Hydroponic Gardening is becoming very popular. There are many reasons for this, but first we need to define hydroponics or hydroponic gardening.

The simple answer is that hydroponic gardening means growing plants without soil or dirt. A growing medium and nutrient solution are used instead.

Advantages of Hydroponic Gardening

1. Hydroponic gardening means year round gardening. In other words, you can have fresh herbs and vegetables year round. No longer do you need to do without during the winter or even worse, pay the prices for produce flown in from another continent. Year round gardening means year round fresh produce on your table.
2. Hydroponic gardening can be accomplished in a very small or confined space. And, it is best done indoors. So if you do not have a yard, hydroponics may be your answer for how to be a gardener.
3. Hydroponic gardening does not use soil. Plants grown in soil expend a lot of their energy sending the roots out looking for nutrients. With hydroponics, the roots are fed directly with the nutrients, allowing the plant to spend its energy growing a higher yield. And, since the plant is not exposed to the soil, the roots will not pick up any diseases which can then kill your plants.
4. Hydroponic gardening can be very controlled and precise. As the gardener, you will control the amount of nutrients your plants receive, as well as the amount of light. Because this is usually done indoors, you do not have to rely on the sun and the amount of rain to make your plants grow. You have complete control with a hydroponic garden.
5. Hydroponic gardens are relatively easy to set up. Many supplies can be purchased from your local discount store. You can choose to spend a lot or a little, depending on your goals. You can even buy kits for getting started. The one thing you must not skimp on is the nutrient solution. Because your plants are not getting certain trace minerals from the soil, you must provide them. Therefore, be sure to buy nutrients made specifically for hydroponic plants.

Whether one of these reasons is your deciding factor for becoming a hydroponic gardener or all of them are, you will find the hobby not only fascinating as you learn more, but also very rewarding as you provide your family with a constant flow of fresh produce year round.

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Hydroponic gardening is a method of growing plants, flowers, and vegetables with no soil. It’s not a recent discovery, in fact hydroponic gardening was practiced by the Aztecs and Babylonians. Hydroponics seems to be having a resurrgence among hobby home gardeners nowadays.

Many people look upon hydroponic gardening as raising plants in water rather than soil, but that’s not quite true. In reality the plants are grown in a liquid mineral nutrient solution. Occasionally different mediums are utilized for growing hydroponics, including clay, sand, gravel, and vermiculite.

A lot of people feel that hydroponic gardening is a healthier alternative, since the plants receive continual access to the nutrients they need. Hydroponic plants also have uninterrupted access to water, so they can take in as much or as little as the need without worrying about over or under watering them.

Why Grow Hydroponically?

There are many other obvious and not so obvious reasons for growing plants hydroponically. The type and quality of soil does not need to be considered for instance, so it doesn’t matter how poor your local soil might be if you’re growing hydroponic vegetables. You’ll also benefit from the plant receiving many more nutrients, and thus theoretically the vegetables and fruits should provide you with much more nutrition than standard soil grown versions.

Generally there are no weeds to worry about, nor soil born viruses or infestations either.

People who live in areas which are primarily rock are unable to have gardens unless they bring the soil in themselves. With hydroponic gardening of course, this is no longer an issue. It’s also the reason NASA has been experimenting with hydroponics, because someday it may be a way for people to live on the Moon or in space stations where there is no soil naturally.

When plants are removed from soil based growth they die. This is why many fruits and vegetables are harvested early when they need to be shipped long distances to retail outlets, because the fruits and vegetables will not die off and rot as quickly during shipping. Hydroponically grown fruits and vegetables however, do not die when they’re removed from their growth system. They continue to live and grow, which means they’re fresher when delivered to retail outlets.

The Downside To Hydroponics

On the downside however, hydroponic gardening requires more technology and technical knowledge to accomplish. Hydroponic gardening requires specialized tanks, lights, pumps and other devices that can are expensive up front investments. And if any part of the system fails of course, the crop could be quickly lost.

If hydroponic gardening sounds interesting to you, or you live in an area where it’s very difficult to grow gardens in soil, you might want to explore some of the growing body of information on hydroponic gardening which can be found online.

Hydroponic gardening is a method for growing plants, flowers, and vegetables without soil. The term hydroponics is comes from the Greek words hydro (water) and ponos (labour). So as the name suggests in hydroponic gardening the plants are grown in water rather than soil, or, rather a nutrient solution to be more accurate.

A variety of techniques exist for growing hydroponics. The two main types of hydroponics are solution culture (where plants are grown in a liquid mineral nutrient solution only) and medium culture (where plants are grown in an inert medium, such as vermiculite, gravel or Rockwool). Most plants can be grown hydroponically, however some thrive better than others.

According to Wikipedia,

“The earliest published work on growing terrestrial plants without soil was the 1627 book, Sylva Sylvarum by Sir Francis Bacon, although he died in 1626. Water culture became a popular research technique after that. In 1699, John Woodward published his water culture experiments with spearmint. He found that plants in less-pure water sources grew better than plants in distilled water. “

In the 19th century researchers found that plants absorb essential mineral nutrients as inorganic ions in water. Under natural conditions, the mineral nutrients in the soil dissolve in water, and the plant roots absorb the mineral nutrients. The soil itself is not essential to plant growth as long as the required mineral nutrients are introduced into a plant’s water supply.