To avoid confusion, this video was taken on Sunday, March 21st, 2010 and was just now uploaded.

silox – Initial Setup and 1st Vertical Plant Tower – March 21st, 2010

The initial setup and after planting in the 1st vertical tower of our hydroponic window farm. Our hydroponic window farm is located in our apartment sliding glass door area somewhere in Texas We are very excited to see how our hydroponic window farm turns out and learn from our experiences. We want to use our knowledge we gain from this to setup a much a larger aquaponics setup(aquaculture + hydroponics) down the road when we move into a house.

This configuration is based from the 3-container, air lift instructions found on windowfarms.org.  We tried to get away with 5 containers, but that seemed to be too high for the water to make it(tried 1 and 2 air tubes).  We settled for 4 per tower(1 more than what the plan calls for).  We also tried getting away with just one air pump tube to power this vertical plant tower, but ended up using two like the plans call for.  I think you might be able to get away with using just one if you were to buy separate, better quality one-way air valves instead of using the ones that came with the Petco pump as each one certainly seems to provide different amounts of air resistance (tested by blowing through each one before installation).

What we are using:
- Petco 9904 Air Pump(4 air outlets and kit includes one-way air valves)
- 1 Gallon or more reservior(8L or about 2 gallons in my case)
- Various surgical type tubing, but most importantly reinforced tubing for bringing water from the reservior to the top to prevent kinking in the line
- Wooden dowel to attach 1.5L plastic water bottles to
- Sports ball air needles (1 for each air line coming from Petco air pump)
- 3″ net cups for plants
- Hydroton(or equivalent) expanded clay pellets for growing medium
- 4ft 54W flourescent light bulb w/ ballast and reflector(reshaped to redirect near 180 degrees on one side)
- Timer for light to keep it on 8-12hrs(depends on cycle of plants and natural light availability)
- Water(Qualtify makes ALL THE DIFFERENCE). Get Reverse Osmosis water if at all possible or something equivalent. Make sure PH is right(between 5.5 and 6.5) and it’s pure.
- Botanicare Pure Blend Pro Grow Nutrients(Organic) for all vegitation phases of growth
- Botanicare Pure Blend Pro Bloom(Organic) for fruiting of plants(haven’t used yet and may not be necessary, so we’ll see)

Plants on 1st vertical tower(far left) from top to bottom:
1. Butterleaf Lettuce
2. Green Beans
3. Strawberries
4. Jalapenos

We will try to post an update once a week for now until we at least harvest most of these vegetables to show trials and tribulations to get to that point(we are hopeful we will make it that far, lol)