No You don't need grow lights. What you need is 1 cool light(blue) tube and 1 warm light(yellow) tube. That gives you the full spectrum of light. Have your lights on chains that can be raised and lowered, so you can keep the light 2 inches above your plants. If you are doing it in a cool basement a plastic cover will keep the heat close to the plants at night. Be sure to open it in the daytime though so you get air circulation to keep away damp off

Thanks for your reply, oilpainter I appreciate it.

Greg
Nevada

Greg,

Don't go with the warm light - seedlings need veg light, not flowering. Cool lights provide all the spectrum needed. And I don't keep the lights 2" above the plants but closer to 1/2".

JMO, but I grow about 600-800 seedlings a year.

Mike

I bought the chrome wire shelves that are four feet wide and two feet deep. (I have them on locking casters if I need to move them, but they are not going anywhere.) I can fit 4 standard nursery flats on each shelf. I have 5 shelves, though the bottom one is used for supply storage. I hang two shop lights for each growing level (4 bulbs total per level) from the bottom of the upper shelf (height adjusted by chains), so, three growing levels (12 flats). (The shelves go just about to the ceiling.) I put in a long 15 outlet power strip with surge protector vertically on the wall so that I could easily connect and disconnect all the plugs for lights and mats and fans. I think it works really well as a self-contained area for propagation, and it looks pretty good too.

Thanks to everyone for your advice, I know how I'm going to go about this now.

Greg
Nevada