Often in soil-based gardening, seeds are germinated in separate containers before they get transplanted into the soil. When growing plants hydroponically, the same idea also applies. This ensures that the plants are free from bugs, bacteria, and other variables that can disrupt the growth of the plant. One method for germinating our seeds is starting them in rockwool, an inorganic growing medium made from rocks that are spun at a very high temperature. How cool is that? In this picture, you can see that our urban farmers are getting ready to start their seeds in rockwool. We like to recycle and reuse old egg cartons since they provide the perfect container for each individual rockwool cube. For each rockwool cube, we learned how to gently place 2 seeds inside. After we filled up all of the rockwool cubes with seeds, we made sure to add water until the cubes were moist, but not soaking in water. Closing the container creates a "greenhouse effect" which helps speed up the germination process. Depending upon the seed, germination rates will vary, but most of our plants germinated within 1-2 weeks. Once we start to see strong roots forming below the rockwool cube, they can then be transplanted into larger containers, as part of our ebb and flow system.
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What is hydroponics?
Simply put, hydroponics is a soil-less method of growing plants using nutrient-rich water. While there are many methods of hydroponics growing, in our classroom, we're learning about hydroponics through our classroom ebb and flow system. |
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