I used to run an organic farm experimenting with hydroponics and I did a ton of research on this.
What I found, organic does not mean healthier. In fact, a larger percentage of food related illnesses are reported for organic foods than foods without the organic label, which itself is controversial and misleading. This is largely due to the types of fertilizer used. Animal waste is used to fertilize organic foods. Yes, that is a fact. Organic foods can also use BT pesticides, which are the same chemicals in GMO crops where the BT is produced inside the plant.
The nutritional content also depends on many factors, including what types of fertilizers are used. Are those fertilizers available to be absorbed by the plant. It also varies by variety. Some plants, especially strawberries are better grown outside in the soil than in hydroponics. That was a rare case. I also read many studies on nutritional content of plants grown hydroponically vs organically and some studies found some varieties were more nutritional when grown organically, others when grown hydroponically.
The reality is, the industry is so competitive and the studies are funded by folks with an agenda, so the data leaves me skeptical on both sides.
Only 17 elements are required to grow a plant and these elements can be provided entirely through hydroponics. From my research, hydroponic vegetables, for the most part, are actually healthier for people to consume than organic vegetables according to the science, but there is a stigma that since hydroponics is produced by science and technology and the industrial farming complex that it is worse for our bodies.
The research indicates though that hydroponic plants can more easily absorb nutrients, they are healthier and better able to resist fungus and insects, so not only are they more nutritious, but they don't need fungicides, pesticides or herbicides to be sprayed on them. Plus, plants can actually absorb salmonella and other bacteria into the plant from composted manure, which even when washed can still infect the human gut.
Hydroponics can’t scale like industrial farming. Our farming practices need to improve to make industrial farming sustainable.
My own foray into hydroponics has been lack luster. Lettuce didn’t taste as good and it’s much more maintenance. I can setup water timers and fertilize every x weeks in my garden. You have to constantly check hydro and put chemicals in it very often. Too labor intensive.
it absolutely can scale and does scale. It is being done at scale right now.
My experience was the opposite of yours. We found through experimentation that the flavor of the crop was directly related to the mineral concentration in the solution. We too had bland crop, but a little research suggested we starve our plants of water. In other words, if you want more flavor, increase the concentration of nutrients. It was easy to check the PPM and pH of the water with two devices you can get on Amazon for under $20. We also used timers.
Our organic farming required a dump truck load of compost, while the hydroponics was about a 5 lb bag of minerals and used about 10% of the water as the soil based. It's much more efficient. In the back yard, it's not that big a deal, but at scale, farming is largely about material movement.
The amount of labor to run an organic farm was incredible. It's also expensive and requires heavy equipment to scale a large farm. Hydroponics not as much, because there is no soil to move, which is heavy! Tilling, raking, tons of fertilizer and pesticides distributed across acres by machines and planes. Whereas hydroponics does that all just by pumping water, which is already being done in those same industrial farms.
Hydroponics requires a lot less labor. Just more thinking. You have to research. You have to engineer things. But you lift less. You move less. Physically its easier. Yes, it's harder because you have to think smarter, but it's not more labor intensive, precisely the opposite.
Recent trends in vertical farming are to heavily automate all of this and use sensors to maximize yields and minimize waste. Greenhouses in the Netherlands have been using hydroponics at scale for decades and are a reason it's a leading exporter of e.g. tomatoes and many other crops. The whole point of hydroponics is industrial scale and maximizing yields.
What you call industrial farming started roughly mid last century when people were people figured out how to grow a handful of crops at scale using large machinery at the cost of diversity and quality. The modern variant of that heavily relies on overusing pesticides, herbicides, fertilizers, etc.
The downside of farming like this is the lack of diversity of crops and the negative side-effects on the environment. Industrial farming has destroyed vast amounts of land and turned them into eroded wastelands and deserts.
Modern farming is becoming more high tech and using data driven approaches, automation, etc. enables smarter use of land, a wider variety of crops, better quality produce, and more efficient use of resources (water, chemicals, nutrients, light, energy, etc.). Hydroponics are one form of that but also organic farming has evolved way beyond hippies growing small amounts of produce like the industrial revolution never happened. Organic farming at industrial scale is becoming a thing.
> Only 17 elements are required to grow a plant and these elements can be provided entirely through hydroponics
This claim is diametrically opposed to the "soil as living organism" claim above. What gives you confidence that there is no interaction between soil, fungi mycelium, plant roots, worm dung microorganisms etc. that you could possibly be missing?
