It is a method of growing plants without soil. Roots of plants absorb nutrients from water instead of soil. Required nutrients are added to the system from time to time. Surprisingly, the process is very basic. One can grow exotic varieties too using Hydroponics; no need of adding any herbicides or pesticides.
We will provide all the guidance about what to add when. This works wonders for spaces where there is no soil to grow plants. It needs less water than conventional gardening methods. Using Hydroponics, one can get five times the yield of a same sized conventional agriculture farm.
For the sake of better understanding, think of Aquaponics as a hybrid between Aquaculture (Fish Cultivation) and Hydroponics. In Aquaponics, the fertilizer that the crops need comes from a fish tank. The excreta of fish is highly nutritious for plants so it is circulated to the plant systems.
When the plants absorb the nutrition, the water in turn becomes filtered and clean. The cleaned water is then circulated back into the fish tank. The same process repeats over and over again. One can harvest the crops and the fish. Thus, without adding fertilizers, the two systems are looped for multiple yields.
This is the next level of awesome one could think of. Even more water is saved in Aeroponics as nutrients are provided by periodically spraying nutrients onto the roots using automation. As the roots don’t need to struggle with pushing the medium around them, they grow relatively quick. Thus it saves more water and produces more yields.
Most of us are aware of this technology whether we know the name or not. Growing plants in highly fertile soils as opposed to raw land is called Geoponics. Raised beds, Grow Bag Gardening and Pot Planting come under Geoponics.
How do you apply the technology of Hydroponics to plants that are top- heavy, bearing lots of fruit, or that have heavy vines? The roots need to be stabilized with some sort of media. Right? So the right kind of a high drainage, porous material is added to the pots or ‘buckets’ in which the plants are placed. Nutrition enters the connected pots from the central nutrition unit. The excess nutritional water is drained off through a pipe from the bottom of each pot. This excess water enters the central nutrition tank and the process repeats. People choose this method for its productivity with heavy plants compared to conventional farming practices.
HydroTribe