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Old 11-26-2015, 12:44 AM
Stan Stan is offline
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Join Date: Apr 2011
Posts: 213
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Quote:
Originally Posted by GpsFrontier View Post
Hello Stan,
I'm going to go out on a limb and say you must like tomato's. I'm also courteous about a few things.
I wouldn't say I like them but i do love them. I can eat a few a day and whatever is left over I make pasta sauce out of them.

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1. That's a good size air pump in the pictures. Do you have a air line for each individual bucket? Or are you just aerating the main reservoir?
It's just aerating the reservoir. I have 1 very large air stone inside the reservoir it will only turn on when the water pump starts.

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2. I assume the tomato's in the square vinyl fence post tube are the aeroponic grown plants. Those roots must be packed tight for such a large root mass to be in there. Are they compacted?
The roots run along the bottom of the vinyl tubing maybe only 1/2 inch high off the bottom. You would think the vinyl fence tube would be filled with roots but they are not. I took a pic of the roots when I took everything down for next year when I find the pic will post it.

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3. Is it a low pressure aeroponic system, or a high pressure aeroponic system?
Yes it's a low pressure aeroponic system. I would go with a high pressure but the pumps are just way to much $$$.


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4. You may mot really be able to answer this, especially since the the dutch bucket plants had a 6 week start. But do you know which ones drank up the most water?
The aeroponic plants seem to drink the most water.

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5. Were you using the same size reservoir (total water volume) for both systems? And growing the same type, and amount of plants in both systems?
Both systems were growing the same type of tomato plants. The Dutch Bucket was using a larger reservoir and was growing more plants as compared to the aeroponic system.

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6. You said the aeroponically grown plants grew much quicker, and larger fruit. Were there any other possible variables that could have contributed to this? Like maybe the aeroponic plants were able to get more sunlight, pH swings, water temps, water volume, nutrient change schedules etc. etc..
Both had same amout of sunlight, both had same ph levels thru the growing season. Water temps were slightly warmer in the aeroponic due to the smaller size reservoir. The aeroponic would receive a 1/4 dose of nutrients and Dutch Bucket received 1/2 dose of Verti-Gro nutrients for the full grow season. Both reservoirs would get nutrients on the same day and ph levels would be checked on both every other day. Both were running on the same feeding schedule which was on for 30 minutes off for 2 hours. At night it was on for 30 minutes off for 4 hours.
The Dutch Bucket was started the first week in June the aeroponic was started 6 weeks later in July. The aeroponic was started when it was brutally hot and the plants just took off and thrived.
Next year will do the same but will do the same amount of plants with same size reservoir.

Last edited by Stan; 11-26-2015 at 12:46 AM.
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