Whether you’re about to start your first hydroponic garden or you’re a veteran with years of experience raising, breeding and taking care of indoor crops, you know that every gardener needs some helpful tools to get the job done.
We’re not talking about fancy pH testers, high-watt lights or computerized timers that run your lights and reservoir. We’re talking about simple tools that you’ll be using every day.
These must-have tools, often made for traditional gardening or other hobbies, are usually perfect for hydroponics, will make your job easier and bring you a better harvest!
- Scissors or Shears – In a hydroponic setting, you’ll need to make precise cuts and careful clips to keep your plants healthy. Whether you’re harvesting from a live plant, trimming excess foliage, prepping a clone or clipping off old growth, you’ll find dozens of options for gardening shears and plant scissors. When making your selection, consider how dense your foliage growth is, the heartiness of the vegetation and the smoothness of the cut. Remember, ragged cuttings can take longer to heal! Also consider how big the scissors are – too big and you will have trouble maneuvering them in the confined space of an indoor garden and among thick foliage. Expect to have several shears and scissors in multiples sizes to address certain needs and make specific cuts.
- Spray Bottles – When you’re mixing pest control concentrates, fungicides, and other solutions, you’ll need to have a spray bottle that offers you precise control to apply these helpful products. Most spray bottles offer adjustable nozzles so you can easily switch from a misting spray to a stream, two adjustments that allow gardeners to adjust. There’s also a fairly wide selection of spray bottle types – there are standard bottles (similar to the kind you buy household cleaning supplies in), bottles with rotating nozzles (to apply product in hard-to-reach spaces of your plant), pressurized bottles (to apply solutions evenly and without constantly hand-pumping them), dial bottles (that attach to hoses and mix your solution while spraying) and many more. It’s best for you to have a separate bottle for every product you’ll be applying to your indoor garden. Doing so will protect your plants from being doused with the wrong mixture.
- Measuring Cups – Running a hydroponic garden requires precise measurements, especially when you’re mixing liquid fertilizer. Most nutrients require you to measure with milliliters (ml), though you may run across teaspoons (tsp) or ounces (oz), so it’s best to have measuring cups that include at least two of them. Measuring cups can come in a variety of shapes – beakers, scoops, eyedroppers, syringes, pipettes, and cups. Make sure to thoroughly rinse out your measuring cups between uses! Expect to invest in a few measuring cups for use with your indoor garden – you’re sure to find one you use all the time while the others may only get occasional use.
- Buckets – The larger your hydroponic system, the more buckets you’ll have. There are buckets to use as growing pots. There are buckets for mixing. There are buckets for waste product. There are buckets to hold your harvest. There are buckets for water. There are even buckets to hold other buckets! Yes, you’ll have lots of buckets in your life from here on out!
- Brushes – You’ll need two or three types of brushes to help you with your hydroponic grow. Most importantly, you’ll need brushes to clean out the grime that develops inside your system, pipes, buckets, filters, and trays. While indoor gardening is rarely messy, you will want to keep your system fairly clean of the mucky byproduct that eventually develops.
The sludge, slime, salt buildup and hard-water deposits can harbor fungus, bacteria and unexpected minerals that can impact the growth cycle of your plants. It can also clog plumbing and, in some cases, drown your plants with excess moisture. To address these problems, you will need to do some scrubbing. The good news is that it’s not too hard to remove with a good brush – just scrub and rinse. Don’t forget that aside from your typical stiff-bristle brushes, you’ll also want to invest in some pipe-cleaning brushes to scrub out tubing! All that being said, you’ll also need a few paint brushes, too! No, you won’t be putting a fresh coat of latex on your grow room walls -- you’ll use soft-bristled paint brushes to spread pollen from one plant to another.
THE TOOLS YOU USE IN HYDROPONIC GARDENING
We just listed five simple tools you need for hydroponic gardening, but there’s probably many more. What other tools do you find essential while you’re gardening, hydroponic or otherwise? Let us know when you visit Safer® Brand on Facebook. Got questions on our OMRI Listed® pest control products or liquid fertilizers? Reach out to the Safer® Brand consumer care team at 855-7-ORGANIC. Looking for some more help from SaferBrand.com? Subscribe to our E-Newsletter!
