Hydroponic Benefits – Hydroponic Economics

Container Gardening vs Hydroponics

What is Better for Your Indoor Garden?

There are a few factors for you to consider when setting up your indoor garden. You must first decide if you are going to be using soil or hydroponics. If you are new to gardening, I suggest starting with soil until you learn the effects of your fertilizer on your plants. If you are growing a variety of plants, I highly recommended starting with soil. You can work your way up to hydroponics by building your own drip system for your indoor garden.

Read the Introduction to Drip Systems and then come back here. If you are ready for hydroponics read this: Guide: Circulating Drip System and then come back.

Benefits of Container Gardening

-Easy to get started

-Easy to maintain

-Little gardening knowledge required

Modifying the Circulating Drip System for Soil Container Gardens

To make the Circulating Drip System into a regular drip system for your container garden, you will just need to take the containers off the reservoir and into a Drain Table. There is a guide for building a homemade drain table here. It is for small plants, if you fill it with large containers it will tumble over. For bigger containers, you can buy a strong drain table or just sit them on something you can drain every day.

Benefits of a Hydroponics Garden

-Higher Yields

-More control of what goes into your plants

-Automation

Hydroponic Tomatoes

At the local super market I saw a label that read “Hydroponically Grown” on a pack of tomatoes. I instantly had to purchase them to add to the salsa we were making that night. The

hydroponic tomatoes were very ripe. They were very tasty and seemed no different than a set of perfectly grown soil tomatoes. But how often do you see perfectly shaped soil grown tomatoes? There is nothing wrong with soil grown tomatoes, but I had to pay respect to the hydroponic farmers. Commercial hydroponic farming is very efficient and eco friendly.

Hydroponically grown food can use up less land space to grow more bountiful crops. Commercial hydroponic food production can be great in a green house. The greenhouse protects the hydroponic equipment from harsh outdoor conditions. Hydroponic greenhouses give growers the benefits of clean hydroponics with outdoor sun cycles. After all, the sun is the best grow light you can get!

Try your own taste test! If you find some hydroponic or organic tomatoes at the local market buy them both! You can also get other kinds of tomatoes and compare all the grows yourself. A lot of times the quality of the product depends more on the farmer than the style, so don’t let one comparison set your mind on one type of food production. Post your comments below on your experience with buying hydroponic tomatoes!

Motivation from MaximumYield.com

In the latest issue of Maximum Yield there was an article about high yields in tight spaces. The article is motivational for new gardeners who may be discouraged to start an indoor garden. A simple indoor garden can provide cheap organic food for a family. It’s economical and eco-friendly. The gardener knows exactly what is going into the food. The knowledge of the food’s growth can ensure there are no harmful chemicals or pesticides being used. Despite the food and agricultural industry’s best attempts to bring families clean food, sometimes there are contaminations. Think of all the times you have heard about major food recalls on the news. These kind of things seem to be fairly rare and random, but there are ways to protect your self.

High Yields in Tight Spaces : Where a Little Can Mean a Lot

“Ever consider container or vertical gardening? Container gardening is an intriguing option for anyone living in tight quarters, as they are compact and easy to move around. Indoor container gardening is a natural extension of an outdoor garden. Any size home is a great space that will accommodate all kinds of plants. ” – Aubree Gail Gagne

Read the rest of this great article at Maximum Yield.

Cheap Organic Pet Food

The cheapest pet snack I can think of is salad greens. Organic greens are a fun snack for your pets and are easy to grow. You can even feed your pets the weaker salad leaves that you were going to cut off anyway. Instead of throwing those extras in the compost or garbage disposal, toss them to your best pet friends! They will certainly appreciate the snack and gain the nutrients they need.

Piggy — Fresh Greens on top of a guinea pig home.

If you have a lot of pets it is very easy to create a small container garden to provide fresh snacks for them. A small container garden is also very cheap and can be automated. An automated container garden for organic pet food is very economical and easy to set up. A small recirculating drip system can be built for about $30. Thirty dollars is a small price to pay for a garden system that will last years and provide many harvests of fresh greens. Assorted seed packs of salad mixes are very cheap($2-$5). One pack of seeds may last you a whole year depending on the rate you use them. You can’t get fresh organic pet food that you can trust at that price!

