Check out this article from Rosebud Magazine's very own grower guru, Erik Biksa. This one is straight from the pages of the latest issue of Rosebud Magazine, and talks about a very important issue arising for growers: smart meters. For those of you who don't know, smart meters represent a serious threat to the privacy of everyone, indoor growers and non-growers alike. A concerned grower wrote in to ask Erik about this, and in true Biksa fashion, Erik served up the masterful advice of a hydroponics expert. This article will give you all the info you need to protect your grow and your personal life. Check it out!

It’s tough to argue against aeroponic cloning if you want big, healthy root systems fast. That’s why this spring, when beans pop and prop domes crop, we’re outfitting you with this run-down and comparison from the Big Three of comparibly priced aeroponic cloning systems. Plant ’em if ya got ’em, and good luck out there this season!

For many indoor gardeners, everything starts with cuttings (aka clones). If you can’t get rooted plants, you will never have a functioning garden. So how do we get stem cuttings that will root quickly and thoroughly? And how does a plant stem generate roots in the first place?

Q:

I want to construct a grow operation that uses IN/OUT ventilation, but only have access to one eight inch diameter duct for IN and one eight inch diameter duct for OUT. I want to run about 12 lights (not all in the same room or timer), and don't have a problem with supplying some supplemental air conditioning for the three or four weeks of the year where fans just won't cut it around here.

Check out this piece covering one of the hottest growing topics in the hydroponics industry – Networked Growing Systems. This is the talk of the town and is ripped straight from the pages of the latest edition of Rosebud Magazine. And best of all, this one is courtesy of the inimitable expertise of grower guru Erik Biksa. Enjoy!

Hey growers, here are some tips for navigating your local hydroponics store. Enjoy!

Since their introduction as a practical electronic component in 1962, LEDs (light-emitting diodes) have found their way into millions of devices. And to say that LEDs have made their mark on the indoor growing industry is an understatement. Because LEDs differ so greatly from our current HID/MH horticultural lighting technologies, many growers don’t know exactly how to make LEDs work for them.

Grow tents have been popping up all over for the past decade or so. It used to be that you had to construct your own grow room, and the old-fashioned way left you with a labor-intensive, clunky, inflexible space to grow your crops in. It functioned well enough, but it was nothing like what the people at Homebox have come up with.

This week we’re discussing something often overlooked by new growers - container sizes. This is a key factor in your successful grow, but many newbies stumble along the way when learning about getting your plants into the right pots. In this edition of Hydro 101, I'll tell you how to pick out the correct container size for optimal results, and also what to expect from the container size you choose.

Answers for April's Quiz:

1. C

2. A
3. B
4. A

Hey Folks, c’mon down and join us here in Hydro Lingo Bingo-the game where you get to show your level of hip-talk in hydroponics. Check with us online at rosebudmag.com/lb for the correct answers.

Can you imagine a day when machines can garden? In many ways, that time is already here. When growing indoors, you are already relying on technology to help create and maintain a healthy growing environment—artificial lighting, carbon dioxide, ventilation, cooling, humidity, and optimal pH and TDS are all regulated by various devices, sensors, and solutions. As some growers are painfully aware, these wonders of technology can may malfunction, causing disaster for your crop. For this reason, you still need a human at the helm to control and monitor activity. That is, until now.

The Grobot (from PurGro) is a grow room and reservoir controller with robotic actuation that enables you to control and monitor every aspect of the growing environment from anywhere around the world via a computer-linked interface. Installing a Grobot also means that if anything goes wrong in your garden, the  system can instantly notify you that something is amiss. It even allows you to check on your growing environment through a series of cameras, allowing you to keep an eye on your crop when you can’t be there.

 This robotic growing controller allows you perform a wide variety of necessary functions for maintaining a healthy growing environment.

This robotic growing controller allows you perform a wide variety of necessary functions for maintaining a healthy growing environment. Functions like emptying and refilling the reservoir, adding nutrients in controlled ratios, pH control, CO2 augmentation, temperature control, humidity control, security alerts, remote viewing, lighting controls, water levels, and dozens of other tasks that would ordinarily require a human touch can now happen while you are miles away.

All in all, the Grobot is very easy to install and has been accurately monitoring and maintaining the environmental parameters of this high tech indoor garden for five weeks. Since not all growers are IT guys, you will be very glad to know that the team at PurGro can help walk you through any questions you might have about setting up the system and the remote networking, and have you automated in no time.

Words can’t describe how James Bond it feels to slide out your smartphone, hit a couple of keys, and know that you just mixed the perfect reservoir for your garden. If you are serious about growing, but want to step away from the garden occasionally, it could be time to give robotics a try.

Stay Connected:

Check out the Rosebud Magazine Facebook page – click here.

Follow Rosebud Magazine on Twitter – click here.

© Copyright RosebudMag.com, 2012

Q: How safe is most of the growing gear that is for sale at the local hydroponics shop? I haven’t had any problems, but I’ve heard of fellow growers getting inspected by local by-law enforcement for electrical codes in their rented buildings. My one friend had no problems, the other place got temporarily halted until they made some changes and got re-inspected. I want to avoid this potential production pitfall-what can I do to protect myself and my grow?

On a crisp morning, Tapan Adhikari, Ph.D., carefully measures clear fluid from a large container, then drips it slowly into a beaker at a lab at the University of Massachusetts. The soil scientist is roughly 8,000 miles from his office at the India Institute of Soil Science in Bhopal, India, and today he is working in a temporary laboratory in a basement in Amherst, Massachusetts, where he has partnered on a collaborative program with the university.

If you choose to grow from clones, an accelerated rate of growth and therefore an increased number of harvests per years occurs because you eliminate the extra time that seedlings require. Cloning also eliminates the lost time and space that comes from growing unfeminized seeds, some of which will produce males that you likely won’t keep.