All plants need oxygen for respiration. This enables them to take up water and nutrients.  Providing root systems with the maximum amount of oxygen possible encourages the quantity of nutrients absorbed by the plant. This results in faster growth and can greatly increase the size and quality of harvest.

When using a continuous flow or aeroponic system you usually don’t need supplemental oxygen.  For other systems, consider aerating your nutrient by bubbling air into the reservoir.  This can be done with an aquarium pump.

It just might be that an in home  garden would work very well for you as it does for me.  Do you like to see plants growing lush and healthy indoors?  Do you like the smell of them and would like to grow something that you could taste as well?

I don’t have a very big outside garden but still grow what I can in the summer.  As soon as the frosts come, that’s the end of that.  Now I concentrate on my in home garden, which grows way faster than the outdoor one, and I have fresh produce in no time.  It takes much less work and can put a small hydroponic system on my kitchen counter, in the spare room or down in the basement.  It has its own light so I don’t have to worry about have a sunny window.  The system is a clean, with no mess, low maintenance and it really works.

If you are interested in starting an hydroponic garden, there are many solutions available to you.  You may be looking at a pre-made grow box or you want to design your own set-up.  Here is a little bit about how the hydroponic technique works.

At the heart of it, there are two basic methods for growing with hydroponics: solution culture and medium culture. Solution culture doesn’t use a solid medium for the plant roots to sit in, just the nutrient solution either continuously or periodically. Medium culture uses a media such as rock wool or expanded clay pellets to hold the plants and soak up or circulate the solution.

When you know which plants you want to grow, you should find out which method would suit them best.  Some are more likely to thrive in the nutrient/water situation while others will need the support of the rock wool or hydroton clay pellets.

Hydroponics has received a lot of undeserved bad press. Because many people are using hydroponics for growing illegal plants associated with drugs,  the person in the street doesn’t know how the use of this technique is feeding people good, fresh food on a daily basis. There are plenty of legitimate uses for hydroponics by gardeners all over the world.

Like people living in high-rise condos for instance. Most people living in tall skyscrapers do not have access to a garden area as you do if you own a house. The same goes for apartment dwellers. It makes it very difficult to haul bag-loads of soil up to your home and then have heavy pots to move about on even a little balcony or patio.

A hydroponic system can easily be placed in any spare room, allowing you to grow your own fresh organic herbs, fruits and vegetables just feet away from your kitchen. With hydroponics you have no dirt or no bugs and everything stays perfectly fresh. Without hydroponics, people who want to grow their own organic and pesticide free fresh fruits and vegetables have a hard time doing so.

A crop of fruit that has benefited hugely from hydroponic technology is the strawberry.  People love to eat strawberries and the home-grown ones taste absolutely delicious.

Using the conventional soil-based method to grow strawberries on a large scale, farmers have to use a harmful pesticide called Methyl Bromide to get a good crop.  Since a hydroponic system does not contain any soil there are no soil-born diseases or pests to be eliminated,  the need to use toxic herbicides, pesticides, or insecticides is illiminated.  This negates damage this would do to the environment. For this very reason, farmers throughout the world are moving into hydroponic gardening in a big way.

Another very good reason to grow this fruit in an hydroponic system is that it can be set up to elevate the strawberry plants so that the fruit hangs down for easy picking. The strawberry being elevated eliminates the problem of the fruit rotting because of sitting in the soil.

The lavender bush has been widely grown in gardens for its natural fragrance and for its use in arts and crafts. Growing lavender has become even more popular for its use in a variety of aromatherapy products. It has a sweet, floral scent with a woodsy herbal aroma and is excellent for relieving anxiety and tension.

Growing lavender is fairly simple and can be grown both indoors and out.  It’s perfect for growing in hydroponics and will be a great addition to your indoor herb garden.  There are three major types of lavender but of the three, it is the English variety that’s most commonly used when growing it for aromatherapy, fragrance and medicinal purposes.  Put some inside your pillowcase for a good night’s sleep.

Indoor gardening can brighten up the drudgery of long northern winters, bringing the delight of fresh tomatoes, peppers, greens, or herbs in the middle of the worst weather.

This can be done by setting up your own hydroponic in home  garden. The advantages are numerous compared to soil based gardening.  For instance, you don’t need to purchase any expensive pesticides. The majority of pests are attracted to soil so they have no interest in your hydroponic plants.

Indoor hydroponic gardens costs are around 20% lower than traditional gardening after your initial set up and you will be able to fit more plants in a smaller area. Your plants will grow larger in most cases because the roots don’t expand as much in hydroponic gardens as they already have all the nutrients they need.  The yield will also be higher.

There is no need to water as they already have all the water they need.  There’s not even a need to weed an indoor hydroponic garden. In fact, all you need to do is pick the fruit or vegetables as you need them.

Metal halide light bulbs are known to produce an abundance of light in the blue spectrum.  The blue color of light encourages plant growth and is especially good for green, leafy growth.  It also helps in keeping plants compact.  This is the best type of light to use as a primary light source if little or no natural sunlight is available.

The average lifespan of a metal halide bulb is about 10,000 cumulative hours.  You can keep using the bulb beyond this time and it will keep lighting up.  Due to its gradual decline, however, you would be wise to replace the bulb for full efficiency.

Comparing the metal halide’s lumen, or brightness, per unit of energy consumed, they produce up to 125 lumens per watt compared to 39 lumens per watt with standard fluorescent lights and 18 lumens per watt for standard incandescent bulbs.

Have you ever considered setting up your own hydroponic in home garden? The advantages are many as compared to soil based gardening.  Here are some of the advantages and benefits of hydroponic indoor gardening:

You don’t need to purchase any expensive pesticides as the majority of pests tend to hang around soil.  They have no access to your hydroponic plants.

After your initial set up costs, indoor hydroponic gardens cost about 20% less than traditional gardens, plus you will be able to fit more plants in a smaller area. Your plants will grow larger, in most cases, because the roots don’t need to expand as much in traditional gardening. They already have all the nutrients and light they need close by.

Never, under any circumstances, should soil be introduced to your hydroponic system. Soil is full of natural microbes that will contaminate and damage system. Don’t use soil as a medium for a hydroponic system and if you ever decide to move a plant from soil to hydroponics, make sure to thoroughly clean all the soil from the plant roots first.

Obviously, plants need nutrients and they normally get them from the soil. Hydroponic systems don’t use soil so those nutrients have to be delivered through another method. This is done by using nutrient solutions, which are distilled water mixed with Liquid fertilizer or nutrients that are important to the plants. The three most important nutrients are potassium, phosphorous and nitrogen so, for best growth, make sure your solution is rich in these three.

The main advantage of hydroponics is that plants can be successfully grown indoors, anywhere you have space to do so. This will probably mean that plants will not be exposed to direct sunlight for very long, or at all. If this is the case, you have to provide them with the light they need yourself for them to flourish. Indoor grow lights offer a solution that allows you to flood your plants with the light they need, anywhere, anytime.