best hydro for a summer time with even more than 90F
- Thread starter Rblade
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Major Blazer
Well-Known Member
I have grown hydroponically in hot temperatures for over 10 years with no issues at all running flood & drain (easiest and you definitely do not need a chiller that's bullshit), dtw drip (too many parts for my taste but excellent), and recirculating drip (GH Waterfarm, nice one plant option but res changes were annoying and algae was a constant issue). The only time I've ever had plant threatening issues running any type of hydro was with dwc and rdwc (pythium). I'll never waste my money on it again unless I move somewhere with cold basement floors. It was the most fun to build and admire with your bros so I get the appeal but in a hot environment, I can't think of a less suitable form of hydroponics. Most recently I took my fist attempt at coco (which I only loosely consider hydroponic) and it too was fantastic for warm climates. I don't like playing with dirt though so idk that I'll do it again.
I grow dtw in coco and I love it but I'm always looking to try or research new stuff.
2 questions...when you do flood and drain, what medium do you prefer and why? I probably would have used coco only bc I'm familiar with it.
Next, is there a resource you could point us towards that you feel explains the ins&outs of f&d properly. No bro science or incorrect info?
memoponics
Active Member
F&D is the best hot weather system hands down. You can get all the benefits you supposedly get from rdwc without all the root rot, chillers, poolshock etc, while pushing room temps of 90° as long as your humidity is around 75%. In the summer i am regularly in the high 80s for temp low 70s for rh. I have an ac but i dont even have it plugged in. You can also get by pretty well in hot weather in a simple kratky. I actually veg with 5 gallon kratkys and then flower in f&d. Since i switched to fd i havent seen anything that even came even remotely close to root rot. I built a custom f&d bucket system where the roots hang in the bucket like dwc/rdwc. I use perlite because its cheap and widely available just about anywhere. It takes 5 minutes for a full f&d cycle and it runs 24-7, something upwards of 300 cycles per day. My water temps are always in the high 80s and the roots get just as white and voluminous as anything ive ever seen in rdwc, and i havent had root rot in this system EVER. I always expected to have to fight root rot every run when i used rdwc.
RDWC/DWC/UC are the absolute worst systems ever conceived. Why people continue to grow with systems that are literally trying to drown your plants, where you have to invest in so much ancillary crap just to keep it from killing your plants, ill never understand. For some reason i believed the hype and thought it sounded cool, but i found out its not very cool. Literally.
RDWC/DWC/UC are the absolute worst systems ever conceived. Why people continue to grow with systems that are literally trying to drown your plants, where you have to invest in so much ancillary crap just to keep it from killing your plants, ill never understand. For some reason i believed the hype and thought it sounded cool, but i found out its not very cool. Literally.
Major Blazer
Well-Known Member
What's up man? I've got nothing but conjecture going for me when comparing my f&d runs to my dtw runs but I'd say that if you're happy doing what you're doing, stick with it bc I doubt you'll see much if any difference in the end product. That said, I'll answer your questions:
When I ran flood and drain, I used a hydroton and rockwool growcube mix in fabric 3 and 2 gal pots. I didn't experiment with mediums and I have no idea if what I was doing was even optimal, but I had bags of leftover hydroton and when I had nothing but growcubes in the pots, the young plants would move all over the place during a flood cycle so I placed a shallow layer on the bottom of the pots and if I remember correctly, I used a 75/25 growcube/hydroton mix throughout. For 2 strains and 3 total runs everything worked out great though, and then I converted the table to top feed dtw for fun.
There aren't really many ins and outs to flood and drain, it's pretty simple and all the same principles in hydroponics apply. Your medium choice should define your flood frequency though. For instance straight hydroton will require much more frequent floods than if you chose rockwool. @HydroRed grows this way and he's got a tits journal all about it here on RIU. You don't need to worry about airstones in the res or any shit like that bc it makes no sense once you understand that the roots get their oxygen from the wet and dry cycle, not the nutrient solution like in dwc.
One drawback with f&d is pH and EC fluctuations in the res but that's really more of a recirculating setback than specific to f&d, so you'll need to pay attention to your res in place of what you're doing now (or should be) with regard to monitoring runoff with dtw.
I remember when I first looked into f&d, this video was insightful
xtsho
Well-Known Member
I did DWC for a couple years alongside flood and drain. DWC can work great but it's too much of a hassle at least for me. Buckets of water, air pumps, hydroton, etc... I went to coco and life was much simpler. I still have a bunch of net pots and 5 gallon black buckets. I've been planning to repurpose the net pots for some DIY SIP's but haven't gotten around to it.
Wow, thank you, I couldn't have asked for a more thorough answer. I figured that info would also be beneficial to the OP, not trying to steal a thread.
rkymtnman
Well-Known Member
try dtw in dwc. i use waterfarms and feed 1 x a day.
I'm stuck growing in a 3x3x6.5 at the moment so I think I could only fit one waterfarm in there reasonably since I only have access to one side.
The part that appeals to me with any of this is the thought of life with less hoses and water lines. Damn, it sounds so good.
rkymtnman
Well-Known Member
i'm in a 3x4 and can fit 4 in there. i only have one sided access too which makes the back 2 a bit harder to get to but it's manageable.
