My Gardening Area

These days, there are less and less fertile farm lands to grow crops in. But contrary to what you may think, this doesn't pose such a huge dilemma for our growers. Why? You might ask. The answer lies in hydroponic grow systems.

Ever since the Biblical times - the time of Babylon to be precise - we have already come up with a means to grow plants without need of soil. How else do you think the Hanging Gardens of Babylon remained hanging up there and still managed to wow people all over the ancient world? Simple: The Babylonians used a form of hydroponic grow system to keep the plants' nutrient and water supply running.

Known as soilless gardening, hydroponics has a long history in human civilization. We may have gotten down its science as late as the 1890s, but the method has actually been put to practice way back during the time of the Hanging Gardens of Babylon.

Today, there are several different kinds of hydroponic growing systems, most of them mere variations of the more basic types. Below are four hydroponic growing systems commonly used today.

Water Culture or Aqua Culture

It's all about marketing. That's what local growers say about hydroponic gardening. In a time when water and fertile lands to farm are scarce, hydroponic or soilless gardening is considered as a some kind of mana form heaven. Where before farmers where completely at the mercy of the seasons, now they can grow crops throughout the year and yield good harvests no matter the season. That is most direct effect of hydroponics.

The possibility that plants could survive and grow without soil as the nutrient source was first described historically by Woodward in 1699, though the technique has been in practice since the time of the Hanging Gardens of Babylon.

Often called the cultivation of plants in water, hydroponic gardening is quickly proliferating due to the lack of a large water supply or fertile farmland. Actually, the method is not new. The famous Hanging Gardens of Babylon, one of the Ancient Wonders of the World, used a form of hydroponics to cultivate the plants.

Today, research has since determined that many different aggregates or media will support plant growth, not just soil, and hydroponic gardening is just one of them. One of the most blatant advantages of hydroponics is that it saves space. For this reason, home gardeners have adopted the technique, growing fresh vegetables and plants even in apartment balconies. What's more, hydroponic gardening has become a widely preferred method for greenhouse gardening because of its space-saving benefits.

Are you getting impatient for your plants to grow? Well, it's a natural reaction so you don't need to tear your hair out over it. There are dozens of natural garden fertilizers on the market. And while it's always good to give your plants a little encouragement along the way, try not to kill them with kindness. Use the following tips below to help ensure you are using the right amount of natural garden fertilizer for the right amount of nutrients.

Question: How do you know what's inside the bag?

Gardening without soil? With general hydroponics, it's definitely possible. Often defined as "the cultivation of plants in water," general hydroponics has since come to mean "the cultivation of plants without soil" after researchers determined that many aggregates or media other than soil can support plant growth.

To compensate for the lack of a large water supply or fertile farmland, growers all over the world are using the technique of general hydroponics. Home gardeners have also applied the same method on a smaller scale. Because hydroponics does not require soil, fresh vegetables and plants may now be grown year round even in smaller spaces, such as an apartment or balcony.

Hydroponics is another name for soilless gardening. The technique is actually not something new. The use of hydroponics could be traced back to the Hanging Gardens of Babylon, known as one of the Seven Wonders of the Ancient World. However, it was only in the 1890s, when a group of German scientists developed nutrient formulas, that the technique gained popular modern appeal. Now, the method has even gone beyond mere gardening with the use of water, to gardening with the use of media other than soil.

The lifeblood of any fertile soil is organic matter. It is that which allows the soil to retain water better and hold nutrients in. Porosity of soil makes it more water absorbent. And the more water the soil absorbs, the lesser chance your plants die from shortage of water supply. Plus, the soil's ability to hold nutrients can very well mean the difference between a scraggly, sickly looking plant and a lush, green shrub.

Using natural fertilizers in your garden or farm will help improve the soil "tilth." By that, we mean the condition or health of the soil. That's because natural fertilizer is less likely to burn the lawn or leach down through the soil and into groundwater.

Ever heard of soil-less gardening? Another name for it is hydroponics. It's the latest development in agriculture - a solution, they said, to the problem of gardening in small spaces.

"Hydroponics is soil-less gardening. It means more food in less space with less water in less time," explains Dan Lubkeman, president of the Hydroponic Society of America, an organization that has helped hobbyists and commercial growers from 23 countries on five continents since 1979.

"It's like playing Mother Nature indoors. You provide the sun, food, water, and fresh water," he adds.

Plants don't need soil. It's true. The reason they seem to need soil is because soil contains the nutrients and water they need for their survival. Take away nutrients and water from soil and your plant will die.

