Hydroponic Vegetable Garden

9 years ago

I have built a gravity fed NFT system in Texas. Brief description. (5) 10'
4" PVC pipes between (2) 8' 4X4's. I buried a 55 gallon drum down with about 4" left out.

so I am running a big pump so I get a lot of flow. However most of the sprout roots do not touch the bottom of the pipe so I have used the 3 5/8"
cut outs to hold back the water at the basket so it gets wet allowing the Grodan cubes & Clay Pebbles to soak up some water.
I just did a nutrient mix on Friday with H&G A & B 165ml of each and 45 ml of the H&G Root Excelurator . I have Corn Broccoli, Cilantro, Dill, Bell Peppers, all sort of lettuce mixes too. Some other plants as well.

Just tested the water. Started with 55 gallons of Rain Water yesterday. Ph 6.3 (Rained almost 4" last night) PPM 478.

So my questions: 1: Am I doing harm not allowing the roots to work to find water, should I put the pump on a timer until the roots are more mature?
2: what should I use to bring the ppm up also can I just use my daughters 1600 ppm fish tank water to boost it a little.
3: After the rain i saw some of the lettuce leaves were almost transparent.... (BRUISED FROM WIND?)

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Gt7iJ5cGKj0

I am about 95% done with my setup

This is my first post but not my last. Please let me know your thoughts.

This post was edited by Mycle2313 on Sun, Sep 29, 13 at 10:50

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Comments (7)

cole_robbie
9 years ago
The fish tank water is excellent for plants. But I wouldn't pay attention to its ppm. Although it does contain npk, it's not the same as bottled hydro nutrients. There are aquaponics setups to grow lettuce from fish waste, which is think is something like 5 -.1 -.1 NPK, but it works more because of the beneficial bacteria in the system than the NPK levels. When you have a lot of good bacteria going, you can get by with less NPK, because the bacteria allow the plant to uptake the nutrients more efficiently. Those bacteria love fish tank water, even if you are still adding chemical nutes.

I would not put the pump on a timer. The roots will follow the flow of the water and continue to grow. The more flow you have, the higher the oxygen content of the water.

The bell pepper is a flowering/fruiting plant, and it will want more phosphorous than the other plants you have going. You might want to consider maintaining two separate systems, one for peppers and tomatoes. Otherwise you end up wasting nutes, because the lettuce and green plants can't use the higher levels of phosphorous.
Mycle2313
Original Author
9 years ago
Thanks for the reply. If it isn't a bad Idea I might just take the gallon or two out of the fish tank scheduled refresh and pour it in the system. I really want to have a second system. I let enought space for it however that means I have to dig another hole for the drum. LoL. (Broke through a layer of lime stone) this way I can like you said not waste nutes.
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.I have not grown either bok choi or buk choy, but it is a Brassica vegetable grown almost like lettuce and if I did it I would be sure there was sufficient iron and give it a similar solution to lettuce except more concentrated since rapa has quite an appetite and like broccoli has a high nutrient demand to produce all that nutrient rich content. If you run the pH around 7 you may limit growth depending on how good your control is, because over 7-7.2 iron becomes limiting and manganese is also slower. Since other Brassicas do fine at pH 6.5 to 6.8, I would do that, use a lettuce formula but instead of a CF of 16, I'd be using around CF=24 in comfortable weather and hope that sped up the growth which I expect it would for medium and bigger plants. Of course if it is hot as Australia there and your plants are transpiring lots of water I would cut back on the CF to the CF=16 level you are using to try to strike a balance between the increased plant uptake due to the heat and my target in regular weather around 22C. Like I said though I haven't grown it so these are just mullings. Good luck.
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Rio_Grande
9 years ago
The down side I see to the fish water is the unknown ppm. Not that there is anything in there that would hurt, you are kinda in a guessing game with the. Unknown ppm. I was doing that with300 ppm tap water. Fought it for weeks and finally I drained and refilled with 3 ppm rain water. Now it is all simple.

On the daming to get the water up to the cubes. I did this at first as well and after fighting stem rot I took the dams out. Now I start the seedlings in a 25.00 ebb and flow setup and don't put them into the nft until the roots are out the bottom of the net cups. The stems are much healthier now.
Rio_Grande
9 years ago
I just watched your video, your water seems way deep to me. But let me know if that works.

On my gutter system the film of water is 1/8 inch deep or less. Maybe you are doing something there I just am not familiar with.
Mycle2313
Original Author
9 years ago
Since this is my first run at the HPVG i was eager to get my seedlings out of dirt and into some Grodan cubes and into the pipes. The majority of the seedlings took to the pipes even in the 100 degree Texas heat. About the dams in the pipes. I was afraid the roots would dry out so i damned up the water. I have a lot of flow so it didn't hurt the plants however the roots did start to grow out the side of the baskets. I am trying to cut the dept by using the pvc cutouts to just splash the water on the bottom of the baskets like a speed bump rather than flood it. Thanks again for all the posts.

I hope once i have the system up and running i can set up a smaller pipe to feed the seedlings or just a different set up. My initial thought was to drill the last 2" or 3" drain pipe and put small pots in it ..... but i think the nutrient will be to much... Thoughts???
Rio_Grande
9 years ago
Hey, I am far from knowing everything if it is working I say do it. More I thought about it you kinda have a shallow water recirculating system. As long as you have an air space might work ok. Good luck!
Mycle2313
Original Author
9 years ago
Since this is my first run at the HPVG i was eager to get my seedlings out of dirt and into some Grodan cubes and into the pipes. The majority of the seedlings took to the pipes even in the 100 degree Texas heat. About the dams in the pipes. I was afraid the roots would dry out so i damned up the water. I have a lot of flow so it didn't hurt the plants however the roots did start to grow out the side of the baskets. I am trying to cut the dept by using the pvc cutouts to just splash the water on the bottom of the baskets like a speed bump rather than flood it. Thanks again for all the posts.

I hope once i have the system up and running i can set up a smaller pipe to feed the seedlings or just a different set up. My initial thought was to drill the last 2" or 3" drain pipe and put small pots in it ..... but i think the nutrient will be to much... Thoughts???