Soil is overrated when it comes to plant growth.
The next time someone tells you that the single most important part of plant growth is soil, tell them they’re wrong. Of course, the quality of the soil is very important when you’re planting vegetables and fruits, but soil is not actually crucial for a plant’s growth. However, water is.
During the 1900s, it was learned that inorganic ions in water are the important mineral nutrients that are absorbed by plants. Soil does fulfill the role of a mineral nutrient reservoir in nature, but it is not required for plant growth. When those essential mineral nutrients are brought into a plant’s water supply through an artificial method, soil is not really needed for the plant’s growth. That’s what hydroponic gardening is all about.
Hydroponic gardening can be quite challenging, especially when you first give it a shot, but it’s also very rewarding after you learn the basics. Once you’ve chosen your indoor grow lights, understood the different types of hydroponic systems and learned some of the skills of indoor gardening, you may find this method just as or even more enjoyable than outdoor gardening.
Among the many components of this comprehensive system of gardening are the nutritional and lighting requirements of the specific plants that you’ve decided to grow, and developing a feeding plan prior to planting.
For people such as me who don’t have as much patience as they used to, one of the things that I consider a big advantage with hydroponic gardening is the unusually fast growth rates that occur. This is made possible by the plant not having to grow roots down into soil to mine for food.
Among the different hydroponic growing systems are hand watering, the reservoir method, the flood and drain method, the drip system, the nutrient film technique, the wick system, and aeroponics. Instead of soil, you can grow your plants in an inert medium, such as rockwool, expanded clay pellets, perlite, perlite/vermiculite mix, perlite/coconut coir mix, or volcanic rock chips.
Have you tried hydroponic gardening yet? If so, what have your experiences been with this very different method? What are some of the challenges you’ve faced and how have you overcome them? I’d love to hear from you about this interesting subject.
Has no here heard of Aquaponics? You feed the fish, and their waste feeds the plants. Believe it or not I am not a huge fan of veggies but I have heard many say that the flavor of hydroponically grown produce is not there. However, with aquaponics you get the flavor AND the ease of growing your own food. Just Google aquaponics and do the research. I think it is a better option than hydroponically grown veggies.
I’m actually a big fan of aquaponics and am currently working on putting together some information and a DIY kit – hopefully I’ll get it all square by here in 2015.
Since my Maternal grandparents were living and grandfather used a push Plow 3 times a year, I learned about seed saving and how old time farmers dried, wrapped and stored seeds for the upcoming season. When I got older I contacted several seed vaults and did some visits to see what was the latest methods to add to my existing knowledge-all of my seeds are organic and seeds not normally seen at the green houses. Most can be found at a good seed vault (ie tomato-Arkansas Traveler). Now I have about 2,000 seeds in nitrogen packages and use my regular crop seeds as starters the next year. I’ve only dealt with buying organic seeds from one place,n that’s Seeds of Change.
Hydrophonics is not difficult or expensive to set up. I am using plastic carry-all containers with holes in the sides and drilled 3/4″ holes in the bottom, put 6 peat pots with Perlite inside. Set it in a dollar store plastic dish pan, Then added a small air stone bubbler and an aquarium air pump. I am still working on which nutrients are best, but started out with soluable kelp in the water. Tomato, Pepper, and Huckleberry plants are thriving but not producing yet. Misting plants will polinate them if indoors. An ongoing learning experience, and fun too!
I grow Tomatoes and Peppers all year long indoors, not as productive but hey, a fresh Tomato in January can’t be beat.
I will take Craig’s advice using mulch for outdoor gardens. I have heard to use old mulch and let it break down to create soil. Thank you!
around Savannah Ga I have had a garden for 40+ yrs, with soil test done about every 5 yrs says ” need a little lime ” so I apply dolomite 1 ton per acre. Using 5-10-15 fertilizer. My neighbor does organic tomatoes also. I give my Rutgers to her and she gives me some of her Rutgers. The only difference here is what tomatoes are feed. I do all the tractor work on both places which are about 2 cities blocks apart. Maybe I am bias but my wife eats my tomatoes and neighbor’s husband eats my tomatoes first always
You say that soil is not important to grow the seeds. You have never tried to grow anything in the soil in
the Las Vegas NV area. I have grown gardens in TEXAS, ILLINIOS, UTAH, OKLAHOMA. ARKANSAS, ITALY
and tried in Las Vegas in 3 different locations with
complete failure on all 3 tries. I have talk to a couple
of people that have had some success growing some
things , but not easily. The soil here is so poor that it
is almost impossible to grow anything. So how could I grow food for survival? There for, How would this kit do anything for my Family?
Some soils need alot more work than others. You could consider hydroponics, like I mentioned, or you work on soil improvement. I hope you already compost. Did you see this article? http://www.patriotheadquarters.com/gardening-in-the-high-desert/
Fact: soils are vital to plants and the nutrition they produce. With out soil plants are unable to properly develop their full nutritional value. Thus is why Hydroponic growing produces generally tasteless food with anywhere from 12% to 38% less nutritional value.
If you want to be able to survive without using excessive water, far lower use of fertilizers if any at all and virtually no use of pesticides then you need to use the following :
1. Go to Soil Secretes.com Read through the entire site. Go through all the video’s and research documents. I tell people about this stuff all the time and have found if people aren’t motivated by self interest there is no reason for me to explain everything over and over.
