Homemade Hydroponic Systems: MOTHER’s Mini-Manual to Hydroponics

By The Mother Earth News Editors
Published on January 1, 1977
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PHOTO: FOTOLIA/ VASILITY KOVAL
A well-kept hydroponic garden requires less work than its traditional counterpart.

At first thought, the practice of growing plants in an inert medium (such as gravel), feeding them periodically with dissolved nutrients, and then draining away the fertilizing solution to aerate the roots seems downright “unnatural.” But people all over the world — from India (where folks frequently feed themselves from discarded containers filled with rubble) to the Netherlands Antilles (where large hydroponic farms operate with distilled seawater on otherwise useless agricultural land) to the good ole USA (where even famous organic gardeners, such as Eddie Albert, endorse hydroponics) — are finding that hydroponic systems do, in fact, have many practical advantages over “ordinary” soil cultivation techniques.

Benefits of Hydroponic Systems

Take, for instance, the fact that hydroponics gardeners can often obtain a greater crop of tasty and nutritious foods (or of healthy ornamentals) from a smaller space simply because the amounts of nutrients given to a plant and the times of those nutrients’ application can be controlled and adjusted and tailored to meet that particular plant’s specific needs.  

Hydroponics also can be successfully utilized on many tracts of land unsuitable for normal cultivation regardless of the native soil type. In addition — and somewhat surprisingly — the system of propagation uses less water than conventional gardens (because the runoff fluid can be recycled for several days), which makes it ideal for use in deserts and other water-poor regions. Other benefits can include:

  • Reduced threat of soil-borne insects and diseases
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