Botanists, agricultural farmers, gardeners, and hobby gardeners have all created complex environmental control techniques throughout the years, allowing hydroponic home gardening to flourish. The three key reasons why hydroponics is preferable to traditional growing methods can be summarized as follows:
- The feeding systems
In essence, hydroponic feeding techniques allow you to inject high-quality fertilizer/nutrients into your root zone/rhizosphere intravenously (IV). Because plants in nature must rely on rainfall/vapor or retain moisture in the earth for liquid nutrition, hydroponics can result in healthier, heavier, and faster development of anything you choose to produce, thanks to the range of feeding options. (Aquaponics, which uses wastewater from a live fish tank/water culture instead of fertilizers/nutrients, appears to have great effects and is gaining popularity.) In a hydroponic configuration, the liquid feed/water is also significantly more efficient, as more plants can be grown in far less space, and less overall water is required due to these feeding systems than if one used a regular setup.
People who live in places with hard water can also utilize a reverse osmosis machine, which filters and reduces the electro-conductivity (ppm) in ordinary water. Another advantageous control feature offered to hydroponic gardening.
- Regulation, Light Quality, and optimal PAR, PPFD
Indoor gardening has undergone a rebirth of sorts in terms of lighting efficiency and quality in the last ten years, thanks to developments in grow lighting. LED lighting provides a higher production potential while using significantly less electricity. As a result, LEDs have boosted not only the amount of usable light for plants (PAR) in any given space but also the distribution of that light onto the face of your plants.
Because light cycles can be automated and controlled, you can produce all year without sacrificing yield or crop health. When you combine the night/day cycle management with cutting-edge lighting, your harvests will soar.
- Environmental Management at its Highest Form.
Hydroponics entails the establishment of a micro-climate — an environment that you build and regulate in order to maximize the vigor and health of the plants, resulting in higher yields. In addition, the introduction of enviro-controllers allows for automating hydroponics, ensuring that your plants are safe. You can even go on vacation for a week and not have to worry about your hygrometer maintaining proper levels.
Extraction (carbon cleansing the air within your growth zone), airflow, barometric pressure, humidification/dehumidification, CO2 replenishment, thermodynamic control, and even ozone formation are all key factors that hydroponic gardeners try to control. All of these characteristics have the matching gear to enjoy, so with a little research, you can design your own micro-climate, which you can now control even from your phone.
“Most individuals consider hydroponics as strictly hydro grows (NFT – nutrient film technique, DWC – deep water culture, etc.) in which water is the growing medium rather than using a substrate, but thanks to current advancements in potting oxygenation methods, you can attain similar results using hydroponic nutrient distribution techniques, but with a more sturdy substrate such as coco coir, or even soil,” says an expert from Progrow, a hydroponics specialist company.