There are many manufacturers of organic and natural pet foods and it may be necessary to buy these for daily nutrition and feeding. Stay tuned- I’ll be posting a detailed guide on how to efficiently grow organic greens for your pets.

Check out Organic Authority for more information on the benefits of feeding your pets organic pet food.

"MMM Organic Pet Food" — Guinea Pig Finishing Organic Pet Food

Collect Rainwater to Fill Your Reservoir

A large hydroponic system can use a lot of water. Most indoor gardeners are concerned about the environment and wan’t to reduce their carbon footprint. Growing your own food at home is a great way to be green. Gardeners don’t want to be consuming more than they have to because that would be completely counter productive. There are ways to get your water for free and recycle at the same time. You can use any sturdy food safe container that can withstand your area’s outdoor conditions as a reservoir for rainwater.

Depending on when it rains in your area you may need to plan to catch the rain water during its season. Collecting rainwater is easy and even though it may not cover all your water uses, it will certainly reduce the amount of water you pull from your city or well. You don’t have to be an indoor gardener to have uses for rain water, although you should run your water through a reverse osmosis system to make sure its clean. RO water is better gardeners anyway because you know exactly what you are putting in. If you would just like to go buy a water collection system your local hydroponics shop should have something you can use. The water barrels at the hydroponic store are usually 55 gallon barrels with a lid.

I plan to write a detailed guide in the near future on how to start your own homemade rain collection system. In the meantime, Hydroponic Economics will be accepting pictures of anyone else who has started a rainwater collection system. Send your pictures to mailbox@hydroponiceconomics.com and you may be featured on the website!

Using Hydroponics for Self-Sustaining Food Production

Today I was watching TV and saw a special on the damage a high magnitude earthquake would do to a city like San Francisco, California. The damage was unbelievable! Traffic in and out of the city would be at a stand still, if it was even operational. Communication lines would be down. A whole mess of things I don’t want to be in. A specialist said the people who were the most independent and self-sustaining, would be the most likely to survive in a crisis like that.

Hydroponics is a clean and green way to grow food practically anywhere. Not only can you grow anywhere, you can MAXIMIZE anywhere. Hydroponic systems are very efficient and practically run themselves with the right equipment and knowledge. The point is the people of San Francisco and all other urbanized areas, can be just as green as anyone else. Just because you are a renter in a small apartment with zero yard space does not mean you can’t have a small wheat grass box, a flood and drain tomato table, and a simple deep water culture herb tote for all your cooking spices. 35-40 cubic feet of space(a 3×3 box about 4 or 5 feet high) is more than enough to take up a serious hydroponic hobby and home food production center. There is nothing better than the satisfaction of eating your own harvest.

Hydroponics are by no means limited to vegetables. If you are like me and really like fresh strawberries all year round, you have a reason to start an indoor garden! Not only will you have your favorite fresh fruit to eat whenever you want, but you will also learn A LOT about the plant you choose to grow. You may find that you can grow a better berry than the local farmers depending on your area.

Pass this knowledge on to a friend whom you think is wasteful or unaware of the many benefits of having a home hydroponics garden.

Soil-less Growing – Happy Medium

Soil-less growing is the alternative to growing in soil or hydroponics. Some soil-less grow systems could be considered hydroponic. An example would be a top feed system in rockwool cubes placed on rockwool slabs. I would also consider a container plant using hydro clay as the medium would be a soil-less grow. These systems can be easily maintained using a water pump to feed water and nutrients to each container or plant.

There are a multitude of reasons to choose a soil-less grow over a soil grow and vice versa. First, soil can be VERY messy. Accidentally knocking over a container that is pre-filled with dirt for a fresh transplant costs minutes of cleaning and a loss of soil. You can also contaminate your soil with whats on the floor if you try to put it back in the container. Soil is also a nesting haven for a lot of different bugs like gnats and crawling insects. Gnat nests buried in soil can be hazardous to your plants. The bugs can eat at the roots of your plants without you even knowing.

