Lets talk about Innovations in agriculture; Hydroponics. Innovations aren’t all always new with the never-in-existence tagline as the dictionary meaning would say, most of the times; it’s more a modification and repackaging of previous ways of doing things. With that foreground already cleared; we shall treat this topic like a twitter thread, to be further built on and updated.
The craziness of traceability is everywhere, even we readers want to know that funny writer that always crack us and the other you-know-who that provides us wacky gens. This same ideology applies to farm-produce consumers like you and I. The best way to trace produce is by having a huge supervision over it (the production, harvesting and processing stages), and such is what in-farming does. So what is in-farming is all about?
Conventionally; farming is done on an open piece of land to expose the plants/crops to sunlight for photosynthesis (its major source of energy) and all these other gigantic biological terms. In-farming on the contrasting end is farming under a roof, in a restricted and protected manner, say in the confines of a room, some sort of indoor farming through hydroponics.
We all have seen a Korean series at a point or the other, and you’d agree with me that these folks love their vegetables. So with their huge population; do you still think the needs are met by mere traditional farming? NO!!! , advanced methods (hydroponics being the chief of the lots) are being used not only by farmers, even giant industries (such as Sharp, Sony, Toshiba and Fujitsu) are now utilizing their former clean room facilities at their plants across japan for lettuce; producing it at twice the rate of normal field production.
Hydroponics this, hydroponics that [I know some are already rolling their eyes, lol], so what is this hydroponics that this guy has been rambling about sef?
HYDROPONICS
"Give thanks to the Lord for He is good: His love endures forever."
It can be defined as the growing of plants without the conventional use of soil, but rather with mineral nutrient solutions in a water solvent. The plants’ roots may be exposed directly to the mineral solution or supported by a substrate. It substitutes sunlight (photosynthesis) with LED lighting.
Basic requirements of hydroponics
For a typical hydroponic setup the following components are quintessential;
| Components | Definition/ Function | Examples |
| Substrate | Media for growing plants, they stand to replace the conventional soil. | Gravel, rice husks, rock wool, sheep wool, wood fibre, etc. |
| Nutrient-rich solution | Liquid medium that supplies the plant mineral nutrients | Organic hydroponic solution (fused with organically sourced nutrients from blood meal, wool waste, cottonseed meal, poultry and ruminants manure), and inorganic hydroponic solution. |
| Equipment | ||
| Electrical conductivity meters | Estimates nutrient ppm | |
| pH meter | Determines the concentration of hydrogen ions in the solution | |
| Graduated cylinders | Used for measuring hydroponic solutions | |
Technique of hydroponics
A lot have been discussed as to what hydroponics is and its benefit, so how do we do it? Hydroponics is all but a general name of planting without the use of soil. It has specific types/techniques such as fogponics (the use of aerosols), aquaponics (deep-water culture), etc.
The article will cover the two simplest techniques which are the Ebb and flow technique and aquaponics.
Ebb and flow technique can also be called the conventional hydroponics grow system. It is the simplest form there is, there is a tray above a reservoir of nutrient-rich solution. The tray is then filled with the substrate, the plant is either planted directly or placed in a pot on the substrate. The tray gets nutrient solution at intervals from a timer pump, it then drains back into the reservoir and the cycle continues like that.
Aquaponics can also be called the DWC (Deep Water Culture) hydroponics. It involves suspending roots in an oxygenated nutrient-rich solution. There will be a container say a bucket of some sort, the plant will then be placed in a net pot, with its root suspended in the solution. Oxygen is supplied by an air pump combined with porous stones so not to suffocate the roots. Plants grow much faster due to high amount of the received oxygen by the roots.
In summary; hydroponics is a very good choice, in fact excellent one for growers. It enables us a greater control over the variables and its effects on our plants.
If you out there [like john legend was imploring] and you looking to grow juicy plants with a great deal of traceability; then hydroponics is for you [winks].
