How to Grow Hydroponic Lettuce and Pak Choy / Garden Hack / Hemp Grow Mat / DIY Hydroponics

I use hot water insulation form bought from Homedepot
It is more firm than pool noodle

Mike  Yesterday I bought my first piece of downspout and enough holders to make 3 of your set ups.  It has been hard to find 3 x 4 inch spout…any way couldn't find any pool noodles at this time of the year and happened upon one at a friends house.  It was a big one and so I made my first kratky system in a mason jar, wrapped in a black sock (to keep out the light).  Pushed the noodle into the jar top (which fit perfectly) so no need to cut it, then what to use to hold the little shoot in the hole?   Well that same friend has sheep which were just sheared, there is no market for fleece now, with all that is going on, I just couldn't watch her throw it all away.  Give it to me, I said.  Think this might work, I am going to fill that hole with my little shoot wrapped in fleece.  I will send you a picture of my project if i can find your email address.  You are my favorite grower…wish we lived closer to each other.  Eva from Oregon.

which fertilizers are u using for hydroponics?

Does it matter how you sprout the seeds for pan choi? I live in a very small apartment in the city and wonder if I can sprout the seeds in a mason jar, I'm a first time gardener and one of the awesome's who bought your drain spout garden!

im in north FL

What to do if your pool noodle dosnt have a hole in the middle?

In my country the pool noodle is scarce, so I found that isolation for heating pipes works fine, and it's even cheaper 🙂

Cool video, new subscriber 🙂

how do you set up the rain gutter down spouts for the hydroponics?

I like using neoprene pipe insulation. Doesn't leak light.

Thanks for your great videos Mike! How would I go about using kratky pool noodles with a seedlings in rockwool cubes?

You can also get larger Pool Noodles and cut a 2 inch hole in the middle. Then just put the plants you started in Net Cups into the Pool Noodle then put the Pool Noodle into the Aquaponic system. This cuts down greatly on plant transplant shock! The Pool Noodles will float in a Aquaponic tray and will spread out as the plants get bigger. Works fantastic for lettuce plants. And to save even more money, use a strip of Polyester Fiber rolled up into the Net Cup. Perfect fit with a hole in the middle for the lettuce seed.

I like that setup. Thank you for the idea. Gonna give it a try this week

Mike, do you have a video showing how to make the wooden rack that you use to support your raingutters and what size lumber do you use? Thanks

Pool noodles not eco friendly :/

I bought 100 little sponges for little net cups. Those will work excellent in the pool noodles. Super soft

The 4 legged critters, can easily crawl up wood and those concrete mason blocks.  So.. I used 15" tall buckets as the base. The slippery surface makes fairly difficult for them to climb. Not 100% effective, but pretty darn good – rofl.  Depending on the air temp where you're at.. it's possible the static nutrient fluids may evap too quickly.. (more so in summer)…so I used a much smaller hole (1") and placed a hole at the very end of the spouts, and put a cork in it. I could monitor fluid level and quickly refill if needed. Hobby Lobby sells corks in a bag.. pretty cheap…or hit your friends up to save them from their champagne or wine bottles.  You could also make a simple floating fluid level from a wooding skewer & piece of foam or cork.

Great Video ….cleared my confusion…thanks

Hi Mike.
When I started using pool noodles, more than half of my seedlings would die, even though there was a tiny hole as you suggest.

So I bought a huge bag of loft insulation rockwool for the equivalent of $20 that will last for hundreds of thousands of seedlings.

I wrapped each seedling in a little bit of rockwool like you have done with hemp mat.

It worked well, but the plant didn’t have any stability when it grew bigger.

I now cut my pool noodles in half (to about 1cm thick), and use pool noodle middle with no rockwool any get 100% success rate.

I use the rockwool for growing micro green peas and it works a treat.

I’d like to join Facebook so I can join your group.

Cheers for your videos👍🏻

You're a good man. Thank you for sharing 👍🏻