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Growing Media Options - trial update · Hydroponics Daily

• 0:00
  Hello, welcome back to Hydroponics Daily with me, Dr. Russell Sharp.
• 0:03
  I mentioned in a previous episode that we've been trialing different growing
• 0:08
  media for growing spring onions because we wanted to get the growing media right
• 0:13
  before we started experimenting with what's the best fertilizer and what are
• 0:16
  the best additives to add for spring onion crops.
• 0:19
  And I started off just assuming that cocoa was the best substrate and then my
• 0:26
  seeds didn't germinate well and I thought, right, that's it cocoa is obviously
• 0:29
  not the best so decided to do a run a trial comparing cocoa to.
• 0:35
  Vermiculite horticultural sand perlite and
• 0:39
  volcanic rock and to see which is
• 0:42
  the best hydroponic substrate and just got the results in this week came back
• 0:46
  after the bank holiday weekend and really surprising is that it was actually
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  cocoa that performed the best which is really frustrating and sent me back to
• 0:57
  step one again, back to the drawing board.
• 1:01
  But it wasn't all negative because the cocoa did really well.
• 1:04
  So I think it was the conditions in which he was in that was the issue.
• 1:09
  So I'll put the picture of the trial as the image, the artwork for this episode.
• 1:17
  And if you're on Spotify, you'll be able to see it.
• 1:19
  I think on Apple, it doesn't really work for some reason but they
• 1:22
  all germinated in the cocoa and they
• 1:26
  even i've been planting the seeds halfway down a
• 1:29
  very very deep plug and and then for one side and then the other side i've been
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  doing them at the bottom of the plug to see if i can get these really long spring
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  onions with a really long bulb as they call it the white section at the bottom
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  then the cocoa they all germinated on both sides, even the deep one.
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  The next best was vermiculite.
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  Then the next best of that was sand. And then there was no germination in the
• 1:56
  volcanic rock or the perlite.
• 1:59
  Now, I think it's something to do with the water holding capacity.
• 2:02
  And this is one of the issues I want to talk about when it comes to grow media.
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  I think the reason why a lot of people use cocoa is it's very forgiving of hand
• 2:10
  watering and watering every other day or every day.
• 2:14
  These plants were not watered to these seeds and seedlings. We're not watered
• 2:18
  every day because of the weekends and things like this.
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  And just because we've got other
• 2:22
  stuff to do, we've got fertilizers to manufacture and things like this.
• 2:26
  So the the vermiculite holds a lot of water and the cocoa holds a lot of water
• 2:31
  and they they they seem to perform well and i think it's because of that reason,
• 2:36
  now the this horticultural sand was a very even
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  though one or two germinated it was
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  a big disappointment the grow media the sand just
• 2:45
  flushed away it just washed away really quickly lost
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  its integrity all the others kept their integrity but
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  the horticultural sand didn't so i thought that would be the best
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  and it was actually the worst not be i will not be using that again and it got
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  algae on it really quickly because i think it was just it's literally been dug
• 3:02
  up out of a quarry and and broke into bits and left in a yard so it already
• 3:07
  had a load of algae on it so rubbish and then the volcanic rock and the perlite
• 3:12
  i've not given up entirely.
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  Perlite i'm not so keen on because i've used it before and it didn't do
• 3:17
  well with wasabi i think it gave off too much aluminium but the
• 3:20
  volcanic rock i've still got high hopes for and that's
• 3:23
  because i'm going to run it in either either a ebb and flood system or a nft
• 3:30
  system i'm going to try again because i think that's where it'll come into its
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  own what i think was happening was the spring onion seeds were not because the
• 3:39
  volcanic rock was not holding on to any moisture.
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  There was nowhere for the seed in the seedling to germinate to access the water.
• 3:47
  It was only being watered once a day.
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  So unless there were only a few droplets that were left on it.
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  So I think if you can get that system flushing with liquid, like a traditional
• 3:58
  hydroponic setup, a few times a day, that's where volcanic rock will come into its own.
• 4:03
  So normally you would think of rock wool to be an alternative hydroponic medium.
• 4:08
  It's the most common hydroponic medium for nft but i
• 4:13
  want this long bulb of the spring onions and i want the
• 4:15
  spring onions to grow through it and because of the tight network in rockwell
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  that's just not going to be a goer so i'm
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  going to set up another system looking at nft volcanic
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  rock and compare that to vermiculite and peat and
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  perlite as well so we'll run that in our
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  new nft system that we're installing this week
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  at utreema hq and interesting that
• 4:41
  the sand that's that's gone now and we
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  will be running more trials with the peat so just hand
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  watering once a day peat definitely seems to be the go-to grow
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  media for hand watering from this trial and we'll
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  be running a number of spring onion trials in in the
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  in the coco's let's say peat i meant coco the coco's the
• 5:00
  best we will be running different
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  additives now in in cocoa now we've got the the system
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  set up where we can deep plant them and we know how to to
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  germinate them and get those really long bulbs we'll
• 5:13
  be running different systems way with comparing gold
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  leaf to two-part fertilizers or gold leaf or liquid gold as it's called in the
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  uk to with plus an our own gatic silicon comparing it with our liquid gypsum
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  product to give it calcium and sulfur our lime sulfur product to give it calcium
• 5:33
  and sulfur as well and because these are what.
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  Provide the strong onion smell the calcium
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  and sulfur what give you a really good crunch and a strong taste
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  in onions so we're going to do some really interesting experiments
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  around that next okay so that's been a
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  really good trial because it's sort of backed up the
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  reason why people use cocoa in sort of hand watering
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  hydroponic systems but we we
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  won't use them when we're moving more towards nft this
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  year so i think we're using rock wall for growing
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  hops and our black grass plants and then
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  we'll be running various systems to find out
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  what's the best for running spring onions thanks very much for
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  listening to this episode i'll be at green tech
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  in amsterdam coming in second week in
• 6:17
  june i think it is have a check if you are around
• 6:20
  at green tech then it'd be great to meet up and maybe if you
• 6:23
  wanted to do a duet on a podcast you
• 6:26
  wanted to be interviewed on a podcast or just give your
• 6:29
  thoughts on a podcast that would be great to meet up get a beer and
• 6:32
  and and talk through hydroponics if
• 6:35
  you're thinking of going to green tech it's a great show i'm
• 6:38
  not paid by the people at green tech to say that it is the
• 6:41
  best hydroponic show in europe
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  it's not focused on anyone's sector so it's
• 6:47
  not legal cannabis it's not tomatoes it's not
• 6:50
  ornamentals it's everything and it's and.
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  It draws a global audience it's in a great location it's
• 6:57
  got it's a great facility it's a great time of
• 6:59
  year to be in amsterdam rather than in the middle of winter
• 7:02
  like a lot of conferences and trade shows are you'll
• 7:05
  always learn something there's always business to be done and it's
• 7:09
  easy to get to as well so if you are thinking
• 7:12
  of going to greentech i highly advise it and give me
• 7:15
  a shout when you're there and we can meet up and i can record you
• 7:18
  on my podcast i've now got two microphones so that won't
• 7:21
  be an issue okay and hopefully i'll get loads of content for
• 7:24
  the for the hydroponics daily podcast while i'm
• 7:27
  there i've got loads of lollipops as well with a hydroponic daily qr carried
• 7:31
  on them and i've got some beer mats as well which i might leave in some pubs
• 7:35
  so hopefully we'll get some more listeners from green tech okay until tomorrow
• 7:39
  that's been hydroponics daily for today just an update on our grown media trials
• 7:43
  and how they suit hydroponics thank you for listening.