How to: Cheap and Simple DWC Hydroponics

[g0pher]

Hydroponics sound like a very technical/pricey adventure to embark on. Yes, its true, it can be very demanding, but what you reap will be worth it in the end.

Salvia Divinorum is a plant that responds very well to a hydroponic home.

There are many systems you can build to start off.

It can be as simple as a soda bottle, and a couple bucks invested, to a multi-site nutrient flow system. The only limitations you have is the space and time you plan to invest into maintaining and caring for the plants.

Mine are grown in an ebb and flow system:


These are the kind of results you can expect from a hydroponic salvia set up(CLICK FOR ANIMATED GIF):

The images were 2 days apart. FAST GROWTH!



Lets start off by building a cheap DWC (Deep Water Culture) system.

You will need the following:

2-liter soda bottle
Ruler
Sharpie or other tool that will write on plastic
Aquarium air pump
Air stone
Scissors or Razor
Drill or Awl
Vinyl tubing (the kind used in fish tanks)
All purpose plant food
Planting media (perlite, lava rocks, gravel, etc.)
Water
Duct Tape

The first thing you want to do is clean out the soda bottle, fill it up with warm water, put the cap on it and shake it around (warm water helps dissolve the sticky mess on the inside) and pour out the water.



Measure 13 cm from the bottom of the bottle to the top, and make a circle around the bottle, this is where you are going to cut the bottle.

PLEASE EXERCISE CAUTION WHEN WORKING WITH SHARP OBJECTS.




After you have cut the bottle, you are going to make 4 holes on the bottle cap, do this with your drill or awl, you can make more holes if you wish, but make sure they are small enough so your planting media wont fall through.
Screw your lid back on the bottle.


Thats it! You have done the hardest part of this project so far.

The bottom half is going to be your reservoir, the top will be the "pot" for your plant.


Take a moment to try and make the bottom light proof, you don't want algae to be growing in your reservoir. You can wrap the bottle with paper, or duct tape, or aluminum foil, WHAT EVER to stop light from coming in.

Put in your airstone and tubing into the reservoir and close it off with the top of the bottle.




Prepare the nutrient solution, here you can add regular plant fertilizer or your hydroponic nutrient of choice.

Add enough so that the first inch and a half of the top part of the bottle is under water.

Now you are going to prepare your planting media, if you have lava rocks make sure you wash them first, they carry a bunch of red dust on them, if you are going to use perlite, do the same it carries dust which can be harmful if inhaled. Fill the top half of your bottle with your media of choice.



Now add your plant to the media and thats it!

Salvia is a plant that grows naturally in a dense forest, where light doesn't usually reach the plant with much intensity. So it is suggested to keep her away from direct sunlight. Near a window that gets diffuse sunlight is fine.
Salvia grows very well under fluorescent fixtures. I have mine under a cool white bulb and a "grow" light, which is designed for plant growth.  My plants have responded very well to 12 hours of light a day. You can go for 24 hours of light, but I have noticed that the plants do better when they have a dark cycle, which allows them to complete the cycle of photosynthesis.

You will have to change the water in your reservoir every few weeks, as the plant grows, it starts to exhaust the nutrient supply.

Also be sure to check water level every couple days, making sure it is not to low and is limiting the plants access to water, and top it off as needed.

The purpose of the air stone is to oxygenate the water, this provides oxygen to the roots, which is ESSENTIAL for healthy plant growth, otherwise you would drown the plant.

[BritvaCharlie]

What medium are you using, exactly? It looks interesting.
What are the advantages to using DWC vs. the ebb & flow method?
Just curious, thanks for the great post!

[Paradoxic]

I can probably answer this, but g0pher should put in his ideas too.

But I believe he is using hydroton (expanded clay pebbles), pretty typical for DWC and drip systems. It works great from my experience and it really cheap. As wrote in another cultivation article, it works really well to mix it with coco fibers.

As far as DWC vs Ebb and Flow: DWC is cheaper and simpler, but Ebb and Flow is less maintenance because with DWC you want to change out the water every so often, which is not necessary with Ebb and Flow. Also for many plants Ebb and Flow is better, DWC is best for one large plant. Another good option is a drip system. Basically just add a pump to a DWC (w/ a 5 gal bucket is best) that drips water through the top into the reservoir. This eliminates the need to change the water out (as with DWC). I will probably add a guide for this soon when I get the time.

