I've recently made a new discovery about the "mark one" aeroponic unit... It's rather tall height makes lighting a bit more complicated. Take a look at the photo below for reference:
Our eggplant is flowering now, and it's grown pretty tall. The added height from the aeroponic unit brings it closer to the light than I would prefer. Although our lights run somewhat "cool" for high intensity lights, I've found that you want to keep the lighting reflector at least 18" from your plants. If you position the light closer than 18" from your plants, you're very likely to burn the leaves with the heat of the light. Don't forget... Reflector type makes a big difference.
A HydroFarm Radiant reflector distributes heat much better than the smaller Hydrofarm Daystar. Both the larger size and different shape allow the Radiant to distribute heat more widely (unlike the Daystar's "death ray" heat pattern.
Regardless, our eggplant is growing larger than I would prefer, and it's closer to the light than is probably good. However, we're limited by our ceiling; so we've got to make the most of the situation.
Now, for something completely different...
I'm puzzled by the
CO2Boost Experiment... Although I don't have a justification, the "control" plant has gained a lot of ground on the "supplemented" plant. I need to do more research on eggplants. I'm not a plant biology guy... For that matter, I'm not a biology guy at all. All I ever took in school was chemistry and physics. My running theory is that an eggplant may not respond to CO2 supplementation... We'll be bringing in some sophisticated testing gear later in the week, so we'll have fresh information for the next post.