Hi everyone, welcome to Monstera Hut!
Today we will be talking about how much light that all my monsteras get daily. What triggered me to write this article is that I received many private messages on Facebook since I posted pictures of my Monstera Albo on one of the Facebook groups when I was trying to sell it. I don't know how to answer those questions, but after so many people shared pictures of what happened to their Monstera Albo and Thai Constellations, I can surely relate to their frustration. So, I decided to measure the light level my Monsteras Albos & Thai Constellations get daily.
To be frank, I am not a light expert, and I didn't know how to measure it until I did some readings trying to understand light level for plants, and now I know that light is measured in 4 units called Candles, Lumens, Footcandles and Lux. I will use Lux here because the apps I am using give me measurement in Lux, haha. But, again, I am not an expert, guys. I am just sharing my experience here.
So, through my readings, I discovered this app called "Photone" to measure lights level, and apparently, this app has been claimed as the best light meter giving the most accurate readings. You can buy a light meter if you want, but I will just go with the apps as I am just doing this for my hobby. You can read more about the app in this article, "The Best Light Meter App for Plants in 2021", which explains how accurate the app is and how to use it with your phone.
So, after I installed the app, I measured the light in the room at different locations where I placed all my plants. I took the reading at 8 am and also at 1 pm (the brightest). The app advises putting the phone close to the leaves to know how much light the leaves receive. So, the readings I got ranges from 6,500 lux to 9,000 lux.
For more detail on how I actually measure the light, you can see from my video here. In the video, I share how I placed my phone and how I made the light diffuser from 80-gram A4 paper. I hope you like the video.
As you can see in the picture and video above, the brightest area is in the middle of the windows. So, after knowing the light level, I have rearranged my plants and placed all Monstera Albo in the middle and Thai Constellation at the side. It sounded like I have favouritism towards my plants, haha. But I did that because Monstera Albo need more light than Monstera Thai Constellation for the obvious reason: Monstera Albo have lesser chlorophyll than Monstera Thai Constellation.
So, there you go, guys. Now you all know the light measurement I have for my plants. I hope it helps everyone out there. But, again, I would like to emphasize that I am not an expert. I am just sharing my experience, hoping it could help others.
Soon I will be sharing how I usually water all my Monsteras. Please subscribe to my blog, and you will receive a notification when I post the new article. Thanks for reading, and see you soon.