The OG crops in The C.A.N were sacrificed for the betterment of the systems… the ‘Guinea pigs’ if you will;)
The first few months of production in The C.A.N were filled with slow growing, nutrient deficient, wilting plants. It wasn’t hard to identify the problem, as all the plant roots were drowning in slime (see pic above); however, figuring out the cause of the slime was a bit more of a head-scratcher. I spent three months troubleshooting. I swapped to only deionized water, installed a bunch of DIY water filters, ramped up the number of air exchange events, tried cooling the water (although I admit, it was a poor attempt), swapped from citric acid to HCl, began treatments of H2O2, and invested in a UV sterilization lamp. With little improvements, I finally bit the bullet and enrolled in a hydroponics course. In the first lecture, I realized what I had been doing wrong… not enough oxygen in the systems! I had previously been relying solely on the “waterfall effect”, however, clearly that was far from enough. So, I put all the water pumps on timers and sourced some air stones and an air pump … about a month later, improvements were happening:D
Slime… slime… and more slime:)
The power of O2…
Using these fast-growing, leafy green crops has been great for testing each system and working out the quirks. However, now that most of the issues have been sorted (and we have actual heads of lettuce!), it’s time to move on to some heartier, more nutritious crops! Stay tuned for some cucumbers, beets, peppers, peas, beans, and tomatoes (hopefully).
Love following along with all this Molly! I especially appreciate all the trial and error before resorting to the course… life’s questions are more interesting than the answers eh?
Look at all those greens!! Proud of you cuz! xo