8 Answers

Dutch bucket or DWC - For growing peppers, tomatoes and cucumbers

998 Views
name
Posted In: Dutch bucket hydroponics Jan 07,2020
8 Answers
name
Posted In: Dutch bucket hydroponics Jan 07,2020

Dutch bucket or DWC - For growing peppers, tomatoes and cucumbers

Question about growing peppers, tomatoes, & cucumbers:

I am thinking that dutch buckets or DWC may be the simplest method for a beginner. I keep reading tutorials and am getting SO overwhelmed and lost.

Does anyone have a good tutorial or something they recommend for this? Something where they kind of dumb it down, lol. And what exactly is the difference between dutch bucket or DWC? To me, they look similar. I apologize for my ignorance.

How high maintenance are these systems?

As in, what do you do daily/weekly/monthly to maintain them?

tomato pepper cucumber
name
Kevin Sullivan
Kevin Sullivan

Dwc is uses too much energy. Go Dutch buckets. I am converting mine, having an air pump run constantly is costly and loud

  • 0
Reply
    • John Correia

      you don't have to run the air pump 24/7 in DWC just keep the waterlevel below the rhizome. Dutch buckets require air and water pumps so you will use more electricity than DWC.

    • Kevin Sullivan

      in my experience only some plants do ok with that, like tomatoes and cucumbers but something like peppers I have always found don’t like the wet feet and need more air.

    • John Correia

      It's always the best Idea to build your system around the type of plants you're growing instead of trying to build the plants to deal with your system.

    • Sunit Chaudhari

      i run my air pump only for 12hrs in my DWC system

name
Ben Joseph Kohn
Ben Joseph Kohn

YouTube MHP Gardiner

  • 0
Reply
name
Jonathan Martin
Jonathan Martin

Try an Acqua Garden

  • 0
Reply
name
Regina Hitchcock
Regina Hitchcock

Dutch buckets use a media (I use a perlite/coir mix) and house a single large plant like tomato or pepper. Nutrient water flows to each bucket and back to the respirator. DWC or deep water culture uses an open bed of water, no media, and floating rafts…See more

  • 0
Reply
name
Chad Stewart
Chad Stewart

Try not to overthink it. If your overwhelmed consider starting with a easier crop or simpler method. I'm doing peppers, cucumbers and spinach in kratky and it's going fine all I needed was mason jars, clay pellets net cups a gallon milk jug and solution. I didn't bother with starter pellets either, I just dropped the seeds right into the clay pellets.

  • 0
Reply
    • Holly Lee

      I do grow salad greens already. I’m hoping to start expanding into other methods!

    • Chad Stewart

      That's good. I'm just a beginner here myself. There's so many options to choose from isn't there.

    • Chad Stewart

      Theres one of my baby lemon cucumbers

    • Holly Lee

      I’m not familiar with that variety. I’m assuming it vines like other cucumbers. Do you use a trellis?

    • Chad Stewart

      I chose it cuz it's small and round like a lemon

    • Chad Stewart

      I'm going to try to let if free crawl around my other plants in the rack. Tie it to the side poles and what not.

    • Chad Stewart

      I had been told that the greens would do the best but so far it's the peppers and cukes.

name
John Correia
John Correia

Start with a tub cut holez for your net pots. Netpots are cheap like $0.35 each. This can be kratky method. Add an airpump and air stone. Now you have DWC method. DWC is the easiest lowest cost. When you get motivated you can convert the same tub to low pressure areoponic with some PVC and red easycloner sprayers. Or just toss in a ultrasonic fogger on a float and you have a fogponic system. Tub systems are the most versatile. NFT rails take time patience and are more costly. Start with a tub. Get a gh ph control kit off amazon. And a tds meter. I suggest seaweed nitrients supplimented with calmag.

  • 0
Reply
    • Chad Stewart

      fogponic?! That's a new one to me!

    • John Correia

      Fogponic is amazing even if your PH is a bit off your plants dont mind for some reason

name
PG SubJapan
PG SubJapan

I have had great success with both mini-tomatoes, eggplant and hot peppers with a simple kratky setup (topping up as needed). No need to overcomplicate it the first time.

  • 0
Reply
    • Chad Stewart

      when you topped them up how high did you top then up? Did you fill them all the way?

    • PG SubJapan

      No, you have to leave room for the oxygen roots. I probably topped 2/3 full, leaving at least 10cm for the top part of the roots.

name
Ricardo Pancho Patrolla
Ricardo Pancho Patrolla

Can I possibly make bench marking on your hydroponics garden for anyone in the Philippines?

  • 0
Reply


Related Posts

Powered By HGS Zone