When you’re growing high value hydroponics crops you’ve invested a lot of time and money in, you rely on your plants and gardening skills…but you also rely on trusting the folks who make hydroponics nutrients and supplies.

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!

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.

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

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.

Springtime in the suburbs. Here’s how my suburb came to exist…

A farmer and his family grew corn, greens, and alfalfa here for six generations.

Until 19 years ago, the rains came reliably in the right amounts and times so his crops grew fine.

Then the rains went away and the winters got warmer. The farmer struggled on as long as he could. Finally he gave up and sold out to a developer. The developer cut cul de sac roads and crammed as many houses in as possible.

In our previous aeroponics article, we noted that aeroponics provides maximized mists containing hydroponics nutrients, water and oxygen to spur incredibly fast growth and superb yields. But aeroponics has its drawbacks. One of the biggest is that you can’t just plug plants in to an aeroponics system, make sure you’ve got adequate water and nutrients in a reservoir, and go away for a few days.

USAID is the U.S. organization that provides aid and outreach to foreign nations in need. In Lebanon, USAID is currently investing $34 billion in support of their agriculture and rural community industries. This aid is aimed at providing financing to business, improving trade relations, and improving productivity. A business partner of ours has visited some of USAID’s efforts in supporting agriculture in Botswana, Africa. The effort there was literally fruitless as she witnessed four failed attempts by AID workers and locals to replant seed and produce crops. The causes were poor soil quality, lack of water and irrigation systems and other reasons, caused by a lack of understanding of crop production.

In our previous article, we talked about how the hydroponics industry has changed from old school days and is starting to catch up with the 21st century.

We’ve been talking in past articles about hydroponics systems, and a few people wrote me to say that learning about hydroponics systems is too complicated and…

We’ve been discussing hydroponics systems and there are plenty more details to discuss before we’re all fully briefed on hydroponics systems, but because I have gotten so many questions about using hydroponics coco coir, I will take a brief excursion into coconutville.

For several weeks we’ve been discussing hydroponics systems and learning huge amounts of hydroponics wisdom together. Last time I started to tell you why the ability of rockwool, coco coir, Pro-Mix and other solid root zone media is a big factor in how and why people choose their hydroponics systems.

In our previous excursions into hydroponicsville, we’ve been looking at hydroponics systems such as aeroponics, drip irrigation, NFT, etc. Why so? Because there are so darned many types, and it’s hard to find a hydroponics store that has all the systems set up and running so you can eyeball them in person. That’s why we’ve been talking about them and will continue to until you have all the data you need to grow easy and grow big!

Greetings hydroponics growers and welcome back to yet another in our fascinating and useful series on hydroponics systems. This is episode number five, and this series will go on as long as we need it to so that you get your biggest yields using the hydroponics system that works best for you.