Airing a Problem Out? Air-Sacks
by Kev
(UK)
I suppose like many people I am feeling the penny-pinch and so I look at cheaper ways of achieving similar results that 'high-end', expensive gardening products are supposed to give.
One such item I saw today is an 'air-sack'. Essentially it's a breathable membrane into which you put your compost/soil mix. This works by allowing roots a greater surface area to access oxygen.
That costs.. wait for it.. a whopping GB£15 each! I can buy a breathable recycling bag of the same size for £0.45p! My question is very simple: how would this affect both a root crop and a fruiting crop, please, as opposed to traditional solid plastic plant buckets?
Answer: Kev- To tell the truth, I imagine these bags will affect plant growth very little. As long as your bags have holes to drain out the bottom, and as long as you are using a lightweight (easily drained) grow medium, you should have no problem with a lack of oxygen at the root level.
Mathematically, the only way to increase the surface area of the roots is to grow more roots! It is true that nutrient absorption only takes place in the presence of oxygen, but the bags you refer to will neither increase the oxygen at root level nor will they stimulate your plants to grow extra roots.
This is one product I would not bother purchasing....it is always better to reach for great results using affordable products than to purchase ANY product without knowing 100% how it is supposed to benefit your plants. Every product out there claims it will increase the growth or yield of your plants by 20% (or some other number)....the problem is, if you know what you are doing and are already getting good results, the chances of you seeing that extra 20% from ANY product you purchase is unlikely. This is true even for the really good products like vitamin B1 or liquid seaweed.
Luckily, as you get more gardening experience, you are able to tell more easily which products are really needed to produce results and which are not. In this case, your gut is correct....this is a product you do not need!
AffordableGarden Design&Setup
Hi everyone, Jason from Jason's Indoor Guide here. When I got started with hydroponic gardening more than 24 years ago, my first garden used rockwool cubes and B.C. Nutrients....and I remember thinking to myself yeah, sure, there may be a lot of advantages to gardening with hydroponics, for example there are very few pest problems, therefore very little pest control, no weeding, no plowing or tilling the soil, no soil testing or having to add things into the garden soil, no watering the garden....but for someone who just wants to grow their own vegetables and have more control over their food supply and the quality of the food that they eat, the cost of constantly having to buy grow media and hydroponic nutrients makes this an expensive hobby for most people...
Epic Nutrient Change
I suppose when you take into consideration how much money you save NOT
having to buy food at the grocery store, it is surely cheaper to grow
your own food hydroponically even with the cost of high quality
nutrients. Nevertheless, I didn't have a whole lot of money to work with
and I needed to make my efforts as affordable and effective as
possible....and in the last 24 years I HAVE learned a thing or two!
As you browse through Jason's Indoor Guide, you will notice all of the
systems that I use personally are homemade systems. As I got 3 or 4
years of experience under my belt, I quickly adopted a preference to
standing water systems and systems that use expanded clay pellets or
lava rock, because the media is re-usable and it eliminates a huge
operating expense. So once a hydroponic system is built, garden
maintenance is minimal- check and adjust the nutrient solution daily,
and to change it completely every 2 weeks....and the biggest operating
cost is the hydroponic nutrients. (and the electric bill, lol)...
Homemade Cloner
And, regarding the cost of the nutrients....I experimented for about 3 years with making different compost teas and nutrient teas, but there is still a lot of expense $$$ associated with making high quality nutrient teas....like kelp meal, liquid seaweed, rock dust, bat guano, un-Sulfured molasses, worm castings. You can eliminate a lot of this expense by becoming an expert at making high-quality colloidal humus compost, and use your properly made compost as the basis of your hydroponic nutrient solution.
Unfortunately, I have been gardening for over 24 years and I have only
just recently mastered this difficult skill....and even then, only
because I happened to find a very easy to follow, high quality technique
and decided to follow the instructions to the letter. I produced more
high quality compost in just one week than I was able to use in a whole
year! If you can master the technique, I highly recommend it. It is one of the top 3 things you can do to
increase the productivity of your food production efforts, while at the
same time decreasing the amount of effort required to grow all of your
own food, and decreasing the total cost of operating your food
production system.
And when I say decrease operating costs, I mean decrease them to almost
ZERO, especially if you are producing your own nutrients...
High Efficiency
Hydroponics
The ultimate solution to eliminate the cost of your hydroponic nutrients: Imagine a hydroponic system that does not require you to buy any nutrients, does not require you to make your own compost, and does not require you to brew your own nutrient tea. Seriously! No cost and no effort as far as providing nutrients to your plants! Plus, at the end of the gardening cycle you harvest all of your garden vegetables, PLUS YOU HARVEST FISH from the system--->
Aquaponics
This solution is aquaponics. If you are serious about producing all of your own food and being self-sufficient, this is the ultimate solution for reducing expenses (as much as possible), reducing the total amount of work required, and maximizing the productivity of your gardening efforts. I have been gardening for over 24 years, and it is the perfect food production solution in my opinion.
Besides mastering how to make high quality compost, learning aquaponics is one of the top 3 things you can do to increase your garden productivity, reduce your total costs, and reduce your total work. The product that I learned from is called Aquaponics4you. With all of my hydroponic gardening experience, the first time I came across the Aquaponics4you product I knew immediately that it was something very special! Place an aquaponics system outdoors and use the sun instead of grow lights, and you have reduced every garden expense to nearly ZERO!
The Same System/ 10 Weeks Later!
