Freshwater

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Part I: Aquarium Basics
A power center enables you to regulate the
lighting schedule on your aquarium. You can set
the time you want your lights to come on and off
and forget about having to remember to do that
as you are rushing off to work.
End caps fit over the prong end of your fluorescent
aquarium light tube like a sock. They are
made of rubber and will protect your lights from
getting rusty or damp in the connection area.
Lighting extras
Making a hood choice
Ballast kits allow you to plug lights into sockets
that you can clamp onto your reflector using
lamp clips.
Sleeves are colored materials that slip over your
aquarium bulbs to give a different color effect
(such as orange, green, purple, red, or blue) to
your water.
The best hood/lighting system for you depends a lot on your personal taste.
Some hobbyists swear by one certain type of lighting and hood combo, and
others swear by another. Here are a few types of lighting systems you can
choose from:
Eclipse
The Eclipse hood made by Marineland (www.marineland.com) is probably
the coolest setup ever invented. (In fact, everything this company makes
rocks.) This system is a hood that contains lighting and filtration. Using the
Eclipse leaves lots of space on the back of the aquarium, so you can move it
closer to the wall as well. You can also put the tank in the middle of the room
and give a good 360-degree view as well.
The downside is that you have to remove the hood to gain access to the tank,
and don’t forget to keep dreaming if you want one to fit a very large aquarium.
Standard full hoods
This is a regular hood that covers the top of your aquarium and has one or
more lights in it. There are usually a few small slots you can remove from the
back of the hood to allow you to hang things on the tank.
Strip lights
Strip lights can be used to add extra lighting to a tank or to replace hoods.
You can buy them to fit across the top of your tank. This is basically the light
fixture unit without the rest of the hood.