Can someone please define lighting for me? Direct sun Full sun Bright light filtered light indirect sun light Is shade the same as indoors? Additionally, any suggestions on what grows healthily in a suite with little natural light?
direct sun - gets some sunlight directly on the plant. usually only for a portion of the day - either in the morning, or the afternoon and the rest of the time it's in shade - which may be full shade or indirect light. full sun - gets sunlight for most of the day, if not all of it. filtered light - something is there to block the sun's rays from being too completely on the plant. this could be by a window and the window has a sheer curtain on it or blinds that can be angled to re-direct the rays or it could be outside and a tree that is close-by has enough leaves overtop of it to provide 'dappled' lighting. indirect light - the plant has access to good lighting yet isn't right in the light. this would be accomplished by putting the plant to the side of a sunny window or on a covered porch - close to the edge, yet not right where the sunlight actually hits. shade means the plant never gets direct sun on it. or, if it does, it's for a very short time - usually in the morning (the sun isn't as strong at rising as it is later in the day) and not more than a couple of hours. we'd need to know what lighting conditions you have before making suggestions. although some plants will have optimal growth in a certain lighting condition, they may still do well in condtions that aren't quite that. a couple examples: jade plants do best in full sun - they will adjust to lower light conditions and still do very well (they'll just have much slower growth). bromeliads also do best in full sun...they will manage to grow (albeit at a much, much slower rate and will rarely bloom) in indirect lighting.
to answer your question regarding my inside lighting conditions; not much! 1 bedroom basement suite, the only window is a rectangle 8 feet long, and 2.5 feet high. That may seem okay, but the window is only 2 feet above ground, and faces North. There are actual rays of sunlight through the window less than an hour per day. Do you know of any plants that will like this lighting?
Direct Sun is used for unfiltered sunlight outside. Typically terms such as a bright window are analogous inside. Filtered light is generally a term used outside only, but may describe a window with broken light from trees but it still should be bright. Full sun is a specific gardening term meaning direct sunlight for no less than 4 to 6 hours a day. In gardening there is a gradation from Full Sun to shade: Full sun: 4-6 hours Part Sun: Less than 4 hours sun Part Shade: Less than 4 hours shade Full Shade: 4-6 hours shade Shade is also relative, there is light shade and dark shade. Very few plants do well in dark shade. Due to the filtering of lights by the window glass, the brightest a house window can get is about Part Sun. Off to the sides of the window and several feet from a window should be considered full shade.
These definitions puzzle me. I must be missing something! Part sun: less than 4 hours of sun the rest of the time it is in the shade. That I understand. Part shade: less than 4 hours of shade. What does it get the other 6 or so hours? If it is sun then it is in full sun. The full shade really baffles me! The 4 to 6 hours of shade will give it 4 to 6 hours of sun? Can you shed some... light on this?
I think maybe that the "part shade" is 4-6 hrs, then the rest of the time is what analogdog identified as "dark shade", or possibly night time.
Any chance that you could get some plant lights hooked up in your apartment? I have a couple of light fixtures with 60-watt gro-bulbs---these are incandescent---in silver clamp-on fixtures. This arrangement is inexpensive and easy to install. ----I'd suggest maybe sansevieria or staghorn fern for plants that can stand low light conditions.
