on & then off when you normally go to sleep. Helps keep the burglars guessing. We also leave a radio on just loud enough it can be heard through the front door.

Once you get a timer, you'll be kicking yourself that you didn't get one before.

But to answer your question, it would be better to leave the lights on for that whole time, rather than off.

I could not function without my timers. I must have a dozen of them. All my lights and fans in my greenhouses and enclosed porch have at least four of them and we have numerous lights in the house that are activated by timers. Since I have and use so many, cumulatively they are not cheap, but they are worth their weight in gold.