Simply switching the growing substrate to hydroclay or hydrorocks can help to control the problem. There are a wide variety of mediums to choose from when growing soil-less. There are also rockwool grow cubes, coco coir, and perilite. You can always mix a variety of things to create your own soil-less mix to create the environment you want for your plants root system.

Another Reason Hydroponic Gardening is Important

One of the main reasons I chose to start an indoor gardening project was to produce my own fresh, good-tasting, safe food. Some stores sell fresh produce, but my area lacks in availability for year round fresh fruit. Strawberries were one of the first things I tried to grow in a hydroponic system. Once you learn the basics of hydroponics you could set up a system to grow tropical fruit inside your house! If you have a big back yard you could even create a tropical green house with the sun and the addition of high power grow lights. Once you are familiar with all the equipment available you can create any environment for any plant. You can tend to plants with very delicate environmental needs.

If you do not trust the source or are unsatisfied with the quality of your local produce then start a hydroponic or indoor gardening project to perfect the fruit of your dreams! Anything is possible if you learn enough about the plant requirements. I try to find books on Amazon.com about organic gardening and plant care. The books on Amazon don’t cost very much and are usually pretty detailed. Buying a book centralizes large amounts of information for you to consume. Searching on the internet for the information you need is fast, but sometimes it is not detailed enough if you are just beginning. If there is a topic you are confused about or don’t know where to start, try getting a book to get your feet wet. On the other hand experience is the most valuable knowledge you can get. Good luck green thumbs!

GUIDE: Setting Up A Simple Drain Table Part 1

This guide is as detailed as possible so that people that are just starting with hydroponics can understand it. There are ALOT of pictures – You were warned.

Left side – Soil container strawberries Right side – Rockwool cubes waiting for fresh clones

It is very easy to go to a hydroponics shop and just pick up a drain table and an assembly for it to sit on. This may also include a $100 reservoir to go with the system. Hydroponic parts add up fast and thats where Do it yourselfers try to save. By building your own simple drain table you may be able to save money on your hydroponic setup. The saved money can be used to get bigger containers and more medium for your roots. The type of table I am going to show you how to build allows you to freely move your plants around in their containers. This table is useful for soil and hydroponics alike because it allows the excess water and nutrient run off from watering/feeding to drain into a run off container that can hold many gallons so it rarely has to be changed. It can greatly reduce the amount of maintenance needed daily in between harvests.

Types of Containers — Blue tub is for the water to drain into after it goes through the plant.

The clear tray is like a table for your plants. The lid of the container is what the tray sits on, on top of the blue tub from the previous picture.

Trays side by side *TOP VIEW* — The blue tub from the first picture can fit two of the clear trays which have about 6-8 inch tall walls.

Trays - A step back — Another view of previous image.

This is a variation of the table I am making for people with less space. For this version the lid of the blue container would be latched on and the clear tray would sit on top with a drain going to the blue tub. T Continue reading this guide: Part 2

Hydroponic Systems as Scientifically Perfected Nature

Hydroponic systems are able to increase plant yield and in some cases plant quality because the plant’s growing conditions can be controlled closer to the plants optimum growing conditions. A few of the conditions that benefit from hydroponic systems are:

Roots – Roots can not only be seen in some hydro systems but they are able to grow in a high humidity conditions.

Water – The plants water needs are met more often and systematically than hand watering or outdoor growing with the rain and good ol hose! Hand watering a large container garden can be very time consuming. Attention to detail may be beneficial during watering because drowning the plants feeder roots with too much water at once could be harmful to the plant. Hydroponic systems usually are characterized by automated waterings and feedings which could reduce the stress of constant human handling not to mention the convenience factor. It’s not always convenient to water your whole garden by hand when your plants need it, humans have lives to fulfill and water as well!

Nutrient content – Nutrient content is one of the best features of hydroponic systems because of the precise control the grower can manipulate. However, nutrient control is an art form that must be tailored to every hydroponic set up and plant selection.

The goal of hydroponic gardening is to increase yield and plant vitality. Hydroponic growing can be very simple or very complicated, the beauty is in the versatility of hydroponics. Look for more to come on how hydro can outgrow soil.