by Shelly Mcrae

Created on: February 06, 2009   Last Updated: September 21, 2010

Hydroponics is the practice of growing plants using nutrient rich water and a non-soil medium. Hydroponic gardens are based on containing the roots of the plants within a water bath. The plant is stableized using a medium such as clay pellets, rock wool or gravel.

To start a plant for a hydroponic garden, place the seed in a rock wool seedstarter. When the seed sprouts, place the seedling, still in the rock wool, in a net pot. A net pot resembles a small plastic cage without a top.

Fill in the net pot with clay pellets, gravel or small sheets of rock wool. The roots of the seedling should be hanging through the bottom slots of the net pot before the medium is added.

The seedling is then placed in a hydroponic system. The dutch bucket is a commonly used system. Buckets equipped with pumps are connected via pipes to a main water supply. The buckets act as reservoirs in which the water is constantly circulated and renewed. The seedling, then, is continuously fed and watered.

The advantages of hydroponic gardens are their minimal space requirement, their high yields, easy pest control and ease of maintenance. Once a hydroponic garden is set up, all the gardener need do is occasionally add nutrients to the water supplies.

Because hydroponics require no soil, pests that live in soil, such as cutworms and squash bugs, do not generally invade hydroponic plants.

Hydroponic gardens tend to have high yields because the nutrients added to the water supply can be targeted to the plants' needs. Tomato plants will take the nutrients they need. Cucumber plants will take the nutrients they need and so on.

Systems such as the dutch buckets system or the lettuce raft require little space. Several tomato plants, cumcumber plants and broccoli can all be grown in a fifteen foot square space. A lettuce raft can accommodate up to nine plants, all contained within a plastic container no larger than two by three feet.

Unlike soil, which can "wear out", hydroponic garden water can be enriched whenever necessary. Hence, there is no need to rotate crops or let beds lie fallow. This means more space available for growing vegetables and herbs.

Ancient civilizations such as the Aztecs understood the advantages of hydroponic gardening. The populations on islands in Lake Texcoco would seed rafts lined with thin layers of sediment. The people would then float the rafts onto the lake's surface. The seedlings would sprout and the roots would grow into the lake. The rafts, tethered to the shore, would then be towed in for harvesting.

As the agricultural industry faces such issues as nutritionally depleted topsoil and ever-expanding cities, hydroponics is becoming an important option. The verticality of hydroponics addresses space issues, and the use of water as a growth medium reduces the need to add chemical enhancements to foods and soil.

This old practice of growing plants in water is gaining interest again. And it can be accomplished by the home gardener as well as by corporate agriculture.

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