HydroBros

Welcome to Hydrobros, a unique blog about our hydroponic adventure! We will be growing Spinach this semester in a deep water culture system.

[hydrobros]

Welcome

Welcome to the official Hydrobros tumblr! Here we will be posting and documenting our hydroponics project once we have germination. Feel free to comment and leave any feedback :)

[hydrobros]

4/27/22

Checked on the system for the last time today. No significant changes from the previous update. Coco coir spinach has grown a little more but still will not be harvestable. 4/5 of Rockwool will be harvested and good to be eaten on Monday. However, the 5th Rockwool spinach is flowering and will not be eaten. The PH level is still steady at 6.2.

[hydrobros]

4/25/2022- Plants still looking good showing continued growth going into harvest day. The PH level is still holding solid at 6.2 which is about perfect. The coco coir will not have any yield for the harvest but the continued growth shows any issues have been resolved. Almost time to dissassemble out system :(

[hydrobros]

germination

4/18/22- The coco coir has now germinated since being replanted the other week. The rockwool has continued to grow and will be ready on harvest day. coco coir seems superior for quick growth in the beginning of the system, but the rockwool seems to better support plants over a longer period.

[hydrobros]

4/13/22- Another successful harvest! Another bag of spinach was retrieved from the system and hopefully a little more before the end of the semester. The big plants were trimmed and should continue to grow.

[hydrobros]

4/11/22- Great growth on the Rockwool side of the system. One of the spinach plants has actually started flowering and will be scraped at harvest. The rest of the spinach should be good for harvest and eating soon.

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4/6/22- Busy day for hydrobros!

Top image: after changing to a new fertilizer (we ran out of the old one) it took some calibration to get our PH levels back in check where we want them.

Bottom image: after the harvest and planting more seeds our spinach in the coco coir did not regrow. Our resident botanist believes there might have been some sort of fungus in the coco coir. We cleaned out the system and replanted spinach seeds in the new coco coir. Hopefully, we will get new germination and another harvest before the end of the semester!

[hydrobros]

4/4/22

Returned to class today after last weeks water change. We had flipped the foam insert around so that the coco coir and rockwool traded places in the system in relation to the air pump. This did not seem to make much of a difference in growing rates as the cococoir has still not had much growth since its harvest a few weeks back. The question is now "will they germinate or should we plant new seeds?"

[hydrobros]

3/28/22

The rockwool side of the system has started growing great since harvest. The coco coir however seems to be much slower to regrow and new seeds to germinate. Interesting being that originally the coco coir was the fast grower. The ph level is still on target at 6.2 but another water change is due soon.

[hydrobros]

3/23/22

Coming in today to continued good growth. All cups are sprouting further after harvest but some with thicker stems are rather limp and falling over. ph level is still golden at 6.2

[hydrobros]

3/21/22:

Coming back in after harvest to nice growth on all plants. The survived harvest and began to regrow in all cups. The ph level was still in our target range sitting at about 6.3. looks like we should be able to harvest again at some point in the near future.

[hydrobros]

3/18/22:

We came in during open lab time today and did our second water change. In doing so we also got to see our root system. The plants are all showing good growth except one Rockwool cup which has little progress since germination. The roots look good and healthy and many of the plants (especially in the coco coir) have sprouted to an impressive size.

[hydrobros]

3/14/22: First day back from spring break and met with a pleasant surprise. All but one cup has now sprouted (one rockwool has not) and the coco coir has shown great growth. Should be able to harvest some soon. PH today was right at 6.2 again which is right on target.

[hydrobros]

3/2/22- today we first checked the PH and still held steady at 6.2.

We then did our first water change to be ready for spring break. Still not much sprouting from the Rockwool cups.

[hydrobros]

2/28/22- All 5 coco coir cups have germinated and 4/5 have made good growth. On the rockwool side of the system only 1 seed has germinated and there are some signs of roots starting in another. So far Coco coir seems to be the better option for quickly getting a system growing. The Ph level today has held steady at 6.2 same as last week.

[hydrobros]

2/23/22

We have our first Germination. 2 out of the 10 pots have sprouted. Both are from the coco coir section of the system. Maybe coco coir is a better option for quickly growing spinach.

[hydrobros]

2/23/22     

Todays Ph read a little bit higher but is still within our range. sitting at about 6.2 in our range of 5.5-6.5. will have to keep a close eye on and check again by Friday.