Tue, 2009/12/29 - 12:10pm
Hi All, I live in the Kwazulu Natal province of South Africa and have been fiddling with a ebb and flow system with poorish results for some time now and I hope the wise ones on this site will get me going more succesfully soon. I have very limited knowledge of hydroponics and furthermore there is no shops stocking a reasonable range of hysroponic requirements close to me.
My current garden is a 3 metre length of 110 mm plastic pipe with holes cut on top to house the plants. This pipe is hooked up with a 30 l container that supplies the water/nutrient mixture via a 1000l per hour pump timed to pump for 15 minutes and drain for 60 minutes. The garden is getting about 5 hours full sun per day with no shade untill about 15h00 hrs in the afternoon and partly shade the rest of the time.. I think I must mention that we have quite high temperatures at this time of the year and the average daily temp is around 38 degrees c and the humidity is around 95% on average. The temperature drops to about 24 degrees at night. I can not get hold of any grow rocks and use 10 to 13 mm crusher stone to support the plants.
I have some chillie and lettuce plants going now and they are not showing very good growth.
Im sure everyone has had enough of my sad lot now and I hope lots of help is coming!
Tue, 2009/12/29 - 10:06pm
#2
Welcome, Herkie!
Ditto what Beth said : 38 C is too hot for any lettuce I know! Even in the shade, I think. Lettuce heaven is about 15 to 24 C, with some special types (romaines, some Asian varieties) doing OK up to 30 C, but not higher than that. It's a spring/fall crop here, and our temperatures are lower than yours in summer! Your temperatures might be too hot for chilis to set fruit, too, I'm not sure. Most tomatoes won't set fruit above 35C.
Cucumbers and other summer squash or melons might like it. Or corn (maize). Maybe beans.
What do other people grow outside for crops in your area in summer? Will it cool down a bit in a few months (to stay below 35C)? Maybe you just need to wait until summer's over?
I'd love to see pictures of your plants and hydroponics array if you have them / can post!
Gisette in Connecticut, USA (currently 15°F, -10C)
Welcome Herkie!
We have experts here that I'm sure can help. I do know that lettuce does poorly in high temperatures. Is there any way to shade the lettuce plants? They don't require full sun to grow.
Beth in Southern Maryland, USA Current temperature is 28 F (-2 C)