Have you ever thought about how much water has been used to make your shoes or the clothes you are wearing? How much to produce the food you eat? How much of this water have been polluted in these processes? You should know about the “water footprint”. We live in a world where water wars [...]
This is a technical post for those who want to optimize irrigation of their hydroponic installation. We will use the concept of Readily Available Water or RAW. RAW means the volume of water that a substrate holds, that is easily taken by the plant. It depends on the substrate characteristics and the pot size: Substrate [...]
As one of my professors always said: There is no perfect substrate, but a perfect management for each substrate. Many materials can potentially be used as horticultural substrates. There are some quite exotic like rice hull, volcanic rock, coco dust, biochar… In fact the ideal substrate for you is the most accessible, cheap, that covers [...]
Do plants have senses? Most people would say no, but in fact they do. Their senses are not like ours, but plants have been on earth much longer, and have evolved in complex ways to perceive and adapt to the environment. They can not move to escape from danger so they learned to perceive [...]
As always, the short answer is “it depends”. We will try to orient you in this first decision. It depends mainly on the climate, culture, substratum and the grower. In warm and dry climates we should choose big containers and a substrate which retains lots of water (rock wool or coconut fiber) They are [...]
There are many myths about hydroponics. Often there is a bias toward the positive characteristics and disadvantages are ignored, but like any other culture system it has both advantages and disadvantages. Using hydroponics does not ensure higher yields by itself; it is not magic, just science! Anyway, you need not be an expert in [...]
Soilless culture has been known and used by mankind since ancient times. The chinampas of Aztec culture, the Chinese floating gardens and mentions to “crop water” in Egyptian hieroglyphs are all good examples. Detail of the manufacture of chinampas in a mural of the National Museum of Anthropology, Mexico city. However, not every [...]
