Thats ok with me. Just so i know where its been moved to, and title its under.

We can look around and find an appropriate spot. I don't have a suggestion at the moment.

We do have a forum for Pests and Diseases.

Mac: The prices I quoted were for the shoplight plus two bulbs, not the bulbs alone. It's tricky to compare costs between T8 and LED lights because there don't seem to be definite figures on how long the LED fixtures last. I've seen estimates from 50 to 84 thousand hours. Also most of the LED fixtures don't have reflectors, which means that the lumen output, already less than that of T8's, is spread over a wider arc and a smaller percentage reaches the plants.

Philip: I tried those newspaper pots one year and got soggy bottoms plus some of the mold that you mentioned. An interesting, but failed experiment.

Don, ok, thanks for clarifying that. It wasn't clear to me that you were including the fixture price. Since I already have fixtures, that cost isn't a consideration for me. LED prices have come way down but are still pretty steep. I think a lot of that has to do with "profit margin" and the more competition there is the quicker the prices will drop.

I read up on lifespan of florescent vs. LED. Grow lites, some time back. Fluorescents 20,000 hrs.
LED 50,000 hrs.
( They! ) say led's will pay for themselves over life of bulb.
But !!! What if you have to buy new fixtures ? Do we have a math-wiz out there that could figure that out?

Don : If lites dont have reflectors.
Some foil will fix-em up. Especially if there cheeper.
😎😎😎

Philip, I think Don covered part of that a few posts back, with cost for fixture and lamps. I was given this link by a member on another forum:
https://hyperikon.com/product-...
Reasonably priced, free shipping, and some run directly off off 115 volts and don't require a ballast in your existing fixtures.

@McCannon
Mac:
     Thanks for the link to the Hyperikon LED T8 replacement bulbs, I didn't have them on my list. They cost about $14 each (in 4packs) and emit 2200 lumens compared to standard T8's at $3 each and 2750 lumens. The LED tubes use 22W each (if the T8 ballast is not removed) vs the T8 32W.
     If burned 15hr/day for 60 days (about what I use for pepper seedlings) a T8 fluorescent bulb would use about $3.46 of electricity (at the average US rate of $.12/KwH) and one T8 LED would use $2.38 per season. It would seem then that it would take 13 years for the LED's to pay for themselves, but factoring in the shorter estimated life of T8's, I am guessing that they would actually only take 7-8 years to pay off their initial cost.

Hi Don. I think there's always a trade-off one way or another. I've been replacing my non-grow fluorescents on an as-needed basis. The cost doesn't make a dent in my budget and I don't consider the energy cost/yr since it's negligible compared to overall consumption. For the lamps in my plant starter area, I bought fluorescent because I had the fixtures and the lamps were cheap per/10 versus per/each.

McCannon said:...We should probably move this discussion to another forum...

Philip has started a thread for the insect question here:
The thread "Bugs in seedlings" in Ask a Question forum

Thanks. Philip let me know where he moved it to. We didn't want to trample on the lighting thread.

I wonder if our OP got the information they were looking for .

I don't know if the OP got the information they needed but I know I did. anytime there is a topic about grow lights I like to follow it. I have been using grow lights for about 3 years now and I still don't fully understand them but I'm learning. So thanks to all for the information.

Sorry if this seems too simple, but a wouldn't a light meter answer the question of luminosity and the seedling level?

Yardenman, wouldn't you still need a light level baseline for each type of plant to correlate the light meter readings?

I'm very much starting from scratch, and unfortunately don't understand the posts in this thread well enough to make a purchase.

Can someone provide a link to the best LED fixture and bulbs for starting seedlings indoors? I may also try growing kale, lettuce, etc. indoors for daily harvest (wildlife gets most when I plant outdoors)

I'll be using a similar shelving system as what's mention in the original post.

Thank you, and I apologize for my ignorance.

Temery, we all had to start somewhere. I start kale, lettuce, and a lot of other vegetables indoors, under lights. There's no reason that I can see that would prevent you from growing them to maturity. I use fluorescent lamps in shop light fixtures because they fit my need and they're inexpensive. I'm sure you'll get plenty of feedback on other options shortly. I'm sorry but I can't answer your LED info question since I don't use them to grow plants.

I picked up a relatively inexpensive, one-foot square LED array from Amazon that seems to be working well. I like it well enough that I'm thinking about maybe getting another.
https://www.amazon.com/dp/B00S2DPYQM/

Now !!! Dont down yourself !!!
The only ignorant/dum/stupid question ! Is a question never asked.

I have no link for you.
You want 6500 k growlite bulbs.
I suggest you go to your local hydroponics store and pick there brains as to what you need. Number of plants, plants your growing, space you want to lite, etc. They know there stuff ! Veges and flowers. Not just marijuana !!!
The hydro guy i talked to... Lives in the foothills. He cant grow a single thing. Wildlife. Veges a gourmet for deer, rabbits, etc. He grows all his veges inside, under lites !😁!
Doing what i suggest. Will give you a good ideal of what you need without buying unnecessary lites.
And ! Being your talking about growing your veges entirely inside, i would go the LED/LCD lites. Over there long lifetime, they will pay for themselfs in energy savings.

😎😎😎

woofie said:I picked up a relatively inexpensive, one-foot square LED array from Amazon that seems to be working well. I like it well enough that I'm thinking about maybe getting another.

How large of an area does a one sq ft led light cover?