The Ultimate Hydroponics For Beginners Guide

Hydroponics for beginners can be a daunting endeavor for even the most prepared of aspiring growers. There’s so much to learn, understand and implement to successfully grow crops hydroponically.

For someone just getting started, it can be intimidating to know what to do without an explainer. This article will provide exactly that.

In this blog, we’ll explain what hydroponics is, how it differs from traditional soil-based agriculture, and provide you with our top 10 tips for finding success with hydroponics.

How Does Hydroponics Work?

Hydroponics is a farming technique that allows growers to cultivate crops without soil. Plants develop from seedlings in grow media, which protects developing plants while allowing their roots to poke through the media and absorb nutrients from a nutrient solution, a mixture of nutrients and purified water.

This enables plants to access the maximum amount of nutrients they need to develop quickly, and it pays off with a highly productive system that can produce greater yields in a more compact area.

A key part of hydroponics comes from controlling the pH variations that are typical in the system.

Because of the way that plants excrete salt into the nutrient solution as a waste product, pH balance can change over time, necessitating frequent monitoring and adjustments, some systems like those provided by Pure Greens can automate this process, while in other hydroponic systems this is done manually.

Lettuce is a great first crop for hydroponic beginners. It’s easy to grow, develops quickly and has high demand in many areas across the world.

What is the Benefit of Hydroponic Cultivation?

Hydroponics has several benefits when compared to traditional agriculture. For one, hydroponics enables growers to vertically stack rows of crops on top of each other.

Instead of being limited to cultivating crops on the ground level, growers can stack their cultivation as high as they want, which is an exceptional benefit for urban farmers that don’t have space to expand horizontally.

What Are the Challenges of Hydroponics?

The largest challenge that hydroponic beginners must understand is the significant power requirements of hydroponic systems, specifically indoor cultivation. While hydroponic farms allow for climate-controlled agriculture, creating optimal conditions for plant cultivation, there’s a lot of components in a hydroponic farm that use power.

From the powerful HVAC climate control system to the high-powered grow lights that shine for as long as 18 hours per day, the power requirements for a harvest can be immense. That’s why the best states to start a hydroponic container farm are those with cheap electricity costs.

In addition to this, there are several other challenges that new growers will need to overcome to find farming success.

• Managing nutrient levels and preventing nutrient burn

• Finding a customer base that will buy your produce for above-market rates

• The regular challenges related to agricultural entrepreneurship, including developing the technical knowledge to effectively run and optimize a hydroponic farm.

Beginners to hydroponics might not understand the benefits of using grow lights instead of sunlight. Grow lights are just one part of controlled-environment agriculture, but they help optimize the growing environment of your hydroponic operation.

10 Tips for Getting Started with Hydroponics

With the basics out of the way, let’s cover some of the tips that direct you to develop good habits, and establish a baseline knowledge about how your hydroponic system works.

1. Create a Harvest Schedule

A harvest schedule provides an overview of the main objectives for your farm, helping you meet future obligations. It includes information about the costs you’ve put into the system, expected yields, expected sales prices and cleaning dates.

2. Make Cleaning a Priority

Because most hydroponic systems require a full flush of the system during cleaning, it’s imperative that you schedule set cleaning times to ensure that you can maintain the system’s production while also meeting your future obligations.

A clean system is an efficient system, and scheduling a regular cleaning time can prevent the growth of algae, nutrient buildup and keep your equipment operational for longer.

3. Record System Information like pH, EC, Temperature, Humidity, etc.

One of the most important things to do as a hydroponic beginner is to keep a close eye on how your hydroponic farm changes over time due to the alterations that you make to the system.

Especially in the beginning, avoid making things up as you go along and carefully record all changes you make. In addition to that, regularly note all your system’s key metrics, including the pH and EC of your nutrient solution as well as the temperature and humidity of your growing environment. That way, if something goes wrong later, you can look back on your changes to identify where the problem arose.

EC is an important measure to track because it measures dissolved salts, which will include some of the nutrients in the solution in addition to salts excreted from plants, which build up over time.

If not measured, the system’s EC can shift over time away from your target.

4. Use High-Quality Water Before Adding Nutrient Mix

Water quality is one of the most important things to pay attention to when getting started with hydroponics.

It’s important to start a hydroponic system with purified water because you’ll be adding a nutrient mix, which can become unbalanced when paired with unfiltered water due to the presence of dissolved solids.

