As you will soon see, I spent some time with the camera this week.  We've got some new items and some followups this week.  I'll start with a followup to an existing experiment.

I've been toying with outdoor aeroponics this season.  I'll admit that the first attempt was a dismal failure.  I attempted to start the season too early, and cold-shocked (and killed) most of my strawberry plants in the process.  Not to be deterred, I made a second attempt (with a single plant) to see if it could survive.  My original theory was that the overly warm reservoir would be detrimental to the plant's health.  I still think that's true.  However, the plant is still alive.  It's a life, but not a good one.  Take a look at the following photo:

Initially the plant seemed to suffer a fail amount of damage from the shock of the reservoir temperature (or so I believe).  At this point, it seems to have acclimated to the environment.  However, it's really suffering from pest damage.  Here's a closer look at the leaves:

The insects are literally eating it alive.  Although it looks like a strawberry will be forming shortly, it's having a hard time in the outdoors.  Perhaps my results would be better in a greenhouse... However, that isn't the point. The goal of this experiment was to see how well "tube" systems would work outdoors.  The goal was to make a very inexpensive growing system for the summer.  Although it's subsisting, I'm not overjoyed.

Secondly, we have a followup to the DIY aeroponic system.  I'm working on a slightly modified version now, which will house four small plants (I'm thinking about lettuce and basil).  It's built from the same Sortera container, but with a different drilling pattern.  Here's an overview of the new unit:

If you're wondering why it's "whiter" than the original Sortera containers... There's actually a good reason.  Following the advice of some regular readers, I've decided to try an experiment.  The new reservoirs have been spray painted with white plastic-bonding paint.  They transmit much less light than the stock containers, so algae growth should be much more limited.

Additionally, the sprayer system is similar, but even more simple than before.  The new spray system consists of a single "stalk" with double sprayers on the end.  Interestingly enough, I've found that the 180 sprayers are much more powerful than the 360 sprayers.  I think that the 180's are drilled out more than the 360's, and they allow much more water flow.  As usual, the holes are drilled and tapped at a 10-32 thread size to fit the threads of the sprayers.

Here's a shot of the PVC cap, with the sprayers installed.  Note the arrows on the sprayers.  The arrows indicate spray direction.  I've found that placing two 180's opposite directions will cause much more flow than a single (or even double) 360 sprayer.

Ok... Last we have a followup on our testing of the STG (Sure To Grow media.  We've germinated seeds in the small cubes.  They seem happy enough, so we've placed the small cubes into the larger rooting cubes.  The new STG product is much more dense than the original version.  It really does retain water very well.  Because it is very white, you should expect to see algae growth on it, as it's always retaining nutrient enriched water.  I suspect that stops being much of an issue once the plant in question has grown a canopy.  This is how it usually works with rockwool.  Normally, rockwool will get a small amount of algae on the top of the cube.  This algae tends to get killed off when the canopy cuts off it's light source.  I'd expect the same would be true with the STG.

The plant in question is a cantaloupe (in between two unrelated strawberry plants).  The cantaloupe germinated without any complications.  Although I mentioned it previously, the new "denser" version of STG is much better than the old formulation.  The new version doesn't "float away" anymore in the ebb & flow system.  I've been pretty happy with it.  I'll post new updates as we proceed.  Although I'm not able just yet, I'm planning on performing some STG vs. rockwool side-by-side tests at some point in the future.

On a side note, we hope to be expanding the hydroponics lab in the future.  At the moment, we are constrained by space.  If things work out, we should have more space available in the next six months or so.  Until next week...