# These look interesting!!



## LondonDragon (29 Jan 2010)

No cheap but then again plants are not cheap either if they are of decent quality.

http://www.growell.co.uk/p/9545/Aeropon ... ators.html

http://www.growell.co.uk/p/2408/Jumbo-A ... gator.html

any thoughts?


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## dw1305 (29 Jan 2010)

Hi all,
These work very well, what you have to bear in mind that these are designed for rooting and growing on terrestrial plants, and in these cases the plants roots aren't designed to deal with low oxygen environments, you can also feed your plant very efficiently from the spray. For plants that naturally grow submersed (including marginals, floating and emergents) they have morphological (aerenchyma etc) or physiological adaptations to deal with water logging, so aeroponics doesn't offer as much advantage over hydroponics as it would for tomatoes etc. That is why commercial aquarium plant growers can use rock-wool as their growing medium of choice, waterlogged rock wool is sub-optimal for terrestrial plants, but ideal for aquatic ones, and cheap to buy.

A thermostatically controlled heated propagator is well worth buying, but for aquatics you don't really need the aeroponics side of it, you can stand rock-wool blocks, or net pots of coir/peat/perlite/vermiculite/hydroleca clay granules etc in water + nutrient sol. in the base of the propagator and the plants will have wet roots (from capillary uptake) and 100% relative humidity at the leaf.

The other problem with terrestrial plants is that the roots grown in potting compost differ from the roots grown in water and you have a difficult weaning period when you place compost grown plant into hydroponic culture (and vice versa from water to soil).

cheers Darrel


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## glenn (29 Jan 2010)

i beleive TGM use somthing very similar if not the exact one (the jumbo one) to grow their plants. very effective


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## ghostsword (10 Feb 2010)

> rock-wool blocks, or net pots of coir/peat/perlite/vermiculite/hydroleca clay granules etc in water + nutrient sol. in the base of the propagator and the plants will have wet roots (from capillary uptake) and 100% relative humidity at the leaf.



Currently what I use on my plants, be they on my emmersed tank or on my main tank is net pots filled with rock wool, and the results are very clear to see. It is easier for me to move them and for the plants to absorb nutrients, as they are on 15cm of water, but with only their roots waterlogged.

I am using:







with:





This allows me to get a plant from a LFS, and transplant it straight into the net pot, so that I can quickly create space for the plant to grow more.

Also by using the pots you can actually drop nutrients straight into the rockwool, as not all plants need the same amount of nutrients this reduces wastage.


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## dw1305 (11 Feb 2010)

Hi all,


> my main tank is net pots filled with rock wool, and the results are very clear to see. It is easier for me to move them and for the plants to absorb nutrients, as they are on 15cm of water, but with only their roots waterlogged


yep same as "Ghostsword", that is exactly the system I use. 
cheers Darrel


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