Filtered water, on the other hand, is a blank slate that you can customize to meet the needs of your plants. That’s why it’s important to use a reverse-osmosis system, which has multiple layers of filters to purify water before it reaches your plants.

5. Don’t Eat Near Your Crops

It’s important to keep your growing area separate from the rest of your life. Think of a hydroponic system similar to a medical room. If you were a doctor, you wouldn’t want just anyone walking in, leaving things on the floor, messing with your medical tools, and eating in what should be a sterile environment.

While eating in your container farm might not harm someone, it increases the risk of pest infestations due to the crumbs left on the ground.

While hydroponic farms can utilize natural pesticides because of their compact size, the first line of defense is to stop pests from infiltrating your system in the first place. Leave your food outside of the growing area!

Your hydroponic operation is only as good as your business plan. In such a tight-margin industry, it’s crucial to nail down your customer base, your finances, and set reasonable expectations for your business’s growth.

6. Don’t Make Drastic Changes, Only Change One Thing at Once

When you’re just starting as a hydroponic beginner, there’s a lot of levers to pull and measures to adjust and it can be an overwhelming process to learn what to change and when.

Because of this, it’s important to take time during the learning process to see the effects of making a change, like adjusting the nutrient makeup of your solution. If you make too many changes at once, it’s hard to determine what specifically fixed the issue you were addressing.

Because of this, don’t make too many changes too quickly. Make the best change that’s available and wait a day or two to see if the issue is fixed.

7. Check Your System for Inefficiency

Every so often, run through a checklist to ensure that all your system’s components are working properly and check for leaks and pests.

Regular maintenance can prevent small issues from becoming major problems like water waste or pest infestation. Inspect your nutrient delivery system to ensure it’s functioning correctly and that plants are receiving the right amount of nutrients.

Monitor the pH and EC levels of your water regularly to maintain optimal growing conditions. Additionally, make sure your lighting system is operating efficiently and providing adequate light for your plants’ growth stages.

8. Find Out More About Your Local Farmer’s Market

Farmer’s markets are a boon to hydroponic growers. They offer a place for them to sell their produce, and it’s easy to set up a stand for a few dollars. You can typically buy a spot for a day, or for a bit more, you can purchase a spot for an entire season.

Farmer’s markets offer much more than just a customer base for your produce; they also provide a network of other growers in the area that you can learn from or work alongside. If you have a problem, chances are that someone else at the farmer’s market has also encountered that issue and can help you out.

Even if you decide to sell at a roadside stand or some other arrangement later on, getting acquainted with other growers in your area at a farmer’s market can be beneficial in the long run.

9. Want to Start a Business? Create a Long-Term Plan to Accomplish Your Dreams

Some people want to learn more about hydroponics as a hobby, while others want to develop hydroponic skills with the eventual goal of starting their own hydroponic farm business.

If you’re interested in taking the next step, you’ll need to create a solid business plan that outlines your funding objectives, expected cashflows, information about your future customer base and other farmers in the area, research about market prices for your crops, and an itemized list of all the equipment you’ll need to get the operation off the ground.

This document will prove useful if you need to seek financing, letting banks know that you have a solid grasp of the industry, your local competition and what differentiates you from them. It also helps you put your farm in the context of your local agriculture market, helping you visualize the challenges that stand in the way of accomplishing your goals.

10. Explore Pure Greens Hydroponic Container Farm Options

If you want to elevate your hydroponics hobby to the next level, you may be interested in learning more about the pre-designed and custom container farms provided by Pure Greens.

Perhaps you’re still trying to find that ideal layout. Maybe you’re still searching for that certain something that checks all the boxes. Pure Greens doesn’t approach container farms as a one-size-fits-all piece of equipment.

Different operations call for different equipment and different customers have different needs. We understand this and use our knowledge, expertise and customization abilities to solve these challenges. Contact Pure Greens today for our system specifications, information about out layouts, sizes and more.

Summary

Hydroponics offers a modern, efficient way to cultivate crops, especially in urban environments with limited space. By understanding the basics, benefits and challenges, and following practical tips, beginners can set themselves up for success.

Whether you’re looking to start a hobby or build a business, hydroponics provides a versatile and rewarding approach to farming. With careful planning, regular maintenance, and a willingness to learn, you can harness the power of hydroponics to achieve impressive yields and contribute to the future of sustainable agriculture.