Saturday, October 6, 2012

The Many Benefits Of Denver Hydroponics

By Juliette Cruz


Denver Hydroponics and the technologies it offers may be all that is standing between humanity and starvation. As the global population continues growing, more land is being gobbled by the need for shelter, roads, and offices. Water culture may be the way out of this conundrum, as it offers a way to grow plants without using soil. There are many advantages to this technology.

Soil has complex physical and chemical properties, which as any farmer knows, complicates the business of growing crops. In many instances, it has to be tested to find out what is missing, and what needs to be added to solve problems such as too much acidity. With water culture, such problems are eliminated, making it much simpler than normal farming.

Breaking ground has to be one of the most popular phrases in modern culture, alluding to the practice of ploughing before planting. This, of course, is done with a variety of methods, from hoeing with the hand, a practice that is thousands of years old, while others involve heavy machinery. After planting, there will be a period of weeding once crops have grown. Water culture is far less tedious.

Farming, particularly the commercial kind, may involve the use of heavy machinery. While these make work easier, they also compact soil, which has grave consequences, as the weight damages soil structure and makes it prone to erosion. Going by government statistics, three billion tonnes of soil are lost to wind and water every year in the United States alone. With water culture, there are no such problems, as there is no soil to be eroded.

Solution culture farms use a number of techniques to achieve their goals; these include dipping plants in a nutritive fluid, suspending plants and spraying the roots with nutrients, or planting them in an artificial substrate. Whichever the method used, some form of recycling is used, which makes these technologies extremely environmentally friendly, unlike normal farming which releases tonnes of fertilizer and chemicals into rivers and other water sources every year.

Most plants start their life in nurseries, and are then transplanted to farms. In water culture, a similar process takes place; crops are planted in propagation blocks, which are made out of foam, coir, clay pellets or other materials. The blocks are then moved to growing chambers; they are not dug out. This eliminates the problem of transplantation shock that afflicts conventional agriculture.

With Solution culture, nutrients are available in sufficient amounts the whole year long, allowing higher density planting. It is even possible to stack plants in levels, something that is virtually impossible with normal agriculture. With minimal problems from pests, yields from this method are much higher. However, like anything else in life, this method has its downsides.

Hydro culture does have its downsides; it requires a lot of capital to start, and the farmer needs to keep up with the technology. However, as Americans put it, the smart money is on this farming technique. Denver Hydroponics may be the only people who can prove the Masai wrong; that land can give birth, even if it needs to be stacked to do so.




About the Author:



No comments:

Post a Comment