A desk lamp would work for one or a few small plants. But, you would need to turn it off and on every day unless it has a timer and can start with a switch rather than a push button. When people talk about growing under lights they almost always mean under four foot fluorescent light fixtures with two or four tubes, and with a growing space approx. 18-24" wide by four feet long. But, you don't need to do this if you want to grow your plants with natural light in windows. The most important thing to remember is that episcias are tropical plants intolerant of cold. They do not like to be in rooms that get cold in winter--i.e. drop below the low 60's. In summer they generally thrive but in winters they will sulk in cool conditions. They like bright light but are not high light plants. Generally they like about the same light conditions as African Violets. Episcias are both easy to grow and problematic at the same time. When happy they grow fast and become beautiful. But, if conditions aren't right they sulk, lose roots, and will slowly die. Episcias are very easy to reroot and restart from cuttings. So, I always recommend that an episcia grower learn to propagate their plants, and restart them often.

As I said in my post on the other thread, I use the newer type of shop lights that are designed to optimize the newer thinner 4' long T-8 fluorescent tubes, which are readily available. I like them because they are more efficient and give more light than a typical cool white tube (which is a T-12). But, a shop light with two cool whites will work for growing a small collection. The 4' plant lights sold in hardware stores are much more expensive. They are supposed to deliver the right type of light for plants but they also do not put out a lot of light, so plants grow under them fine but not that much differently from those grown under generic cool white tubes. Since you want to give your plants about 10-14 hours of light per day, you need to have your light fixture hooked up to a timer. I use a three prong timer since the fixtures always come with three prongs on their plugs. Between a local hardware store and Home Depot I can find all of my equipment (fixtures, tubes, timer, plug strip). I use metal shelving units for my plant stands, that have three shelves for plants. Each shelf has one fixture with two tubes. Episcias appreciate lots of humidity so I keep some of my plants in terrariums, particularly my rooting cuttings, but the established plants do fine out in the open.

Jon

I want to put some of my episcias in a 10 gallon fish tank i have. What type of lighting and how many watts it has to be for them to be healthy? I have the fluorescent light that came with the tank but i'm not sure that would work. I was reading about this in some website and it said to use cool and warm white light? I don't know anything about growing under lights so any advice would be helpful. Some of the episcias that would be in the tank are cleopatra, pink dreams and unpredictable valley. I read they like to be either in a bubble bowl or terrarium. Anyway I want to know what type of lighting i should use that won't make it to hot in the tank for them.

In general I'd think you need a minimum of a two tube fixture with your choice of various lights. I think most work fine , though I use a cool white combined with one plant lite. If your aquarium flourescent has two tubes it should be fine if they're forty watt tubes. You can tell if they're not getting enough light , since they'll start looking very long and stringy with much more distance between each set of leaves "etiolated". Of course they will flower best with the brightest light , short of burnign in direct sunlight. I have to watch mine in south windows since come late spring the sun gets much too strong in the south windows and they will burn then. For winter , south is ideal for the longest hours of sun , and they bloom well for me then.

Mine thrive on a lightstand with 4 20W 24" Gro-Lux WS's per shelf. They get enough humidity from being on eggcrate above the water on the trays, which get bottom heat from the lights below.

I have 2 fish tanks with episcias - and they do good. Looks like if your aquarium gets some daylight as well as single tube aquarium light - together they do OK.

The inexpensive timer as well as grow-light for shelves you can get in Walmart.

The thing to keep an eye in fishtank = you need to open it and let it dry a bit from time to time - and meticulously remove dead leaves, spent flowers etc. I just lost everything in a third fishtank thanks to the botrytis fungus which works as a forest fire in an extra humid warm environment - so not only episcias can thrive in a fishtank.

It seems to me that episcias always grow fast and like to be repotted and restarted quite often to look good.