Landscaping and Gardening Info

If you’ve had some thoughts about gardening but wanted to try something a little more technically challenging, you might want to give hydroponics a try. This article gives you a brief overview of hydroponic gardening.

Dig Gardening — Without The Dirt

How does your garden grow? With fresh air, sunshine and rich, black soil? Not if you’re one of the countless gardeners who are now enjoying the benefits of hydroponics gardening.

Also known as the cultivation of plants in water, hydroponics gardening is booming in popularity, partly due to shrinking fresh water supplies and scarcity of fertile farmland.

There’s nothing new about hydroponics gardening. This method of growing has been abound for thousands of years, and can be traced to the famous Hanging Gardens of Babylon. This ancient wonder of the world was created with a form of hydroponics. Since those ancient times, researchers have proven that a number of different aggregates or media could be used in place of black earth to support plant growth. Hydroponics gardening is just one of many alternatives to traditional soil growing.

Benefits

Many people enjoy the space-saving benefits of hydroponics gardening. Apartment dwellers and homeowners alike can grow fresh vegetables and plants in the smallest of spaces, even on compact patios and balconies. Many commercial greenhouses have also adapted hydroponics gardening because of similar space-saving benefits.

It’s been suggested that, when properly grown, hydroponics plants may be healthier and more vigorous than their soil-bound counterparts. Without soil, nutrients are more readily absorbed by the plant. Hydroponically-grown plants mature more quickly and yield their harvest of flower and vegetable crops earlier.

Automated timers can enhance the overall convenience of growing in a hydroponics garden. This sort of system allows the gardener a little more flexibility, because it takes less time to maintain the operation. The hydroponics grower can spend more time away from the garden and not be worried about watering the plants.

Raising Healthy Plants

All plants, whether grown with hydroponics or in traditional soil gardens, require air, water, nutrients and light. Plants grown in a soil garden will absorb nutrients and water from the soil. The soil impedes the roots’ abilities to access what they need, making the nutrient uptake a little slower.

The simple lack of soil is one of the joys of hydroponics gardening, making it a cleaner and easier way to grow. Plants are never stressed, because water and nutrients are always available. A hydroponics system set up outdoors will receive natural sunlight and air. Indoor systems, on the other hand, require artificial lighting and air circulation for plants to enjoy optimum health.

For artificial sunlight, many hydroponics gardeners use metal halide lamps and sodium vapor lamps in conjunction with incandescent light bulbs. Fluorescent or specially designed grow lights may also be used.

Like all living things, plants need oxygen to stay alive. Healthy, white roots are responsible for delivering all of the nutrients for the plant. If the roots die, it is impossible for the plants to survive. Even if all of the other growth requirements are in place, they will be useless if the plants are not able to access nutrients through the roots. Therefore, your hydroponics system will require proper aeration through a means of supplying air circulation. This technique mixes the air throughout the nutrient solution, allowing the plant to draw out the carbon dioxide necessary to carry on photosynthesis.

Finally, a sterile medium is required. There is a selection of media available on the market, from simple gravel to specially made formulations. Due to the lack of soil, a definite joy of hydroponics gardening that’s particularly exciting for home gardeners is the lack of weeds to pull. There are also no soil-borne pests to worry about, so diseases caused by these pests are minimized, if not entirely eliminated.

If you love fresh produce but you’re short on time, short on space or simply don’t like getting your hands dirty, discover the many joys of hydroponics gardening.

Tags: garden, landscaping