Hope thats helpful.

[BritvaCharlie]

I've adopted this system for growing my tomato plant, and it pretty much rocks my socks.  
I have a similiar tomato plant in soil as a control, and the hydro plant is growing much much faster :-)

[Paradoxic]

Yeah hydro works very well for tomato. I made an outdoor DWC system and they grew like weeds.

[SkaPastora]

verry nice gopher!. are you the gopher from the shroomery? nice to see you here as well.

[gewf]

Is they're anyone that would be willing to write a guide like this for other methods of hydro growing? I like this method a lot and I will probably use it for my mother plant and another method for all of my cuttings. Great guide though, very straight forward and easy to follow!

[SkaPastora]

i have a question or two. how much nutrients do you use? and how long will a plant like in the coke bottle system before needing transplant?

[Paradoxic]

Is they're anyone that would be willing to write a guide like this for other methods of hydro growing? I like this method a lot and I will probably use it for my mother plant and another method for all of my cuttings. Great guide though, very straight forward and easy to follow!

I definitely plan to add some more guides like this for other hydro methods. When I get the time I will write one up or perhaps if someone else has the know-how they can do it. Is there any particular method you are interested in? A few possibilities are: EBB and Flow, Drip system, aeroponics, NFT, etc. I will probably do one soon on a simple drip system, which is really just involves adding a part to the DWC system I outlined in my guide.

i have a question or two. how much nutrients do you use? and how long will a plant like in the coke bottle system before needing transplant?

Salvia will usually be fine with a concentration of nutrients that the product recommends. If anything you should only reduce the concentration as Salvia does not need a ton of nutrients, especially with a young plant.

As far as transplanting, just use your own judgment. This system should give the plant a lot of room to grow. Basically your only constraint is root space, but in hydro the root mass can get huge without causing any problems for the plant. Maybe when it gets to the point that the roots are completely crammed in the bottle and there isn't even much room left for water, then you may want to consider a transplant.

[sunsnail]

This method is very innovative. I will definitely try this out. Thanks a bunch.

[MstryShovel]

I have some questions for this method aswell,

1) Air rocks, the pump and tubing are all common aquarium/pet shop items right? (like petsmart or something simmilar should carry a decent example)

2) how well would a plant/sally do caomming from a soil growth and changing into hydro
  2b)do you have any tips (other than disolving the root mass in a bowl of water then cleaning the roots and popping it in) for transplanting from soil to hydro

3) how well do plants do making a change from hydro to soil (gets too big ect)

4) would sally do well taking a direct cutting and popping it into a hydro chamber like described above? mabey even using a soil-rooting solution?

[Paradoxic]

I can answer most of these, I dont think the author comes here too much anymore.

1) Yes, you can use the regular fish tank stuff from pet stores.

2) You dont really ever wanna transfer soil to hydro, it wont work for any plant. The only way you can really go it from hydro to soil, but not vice versa. I mean you can try it but I've never heard of much success.

3) Hydro to soil should be pretty straitforward, just be very careful when taking it out of the hydroton grow rocks. Try not to damage the roots too much, this could be difficult if the plant it big. Doing a hydro system without medium is easiest for hydro to soil. You use foam to keep it in place and the roots just grow into the water. This is a good cloning method. I've been trying to get a giude for building one like this:


4) Taking a direct cutting probably wouldnt work in this system, its best to get some rooting growing on it first.

[DrYRHead]

Interesting idea.  :idea:  

[MstryShovel]

cool thanks
i plan on trying something very simmilar to your picture there. the top of my main plant is looking like it could use being cut off a joke but im also serious, so im going to experiment with making cuttings. and water rooting them, and then try to make up a hydro set up like mentioned in the original post.  would it be possible to "split" the air hose comming from the air pump to lets say 3 different "pots/2litres" I assume one would have to get a higher preasure pump to accomidate? asking this because once one works, and keeps growing i plan on making a few more yah dig? has anyone tried this? or would i need to get a separate air pump for each pot?

[MstryShovel]

oh yeah, and what is that little dual compas looking contraption in that picture, rioght in between the plants