Most soil in the US is nutrition depleted. Products produced at soil secretes are exceptional and have been used in very dry deserts with sandy soils poor soils. The products have also been used where mining has been done and the soils have become toxic and refuse to grow anything.
Just study the site. If you have questions call Michael and tell him Craig Barnard in Idaho referred you. I’d appreciate that.
Next it is important to understand how soil works and you should know that without plants it doesn’t work so well. For example, how many of us have bought tons of material to change the PH in our soils? We have bought soil test kits and followed all the procedures Master gardeners tell us to follow. By the way, Master Gardeners are educated by Govt Extension offices who are associated with the USDA who are associated with Monsanto and every garden product seller in America.
So lets look at nature. Why are all the plants dying from insect infections and how come they seem to grow wild fruit without being worm infested etc??? Ever wonder?
First lets understand that even if you had a 200 foot tall tree only the first 6″ to 8″ of soil produce all the nutrition it needs. This is where that all you need is water from Frank comes in handy. Yes plants need water. Some more than others but here’s the catch, plants in soil without water have no mechanism to take the nutrients out of the soil if water isn’t available. Roots suck up water and micro nutrients together. Naturally occurring nutrients made through the natural decaying process are best for the plant and the soil. Plants will actually create the PH environment they need in the soil close to their fine fibrous roots that take up water. This takes place at a microscopic level.
Now, let me step back for a second. If your one of those super duper all powerful Master Gardeners you probably believe fertilizer is king. I’m not able to agree. Fertilizer is like candy is to a child. Give a child a warm healthy well balanced meal with a candy bar next to it and guess what is eaten first. Yep. If you have kids you know the candy bar will be eaten first. So, if you put the candy in the soil (Candy bar on the table) the plants will first go to the candy and stop their natural action and reactions with the soil. By the way, this is the recorded and well established reason 80% of all farm land is or has become sterile of naturally occurring nutrients and why farmers keep companies like Monsanto and Dow so wealthy.
Because of the badly damaged soils on most farms the business of hydroponics is becoming bigger business every year. AND farmers are learning that the can feed plants candy (fertilizer in water) and get massive amounts of produce per square foot as compared to open land farming. However, the nutritional values are inferior and always will be.
Next tip. I highly recommend you learn about how to make your own mulch. Not compost. Mulch. We have learned to take plants from all around us, including shredded pine branches, and all kinds of other green plant material grind it all up in a shredder and spread anywhere from 10 to 212 inches of the material over our plant beds. Remember this, the mulch will eventually become top soil as it breaks down. It will also keep the sun from robbing your soil of both water and natural micro nutrients and it will not bleach the soil of natural enzymes. This reduces watering and keeps your soil alive which is exactly what you want in a SURVIVAL environment. You DO NOT want to be going out to buy fertilizer and pesticides all the time.
In our experience it take two seasons to reall see the benefit of your application for fruit tree’s and you will see some significant benefit in gardens the first season.
I wish to stress this entire process is topical. No tilling is required or suggested.
The fruit and produce you will get from this process will be amazingly tasty and have every bit of nutrition any survivalist mother will want her family to have.
We are adding 20,000 earth worms to our garden this year as well as other beneficial bugs.
I hope all this information is helpful.
Regards,
Craig.
First you do a soil test. send it to me and I will solve the problem for you. You have to know what is missing before you can solve problems. Here were have extremely high Mg. If you don’t know that, then you can get to first base. So soil test.
I beg to differ with the idea that hydroponics is a “better way” to grow healthy foods. Lately there has been a push in favor of “EARTHING”. Meaning that we humans need to engage more in connect with the Earth –Soil via going barefoot more often (where comfortably and safely possible of course) As with plants, they should get their Energetic foundation from touching the soil. Water-only based growing of foods may be space conserving, but think of the following also:
If there is a crisis of any sort which cuts us off from the general economic supply line, then where are we going to get the “nutrients” to put in the water in which our plants grow? These commonly come in bags available from the specialty supplies stores.
Sure, urban sprawl has put way too many of us humans and companion animals out of touch with the soil and sunshine. That is why way too many of us are not healthy, and will not so as long as Big Medicine and Big Pharma neglect this aspect of our wellbeing.
The kinesiologocal (= neuro-muscular feedback) http://www.kinesiology.net/ testing of foods grown on adequate (preferably high quality) soil versus hydroponically cultivated foods, shows that our bodies are not apt to accept the latter version. The reason is that the bagged supplies are grossly devoid of the nature-made components which make “certified organic” so much more agreeable to our human physiology.
Look at the content of a carrot on this URL:
http://sun.ars-grin.gov:8080/npgspub/xsql/duke/plantdisp.xsql?taxon=357 where it states: “Number of distinct activities for species = 917”. Mind you, 917 have come from the soil these carrots grew on.
Unfortunately, there are no studies done on data acquisition of water-only based grow mediums.
I am Dr. Pieter Dahler, DDS, MD, ND (hon Prof), PhD.
When you write me at [email protected] I will send you an article I wrote regarding the time factor in the quantity of nutrients left over after growing them at different locations and soils.
I teach soil balancing so everyone can have good soils. It is not that difficult but so uncommon. We can solve most problems quickly by knowing what is there and what is not and what are the values. We live in the desert and we grow everything.