This simple idea lead to the newest gardening method developed - hydroponics. Many people prefer hydroponics because it is the one method that doesn't use soil. Without soil, hydroponics therefore is a more efficient way to provide food and water to your plants, minus the hassle.

Below are some great places where you can find hydroponic supplies:

PlanetNatural.com

The word "hydroponics" was derived from the Greek word hydro, which means "water," and ponos, which means "labor." It is a technique of gardening that involves growing plants with their roots in other nutrient sources besides soil.

Hydroponic gardening is as simple as ordinary gardening using traditional methods. After all, plants, whether hydroponically or traditionally grown, need the same essential elements to stay healthy - light, water, temperature, and nutrients. The only difference is that since hydroponics requires no water, you may need hydroponic equipment to provide the plants with its needed nutrients.

Decomposing plant and animal life enriches the soil and allows the plants to use the newly available nutrient to grow and thrive. That is basically the information on natural fertilizer and the concept behind organic gardening. As organisms die, Mother Nature's natural process is to transfer the energy from their dead bodies to new living organisms, i.e. from dead plants and animals to growing plants. The information on natural fertilizer is that this decomposition also increases what is known as the soil's microbial life.

Every farmer from some fifty years ago - whether a farmer of large acreages or an urban backyard farmer, knew that to produce healthy plants, you had to improve the soil. If the soil is weak, your plants will be weak. And if your plants are weak, then they are more susceptible to insect infestation.

While some people think that home gardening is a bit on the expensive side, others - the smarter ones - think of it as a sort of natural fertilizer science project. Think about it. If home gardening is all about the soil, then shouldn't you be paying more attention to cultivating the soil than to anything else? And natural fertilizers, as opposed to chemical fertilizers, encourage microbial life in the soil, keeping it healthy for plants to grow.

One of the most important breakthroughs in organic lawn care is the fertilizer preemergent natural. It's a type of natural fertilizer made from byproducts of organic materials. But what makes this fertilizer truly unique is not its very effective nutrient base, but its natural weed suppressant ability. It's a preemergent, which means that it inhibits seed germination by drying out a seed as soon as it cracks open to sprout. For this reason, the fertilizer preemergent natural has since become known as a "weed n' feed" fertilizer.

When it comes to growing tomatoes - and plants in general - people usually turn immediately to the best natural tomatoe fertilizers for help as though these are the be-all and end-all of everything. Well, news flash! Not even the best natural tomatoe fertilizer can help you if your soil has a pH level that is too high or too low or if weeds start choking your plants.

Below are some help tips to help you grow the best tomatoes this side of town.

Choosing the Plants

Having a garden in your backyard is a wonderful way to get fresh vegetables all summer long. But what about the rest of the year? For fresh vegetables 365 days a year, turn to indoor hydroponic systems.

Hydroponics is soilless gardening. For years now, scientists have known that plants may be cultivated in a medium other than soil. To apply this principle of soilless gardening, they came up with agricultural systems like indoor hydroponic systems that do not require soil for plant cultivation.

There are several different methods used to apply indoor hydroponic systems. Typically, instead of soil, an inert growing material or plain water is used to grow plants.

We could get technical about natural plant fertilizers. But let's not.

For thousands of years, farmers have been using natural plant fertilizers to improve the nutrient holding capacity of soil to help plants grow healthy. Natural plant fertilizers have been known not only to promote the health of your plants, but also the health of the naturally occurring microorganisms that thrive in healthy soil.

A symbiotic relationship exists between the plants and these microorganisms. The former depend on the latter for increasing their uptake of nutrients from the soil. While the latter depend on the former for their source of food (they feed on the decomposed dead leaves that fall off plants).

Want to know what's the best and least expensive natural flower fertilizer?

It's no secret. Composting is one of the oldest methods used to fertilize plants whether of the flowering variety or the leafy kind. Learning how to compost certain food scraps and yard waste and turn it into a natural flower fertilizer is the single most money-saving method of fertilizing out there. And what's more, it helps you reduce waste. Once finished, compost is a dark, crumbly mixture of decomposed organic matter. Used as a natural flower fertilizer, it can:

Many homeowners aim to have a lush, green lawn that's free of weeds and one that's relatively easy to maintain. In addition, most of us want to protect the environment, and our family's health, by cutting down on the use of lawn chemicals.

So what's the solution? Almost everyone has turned to natural lawn fertilizers.

The philosophy behind it is pretty simple. A healthy soil grows healthy plants. Growing turf with the use of natural lawn fertilizers seems like the best means we have. Why? Because when we feed the life in the soil, those growing populations of microorganisms begin to accomplish many of the jobs that would have consumed great amounts of our time, money, and energy.