What is Hydroponics Gardening

Hydroponics is a subset of hydroculture and is a method of growing plants using mineral nutrient solutions, in water, without soil. Hydroponics is a technology for growing plants in nutrient solutions (water containing fertilizers). Terrestrial plants may be grown with their roots in the mineral nutrient solution only. The plants are placed in growing media such as rockwool, clay pellets, foam, recycled foam, gravel, peat, sawdust, or coconut fibres, then fed a nutrient solution to make them grow. Since many hydroponic methods employ some type of growing medium these methods are often termed ""soilless culture"", while water culture alone is true hydroponics.

In combination with greenhouses, it is high technology and capital-intensive. It is also highly productive, conservative of water and land, and protective of the environment. Yet for most of its employees, hydroponic culture requires only basic agriculture skills. Since regulating the aerial and root environment is a major concern in such agricultural systems, production takes place inside enclosures designed to control air and root temperatures, light, water, plant nutrition, and adverse climate.  

There are many techniques to deliver water to the plant root zone. For container grown plants, each individual plant is provided an emitter for water from a drip irrigation system. Water may be channeled to a continuous row of plants within a trough, such as in the nutrient film technique system. A large tray of plants may be watered from below by filling the entire tray with water and then draining all excess water. This is called ebb and flood irrigation. Water is typically recycled within nutrient film technique and ebb and flood systems. It is more difficult to recycle in a drip irrigation systems and requires additional equipment such as water a sterilizer and fertilizer monitoring and adjustment equipment.

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