Hydroponics Feeding Schedule

If you’re looking for a head start on your hydroponics feeds schedule, you’re in the right place. This article provides you in-depth guidance on hydroponic feeding and a sample hydroponics feeding schedule to help your plants grow healthier and produce bountiful yields.

What is Hydroponics

Hydroponics is a plant cultivation system that utilizes a water-based system and incorporates nutrients. The cultivation mechanism doesn’t utilize soil when growing the plants; instead, you use plant mediums.

After preparation, you use the mediums like perlite to fill the planters as they serve as your crop’s root bed. The medium allows the crop’s root to reach the different vital nutrients in your reservoir to stimulate healthy growth.

Advantages and Disadvantages of Hydroponic Gardening

Apart from the numerous benefits, this gardening mechanism also has some drawbacks you need to consider. Below are the pros and cons of hydroponic gardening:

Pros

● The plants have a faster growth rate than the ones in the soil

● crops grow larger due to the easy access to the essential nutrients

● The hydroponic garden conserves more water

● The gardens are eco-friendly and release less waste and pollution

Cons

● The systems are expensive

● Setting up and maintaining the garden is time-consuming

● Prone to breakdowns as they majorly rely on various mechanical components

Tools for Feeding the Hydroponic Plants

When providing nutrients for the plants, it’s necessary to consider choosing the appropriate tools to ensure effectiveness and efficiency. Below are the essential tools you should have when feeding the crops:

1. PH tester

Before cultivating your crops, it’ll be fundamental to set the water at an appropriate pH to prevent unnecessary issues and enhance proper growth. The pH tester will be an essential tool for testing to ensure you grow your crop in the correct water pH.

2. Measuring spoons

A measuring spoon is an essential tool for measuring the salts and nutrients you provide for the plants. Using this spoon is an effective solution to get the proper amounts for your plants.

3. Nutrients

They’re vital for the growth and development of hydroponic plants. We’ve got a wide range of nutrients you can consider. Importantly, select the appropriate ones that suit your plants and the environment.

4. Epsom salts

Selecting a well-balanced magnesium salt will be imperative to achieve bountiful results. Experts recommend that you have approximately a quarter teaspoon per session.

5. Water

It’s an essential tool or requirement when feeding your plants in a hydroponic environment. You can have the water in a container or bucket to dissolve Epsom salts and feed the plants. After which, you can add the plant’s roots to the medium.

Hydroponic Feeding Ingredients

After acquiring the essential tools and requirements, getting the right ingredients for your plants will be imperative. Besides proper light or temperatures, the availability of the right amount of nutrients and water plays a vital role in the plant’s growth. Below are the essential ingredients:

Water

For your plants to thrive and achieve bountiful yields, it’ll be necessary to have a high-quality reservoir and watering water. Notably, it’s good to avoid using non-distilled or tap water, as they may lead to overfeeding. The overfeeding results from the introduction of nutrients coming from external sources leading to undesired outcomes.

Therefore, it’s good to consider using high-grade filtered water and a multi-filtration system. The filtration system will help separate water from the other components before delivering it to the reservoir or misting system. The filtered water will be free from chemicals, stray salts, or nutrients.

Feed nutrients

With the numerous options available for the different plant’s growth needs, picking the ones vital for your hydroponic crops is vital. When choosing the nutrients, it’s good to understand that the crops won’t get any from the soil due to the lack of a soil medium. Importantly, consider the dry and liquid nutrients for the crops.

While choosing, it’s good to understand that the liquid formula is very easy to use but costly, and the dry nutrient formula provides a cheaper alternative. After getting the appropriate one, you can include some Epsom salt and develop a suitable plant feeding schedule.

A Sample Hydroponic Feeding Schedule

When drafting your schedule, it’s good to ensure that you water the crops moderately. Watering too little or much will disrupt the cleanliness of water flowing through the hydroponic system. Importantly, it’ll be imperative to consider the proper quantity and quality of water when designing the schedule.

A proper schedule should have appropriate nutrients and the correct quantity. You can achieve the proper schedule by considering the instructions from the manufacturers and the type of crops. Additionally, it’d help if you considered a consistent dosage of the plant’s nutrients to ensure excellent results. Experts advise for adjustments only when you notice some adverse symptoms on your plants.

The schedule may vary with the crops, environment, and the types of plant feed you’re using. Importantly, when drafting your feeds schedule, you can consider the nutrients charts on the nutrient brand you choose. But below is a sample hydroponics feeding schedule for a four-week feeding sample that’ll provide a clear picture of what your hydroponic feeding schedule should entail:

● First week – 5 ml of the nutrients

● Second week – 10 ml

● Third week – 10 ml

● Fourth week -10 ml

Additional Tips

Apart from following the feeding schedule, we’ve got additional tips that’ll enable you to get healthier crops and get the best yields. These additional tips to enhance your plant’s growth include:

● Install a perfect pump timer for setting up a good cycle

● Monitor the water pH regularly and adjust when necessary

● You can plant crops that have thrived well in the medium for easy and cheap maintenance

● Expose the crops to direct sunlight, averagely six hours each day

Summing Up

Creating a feeding schedule for your hydroponic plants is essential to enhance proper feeding and get appropriate results. A good schedule will depend on the plant type, local climate, the hydroponic setup, and additional determinants. These are factors that’ll help you set up an appropriate feeding schedule to enhance healthy crops and better yields.