Hydroponic Growing media
Before starting an experiment you should first understand the different types of media to choose from for a hydroponic project.
The word hydroponics traditionally meant that one 'grew in water', but now everybody uses some type of medium. Media is used to give the plant something to anchor it's roots in as well as provide some water holding capacity.
The key is that a hydroponics medium should not buffer (hold back or lock up) any nutrient. We want the plant to have instant access to anything it needs, when it needs it. Saying that, some hydroponic media do have a small buffering capacity for micro nutrients.
If you choose to use media with low water holding capacity, you need to make nutrients available to the plant all day. This can be done by a passive wick system or by using an automatic watering system.
