We started growing with hydroponics 3 years ago. We started by using rock wool in two liter bottles. This gave the plants enough room to grow and held the moisture into the roots. Although it started well, eventually the roots ran out of room to grow and the rock wool became a space taker rather than a benefit. We also cut the entire bottom off of the bottle which exposed the system to evaporation.
We had some fantastic plants but rock wool is expensive and we knew we could get more produce with more room for the roots to expand into. The next step was to try a test system which used no medium at all.
- You can see the rock wool nuggets in the bottles.
- Rock wool system later in the year.
The plants below were placed into the bottles with nothing but a peat pellet for support. The tomatoes we got from this system had the thinnest skins we have ever seen and the taste was out of this world. The bottoms of these bottles were cut more precise so that the plants were held in place using a peat pellet. This also limited upper evaporation.
- This test system used no growing medium. Just roots and a peat pellet.
- Same system later in the year. The plants worked fine with no medium in the bottles.
This test system was such a success that we decided to drop rock wool completely and grow just using roots in bottles. We set up two systems this year in this fashion but encountered some serious issues. The first problem was that each system had to be extremely level from one end to the other. If the system was out of level just a bit some plants wouldn’t reach the nutrient solution and others would overflow. This was a drastic change from using rock wool which sponged nutrient solution up to the roots. Throw in unlevel ground and the leveling of each bottle quickly become a royal pain in the ass. Peat pellets are small and were difficult to keep attached to the upper part of each bottle. Once the roots grow out they will tighten the plant into the bottle opening but until then they slip down into the bottle, wobble about, get damaged and require daily adjusting.
- New peat pellet hydroponic system.
In conclusion each bottle required that we trim it accurately to wedge the pellets into place for stabilization. If your level is off by 1/2 inch or less the hydroponic solution won’t reach the base of each plant causing crop loss. We needed to go back to the drawing board.
A few weeks ago my wife found some coffee cups in a closet. They seemed to have no value at first. When planting, you always need containers to put your plants in so we began transplanting our sprouted peat pellets into the cups. We added our own mixture of worm castings, bat guano and other nutrients to give each plant a boost before placing them in the hydroponic systems. The coffee cups quickly became loaded with roots. We were able to be slide the plants out of each cup and the roots held the mixture firmly in place.
Eureka… we can put the cups into the bottles. Each bottle was trimmed so that it would fit a coffee cup all the way to the rim. Fresh cups were trimmed about a half inch from the bottom and plugged into the newly cut two liter bottles. Pulling each plant from it’s current cup and setting into the new hanging cup system went smooth and easy. Hanging like this the lower portion of the roots is exposed to the nutrient solution.
This is working fantastic and we plan to use this system for our newest greenhouse. The plants have stability and there is room for roots to grow out into the two liter bottles. The best part of all is that each cup hangs way down into the bottle so I can have an unlevel system and each plant still gets water. Each plant can be up or down as much as an inch and they still gets a full watering.
No more peat pellet wobble, no more worry about each plant not getting enough nutrient or water and best of all no more peat pellets. We are now starting seeds directly in the coffee cups and once sprouted and they develop a root system to hold the nutrient we plug them directly into the hydroponic systems.
- See how nice the two liter bottle holds the coffee cup…
- We even tried using small planters which also worked great.
- See how the nutrient solution touches the roots which are exposed from the cut coffee cup?
- When the nutrient drains the roots still hold the soil mixture in place.
- The new hydroponic system looks and works great. I can’t wait to try this in the new greenhouse. Our next step is to cover the bottles with aluminum foil so that algae and other things don’t start to grow and use up our nutrients before our plants get their share.
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