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Hydroponics Setup

  • Seedling Culture

    • Hydroponic is the act of raising plants without using soil, but rather in a water medium with nutrients.
    • The plants are placed in a hydroponic system that supplies the required nutrients to the roots with the help of the water medium.
    • The use of hydroponic has helped farmers to evade serious seedling diseases and pests like fungus and gnats, which mostly attack in moist soils.
    • Media like coconut fibre, plugs, and peat pots have necessary nutrients and ensure that the seeds have a healthy growth.
    • Rockwool or oasis can serve as a medium, the seedlings can be transplanted along with the cube into a complete hydroponic system later.
    • Rapid rooters are mostly used as a medium as they have large numbers of important microbes and Mycorrhizal fungi that help in colonizing the root thus maximizing uptake of nutrients by the plant and evade serious diseases.

    Other options:-

    • Other than rapid rooters, there are other hydroponic options you can go for like, rock wool, coconut fibre, peat and oasis cube.
    • While the rapid rooters retain a lot of water, oasis and coir retain very little water.
    • The rock wool has a high PH concentration; therefore, the cubes should be rinsed in the solution of both water and vinegar to neutralize the PH before putting the seeds in the cubes to grow.
    • Mix a teaspoon of vinegar in a cup half-filled with water and dip the cubes into the resulting solution shaking off the excess.
    • Rock wool needs more attention because it is alkaline in nature.

    Location: -

    • The container should be placed where it can receive maximum light.
    • If you choose to grow your seeds in the house, the convenient places are like on a table or near a window where there is partial light either in the morning or in the afternoon.
    • In case you want to grow outside, then you should select a partially sunny location like a porch.
    • The container should be away from heavy rainfall and winds.
    • Since the container is small and portable, it should be moved from one place to another to protect it from bad weather.

    Maintenance: -

    • Water should be added only when the cubes start to get dry. Because much water favours the development of molds on the rock wool.
    • On the other hand, if there is no water for a long time the seeds will not germinate. Thus, the cubes should be moist but not wet or dry.
    • When the seedlings reach 2 inches in height, add diluted nutrient solution or fish water to the water in the container. This will greatly boost the root growth.

    Transplanting: -

    • The seedlings are ready for transplanting to a hydroponics grow system when they reach 3-4 inches in height. Look for 3 to 4 true leaves.
    • Fill the net pot with clay pellets until it is half full. Which supports the plants.
    • The best time of day to plant is in the late afternoon when the sun is not hot, and the wind has calmed down. By taking advantage of this time of day, the new plants have overnight to acclimate.
    • Strong sun and wind are very hard on new transplants. Unless watered carefully, and in some cases provided with some shelter from the wind and sun, they can severely wilt.
    • This places the plants under stress at the very beginning of their growing cycle and is not a good idea because sometimes they never bounce back and don’t thrive as well as they could have.

    This entry was posted in Uncategorized and tagged Hydroponics, Urban farm Bangalore, Hydroponics Setup, plant nutrients, water PH, seedling, rockwool, cocopeat, net pot on June 29, 2018 by hydrilla.

  • Food Security & Sustainable Farming methods

    The increase in population and urbanization has resulted in increased need for food and water in India. Our lands have become water and nutrient scarce and continuous use of synthetic fertilisers has depleted soil diversity which is needed for crop production. Challenges such as soil-borne diseases, weeds, and soil infertility, associated with soil plant production have made the soil culture risky and at times undesirable. As a result of the need to produce more and good quality food, without further damage to the natural environment, there has been an exploration of soilless agricultural systems, most popular, these include aquaculture, hydroponic and recently aquaponics system.

    Overview of Soilless Systems

    In soilless production, plants are raised without using soil as a growth medium. The method of not using soil as a crop stand saves significant water because in soil systems water can leach into groundwater. There are various common and available soilless productions systems; these systems include hydroponic, aeroponics, aquaponics, vertical gardens and tunnel or greenhouse aquaculture culture. Soilless production plays a critical and unique role in providing out of season food (meat and crop plants), herbs and flowers. While soilless systems have been a viable option to food and nutrition security in many countries there is little known or documented about these systems.

    Hydroponics 

    Hydroponics or hydroponic culture is a system where plants are grown in a soilless growth medium where all mineral nutrients delivered to plants are first dissolved in water before nutrients are available to plants. There are two types of hydroponic systems that are usually in use, these are liquid and aggregate production systems. The liquid hydroponic culture usually adopts nutrient film technique, and Deep-Water Culture (DWC)/floating rafts system. The growth medium hydroponic systems adopt various inert materials such as gravel, perlite, peat moss, peat, sawdust, rock wool, coconut fibre, grow stones, oasis cubes, vermiculite, coarse sand and expanded clay pellets.

    Aquaponics

    Aquaponics is a bio-integrated system that links recirculating aquaculture with hydroponic vegetable, flower, herb production, in the process saving a significant quantity of water. In an aquaponics system, effluent that is generated from the fish tanks is pumped and used in fertigation of growth medium beds (GMB) in hydroponic culture. In return, this process is worthy to the fish, because crop plants roots system together with rhizobacteria helps to extract available nutrients from water solution. The nutrients materials produced from fish algae, manure, and decomposing uneaten fish feed are pollutants that could build up to lethal levels in fish tanks, however, this instead waste serve as liquid mineral fertilizer in hydroponic culture. The hydroponic culture function as a biofilter removing off ammonia, nitrates, nitrites, and phosphorus and other trace elements, so the freshly cleansed water can then be recirculated back into the fish tanks. The nitrifying bacteria living in the gravel and in association with the plant roots play a crucial role in nutrient cycling. In the absence of these microorganisms, the whole system would be dysfunctional.

    Role of Hydroponics & Aquaponics in Food Security

    Food security exists when all people, at all times, have physical and economic access to sufficient, safe and nutritious food that meets their dietary needs and food preferences for an active and healthy life. There are four food security pillars which define, defend and measure food security status locally, nationally and internationally. These are food availability, food accessibility, food utilization and food stability.

    On top of food and nutrition security agenda/resolution is to achieve a method or programme that can directly support people with the opportunity to realize food security, particularly nutrition security. Developing simplified Hydroponics systems to make nutritious food production achievable for one and all is the core mission of Hydrilla Urban farms.

    This entry was posted in Uncategorized and tagged Hydroponics, Aquaponics, Aquaculture, DWC, Deep Water Culture, NFT, Nutrient Film Technique, Trough, Ebb and Flow, Urban farm Bangalore, Hydroponics Setup on April 30, 2018 by hydrilla.

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