Top 10 Rookie Mistakes to Avoid When Growing with Hydroponics

Marijuana is not commonly grown in all the gardens. It needs years of experience to grow marijuana perfectly. Those who are serious marijuana growers, have got great experience and different techniques to grow it. However, it is really disappointing for the beginners that improper decision can go in vain. In fact, different mistakes occur because of which the grower does not get expected result. The ten common mistakes which are made by the beginners will be mentioned in the following review. You will be surprised that, the mistakes are also found in the works of some experienced marijuana growers.

Top Ten Hydroponic Growing Mistakes

1. Prepare: Once you start marijuana cultivation, you will find a lot of work to do. You have to know all about the necessities of the plants you are going to grow. The need of water, nutrients, light, CO2, etc.
2. Fertilizer: Using perfect fertilizer can ensure better outcomes. The beginners do not have much knowledge about fertilizer. Instead of maintaining any hard and fast formula of providing the fertilizers, the grower should use it by knowing the demand of marijuana plants.
3. Handling Germinating Seeds: The grower have to be very sensitive about the growing seeds. You have to have some patience. At the seeding time, plants need extra care to grow healthy and in a proper manner.
4. Watering Marijuana Plants: The marijuana plants need proper watering. You have to hold the moisture. However, dripping wet can be severely harmful for the tender plants of marijuana. In case of hydroponics it is harder to monitor watering in marijuana plants.
5. Start Growing with Seeds: It is really a wise decision to start growing marijuana with seeds. In case of cloning, it will need much more experience to make it perfect. Seeds grown plants are more likely to protect diseases. It will help you to be successful in the first attempt.
6. Perfect Season: In both the cases, whether it is indoors or outdoors, you should be conscious enough about the timing. Don’t plant the seeds too early or too late.
7. Don’t over Fertilize: You have to start fertilizing when two spiked leaves appear. Don’t fertilize every time before watering. You can start fertilizing marijuana plants with 25% fertilizer and gradually increase the amount.
8. Don’t Under Fertilize: In most of the cases, it is seen that the beginners fear to provide enough fertilizer. It leads to the decision to fertilize lesser than the demand.
9. Bad Environment: Environmental factor is very essential here. The humidity in growing marijuana should be 30 to 70 percent. Depending on the season you have to change the decisions too.
10. Don’t Disclose the Fact: You know that growing marijuana is now in no go. Therefore, it will be wise to keep the decision and all the action inside you. Even an intimate friend can cause a major problem in this case. So, the beginners have to be confined enough to keep it secret.

Read More

Hydroponic Lighting 101: Definitions of Grow Lights Explained

Hydroponics is the technique of growing plants without the use of soil. The roots of the plants are directly soaked up in water rich in nutrients. Since, no soil is required, hydroponics can be easily grown in areas with limited space and even indoors. If you are looking to grow hydroponic plants indoors or in places with limited supply of sunlight, you will need to install hydroponic grow lights for the plants.

Here are some of the factors that will help you determine the type of lighting that you will need.

• The area that you will need to light in your hydroponic garden is one of the factors in determining what bulbs and of what wattage needs to be used.
• The amount of light and for how much time the plants will require is another important factor to decide the type of lighting that you need to use.
• The amount of money you want to spend on the lighting will also influence your lighting system decision.
• Different plants will have different needs of sunlight. So, the kind of hydroponic plant you want to grow will also be a determining factor of the lighting system to use in your garden.

Types of Hydroponic Lighting Systems & Grow Lights

There are a number of different Hydroponics lighting systems available in the market today and each of them has their own pros and cons. Choosing the right lighting system for your indoor hydroponics plants is important for its growth.

HPS Grow Lights

HPS lights systems, which are the common household lights used in most homes today, were used as a source of light energy. However, with time, they were found to be inefficient and the spectrum of light it produces is not ideal for growing plants. The benefit of using HPS lights is that they are easily available, easy to install and costs much less than other lighting systems. However, they output more heat and use more energy that will shoot up your electricity bills.

Fluorescent Grow Lights

Fluorescent light systems are a good hydroponic lighting system and provide red and blue light is a major requirement for the growth of the plants. They are more efficient and energy saving than incandescent lights. However, they are not suitable for large plants as they do not penetrate enough for them to grow. If you still want to use fluorescent light system for large plants, use the lights above and also on the sides of the plant. A popular type of fluorescent lights is t5 grow lights that is used by many plant growers.

High Intensity Discharge Lights or HID Grow Lights

HID lights are the ideal choice for most hydroponic plant growers. HID lights uses two types of bulbs, namely High Pressure Sodium (HPS) and Metal Halide (MH) bulbs. They are used by growers because they offer high light output and are more efficient than incandescent lamps. Since HID lights produces large amount of heat, proper ventilation and reflector height from the plant should be considered when using them.

Light Emitting Diodes Lights or LED Grow Lights

LED’s are the newest technology that is being widely used by hydroponics plant growers. They use less electricity as compared to other light systems and thus is growing in popularity. They also lasts longer, most of them running for more than 50,000 hours making them more convenient. They also produces a specific light spectrum that the plants needs. However, the initial cost of putting up a LED light system is huge and may take up to a year or more to pay off the initial installation cost.   

Since there are a number of factors that you need to take into consideration when choosing a lighting system, it is important to do your research and make an informed decision. For different particular cases, the grow light system must be selected correctly to ensure the best outcome. You can find all kinds of grow lights from hydroponic grow light retailers and on amazon.

Read More

History of Hydroponics

Hydroponics history covers a period starting from 600 BC to this twenty first century. In different times during this period, a lot of development and change has occurred, which has given birth to the current way of hydroponics gardening. As we know it is an art of growing plants without soil. Therefore, it took a lot of research activities by different prominent people, who made very effective formulas to enhance the production through hydroponics.

• In fact, the first man-made hydroponics nutrient solution was made in 1699 by John Woodward. He first took the initiative to grow plants on water containing different types of soils. As it was very first time of this experiment he couldn’t manage to find out individual growing elements.
• The history begins actually in the age of Theophrastus. He started experiments on crop nutrition before 287 BC. However, the earliest scientific approach was formulated in the year 1600. Belgian Jan Van Helmont illustrated that plants can get substances and nutrients from water. He proved his theory through classical experiments.
• “Plants get the essential mineral and chemical elements from air, soil, and water”-was published by Nicolas De Saussure in 1804. Within 1842, a nine-element list was also published which was essential for growing plants. The first standard formula of nutrient solution which became effective later was made by Professor Julius Von Sachs in 1860. Through this formula the plants were eventually grew successfully by nutrient solution.
• Within the years of 1882 to 1946, different prominent persons developed and researched various basic formulas of plant nutrition and ways to develop hydroponics. For hydroponics gardening and laboratory research on plant nutrition, those formulas are still used. Some mention worthy names who have contributions are Shive, Hogland, Deutschmann, Trelease, Tobbins, etc.
• In United State, the hydroponics cultivation was started as an experiment in 1950. The experiment was started on 3.7 acres of land. In 1975, hydroponic greenhouse were in effect in United State.

By 1999, not only the hydroponic gardening became fully successful, but also the hydroponic products were available in the market to get better results from hydroponic cultivation. Even in the next NASA mission too, Hydroponics will play a revolutionary part.

Read More