Hydroponics Update1 A brief update on how the hydroponics project is going. I explain how I have been starting and growing Seedlings in Rockwool. The small seedling plugs slot directly into the larger rockwool blocks once they have sprouted. The purpose-made hydroponic rockwool blocks are quite expensive to buy – I only brought them this time around to make sure it works – next time I will buy a bale of rockwool from a DIY store and make my own. I’m always happy to hear feedback, suggestions, and constructive criticism to help me improve cheers Rick. . #43 – Top Rated (Today) – Howto & Style
25 Responses to “Hydroponics Update1 – Growing Seedlings in Rockwool NFT”
i am going to try my passionflowers and papays like this
lets see if it works
at 0:25 really looks like a marijuana seedling.
rockwool is acidic out of the packaging. you need to either a) soak it in a good pH water (about 5.5-6.5 pH) or you need to soak it in a rockwool conditioning solution. The latter may be necessary if you have hard water running out of your faucet.
depends what seeds you are growing – most will need at least a week or two to germinate.
I have to agree. after working with it for a while, it just stays too wet.
I have since upgraded (see my latest hydroponics update)
rockwool doesnt work for me.
i put my seeds in rockwool and they arent even growing and its been three days. so i have no idea whats going on.
Hi. After experimenting with the rockwool for a time, i decided to change over a hydoleca system as the rockwool stayed too wet and didnt encoutage the roots to grow. see my latrest hydroponics update for details.
Hi,
First off all, thanks so much for uploading this informative vidoe. I have got a couple of questions. Did you adjust the pH? coz I heard that the rockwool pH is basically high.
When is the best time to transfer seedling form the starting pluges to the rockwool cubes and from rockwool cubes to the slabs? I am about to start this project and i will be growing tomatoe, but I do not have any information about the rockwool,.
Looking good Rick!, Nice bay window you have! Ever set a few plants there? You can rip up the RW and use it just like soil. you dont need an air stone or pump. /You can hand water twice a day and its still hydroponics.. they sell small cube bits in a bag… You may want to rethink it, but would say soil is best where u are… you may need lights and heating mats…you must provide what the plant needs,,sun, warmth,nutriences, and air/co2. more sun
whay do ppl use them shitty cubes test have proved that they cause probs but each to there own i guess
My Pleasure! Thanks for watching
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I have meandered through a few of your videos and have learned so much about plum wine, irritable bowel syndrome and hydroponics in the last 15 minutes! Thanks for the fun learning.
I like your videos as you give a different view on hydroponics. In the video i wanted to point out that the “Bloom” nutrients are primarily used for cannabis production as it helps is flowers become heavy and product higher yield. You can still use it but i do not know how it would effect vegetables or fruit as they only have flowers just long enough for seed production.
I have to admit at the moment, I’m not that impressed with it all, although being the winter time probably has a lot to do with the lack of growth. I’m looking into growing food in containers from the springtime, so will have a direct comparison to work with.
I’ve tried various strengths of nutrients and so far have discovered that the weaker the solution, the less young seedlings die off.
Hydroponic gardening sounds like it’s a lot more difficult in practice than in theory.
I know you just started so I don’t know how much of this you’ve tried yet. Have you had time to increase or decrease the amount of nutrient that’s mixed with the water or changing the brand of nutrient and see which plants are affected?
I tried putting some of the seedlings that were growing in the small starter plugs, directly into the water channel (without using the larger rockwool blocks). they don’t appear to be doing any better at this stage. 2 of the seedlings died after I minimised their exposure to water (trying to make them seek out water with their roots) – so it’s a real hit-and-miss affair at the moment.
I chose gutter over piping because the right fixings were more easily available.
Thank you for replying. I had learned from your video that sunlight can’t touch the water or else a bacteria infestation might set in.
Did you try taking any of the plants out of the rockwool and putting it directly into the container as you had mentioned in your video? I am wondering how the plants would stand up right? If you do that, do the plants stand up right, or prop against the hole, or do they fall into the water? If they prop, do you need a smaller hole so they don’t fall in?
Glad the vids are helping – I should mention my knowledge on this hydroponics lark is still extremely limited.
Thank you for making these videos on your hydroponics project. My wife and I have started our own project of trying to become as self-reliant, food wise, as possible. We have been raising 3 pigs for the past 4 months, started raising 30 chickens a month ago (28 still alive), and today I started looking into growing our own vegetables. I found your videos very helpful as I am starting from knowing absolutely nothing about gardening.
Quick question. Why did you choose to use a gutter over a pipe?
Well my experience has taught me to veg for 24 hours, later when the plant has matured in 1-2 months I cut down the time to a 12/12 schedule I’ve found I had much more vegatative growth doing it that way than 16/8, but that’s my exp. growing with two seperate tanks, same seeds same nutrients etc.
@wroutson
Not a good idea. Plants will do much better in an 16-18 hour vegetative cycle. During the night cycle, plants use all the energy stored up from the day to do actual growing.
why do garden centres in the uk never stock rockwool or coir blocks like the hydro stores do.. Also the garden centres in the uk never stock plagron soils or biobizz soil which is better than any other soils i have ever tried from garden centres. One time i asked a garden centre if he sold rockwool and his reply was “rockwools for professional groqwers only” I didnt say anything but i thought what kind of fool is this guy. rockwool is for anybody to use freely.
thing i dont like about rockwool is its harder to cover the seeds as you have to squeeze it tightly. I prefer jiffy cubes coir. I have found a new way to germinate seeds in aeroponic props using no media at all. Get some nft spreader mat and line net pots with this then just put seed on this. save money on grow cubes
unfortunately I didn’t keep all my receipts, but I estimate the all-in initial cost including the nutrients, rockwool, air pump & stones, plus the guttering would have cost me around £100GBP give or take.