The question is then how do you source those 17 elements at scale. With traditional farming, they are naturally replenished with the lifecycle of soil and its surrounding fauna. In the case of hydroponics, they will be extracted in some form of industrial process that is most likely not sustainable.
Very interesting! Where could I learn more about this, in particular how to run my own experiments growing plants with the 17 elements and so on? Also, have you looked into aeroponics as well?
There are lots of good books on it and youtubes. It largely depends on what you want to grow. Fruiting plants are different than leafy plants, for example.
You can look up the ratios of the elements for different plants on the web. It's all out there. mhpgardener on Youtube is amazing https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nXy32Dr4Z4A He has videos on how to set up different types of hydroponic systems, there are 3 main types, the video link is to an Ebb and Flow system called Dutch Buckets and is mainly used for fruiting plants like tomatoes, eggplant and peppers.
There's also Nutrient Film Technique (NFT) which is more like what you see in PVC systems that pump water along the roots of the plants. There's also a raft system where the plants float on top of the water and the roots are constantly submerged.
I looked at Aeroponics too and I believe that is an excellent system as well, though did not try it.
Watch mhpgardener's experiments with different nutrients. He does one with organic nutrients, but they didn't grow as well as the masterblend recipe, which you can learn about here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vYv9iu2NI3M
I remember watching a video about a Japanese company that can tweak the flavor of different herbs to exactly cater to what their chefs wanted to accentuate different notes for different dishes.
The rest depends on the setup you want and the plants you want to grow. What do you want to grow? I can point you to a good kit to get started. Here's one for dutch buckets on amazon, real cheap. https://www.amazon.com/Deep-Water-Culture-DWC-Hydroponic/dp/... You could grow two tomato plants in one bucket and get 20-30 pounds out of it in one season very easily.
Pretty much anyone here can do hydroponics. It's like programming plants!
And they do not taste like grocery store hydroponic veggies. Those are grown to meet other priorities: thick skin, shelf life, uniformity, color (sometimes). They are not concerned with flavor or nutrients.
In your home, in your yard, you can prioritize any aspect of the plant you want, what's important to you: Flavor, Nutrients, Color, Size, harvest dates.
They are all just numbers. It's not that hard. It's not easy and you have to care but it's the same as anything. If you care and you want it, you can do it. I know, because I did and I want more people to know they can too.
Thanks, very interesting! I'll take note, and start playing around when I have more space in my apartment :)
I'm generally interesting in hydro-/aeroponics from the perspective of growing plants in space, via, as you mentioned, "programming" them - basically, what's the minimum of nutrients (not just minerals, but also water, air and sunlight) that's needed to grow food (and air) for people.
I also thought about actually programming plants, I wonder if there's any research in this direction - e.g. why do I need an orange plant to grow a trunk? If I could inject the right hormones at the right place, I could skip all that and just have it grow leaves (energy production) and fruit (energy consumption) without any other superfluous parts.
What I found, organic does not mean healthier. In fact, a larger percentage of food related illnesses are reported for organic foods than foods without the organic label, which itself is controversial and misleading. This is largely due to the types of fertilizer used. Animal waste is used to fertilize organic foods. Yes, that is a fact. Organic foods can also use BT pesticides, which are the same chemicals in GMO crops where the BT is produced inside the plant.
The nutritional content also depends on many factors, including what types of fertilizers are used. Are those fertilizers available to be absorbed by the plant. It also varies by variety. Some plants, especially strawberries are better grown outside in the soil than in hydroponics. That was a rare case. I also read many studies on nutritional content of plants grown hydroponically vs organically and some studies found some varieties were more nutritional when grown organically, others when grown hydroponically.
The reality is, the industry is so competitive and the studies are funded by folks with an agenda, so the data leaves me skeptical on both sides.
Only 17 elements are required to grow a plant and these elements can be provided entirely through hydroponics. From my research, hydroponic vegetables, for the most part, are actually healthier for people to consume than organic vegetables according to the science, but there is a stigma that since hydroponics is produced by science and technology and the industrial farming complex that it is worse for our bodies.
The research indicates though that hydroponic plants can more easily absorb nutrients, they are healthier and better able to resist fungus and insects, so not only are they more nutritious, but they don't need fungicides, pesticides or herbicides to be sprayed on them. Plus, plants can actually absorb salmonella and other bacteria into the plant from composted manure, which even when washed can still infect the human gut.