Method Two

The Gardens of Ease are a project based system of plant and food production using commonly measured Food grade plastic containers we recycle every week. “Upcycling” Using low skill Arts & Crafts those same plastic containers are made into planters. The idea here is to waste less and produce more. Waste less because we’re reusing plastic container which last for a hundred years in a landfill to introduce your favorite raspberries to your grandchildren. How about growing a hundred ears of corn in a 8’x8’ on two cups a water a stalk. An do it on a side walk. Using plastics mean we’re no longer tied to the horizontal or even needing the use of ground. By using the “Waterfall” and “Waterwall” systems we build for the amount of sunlight not space.

As for the material the plant itself is grown in it’s mostly “popcorn” glass. The “popping” of the corn is it being blown inside out. Before you eat it next time look at the grooves and pits that action produces. It’s the same for those tiny pieces of Perlite you buy at the store. The roots from a plant joins up with that “popcorn” in one of those groove and pit. Here’s where the science comes in. Glass has a slight attraction to it. A static charge not electric. The static charge makes the Perlite stick together which attracts the charge of free floating ions in the mass. Nutrients. But because the roots are connected to the Perlite it can draw it off a little at a time using Osmosis. At this point I want to introduce two terms and explain their difference “Working Water” and “Hydroponics”. Hydroponics is a mined, refined chemical extraction from the Earth from some where. A mix of elements that is administered to the plant by water at a specific ph. The ph is important because it over comes the osmosis barrier. Your force feeding your plants nutrients using water. Your plants blow up like a balloon. Not only that the plant takes up different amounts of nutrients at different times during it’s life cycle. Which means you have to switch out your soup every week to keep up the change. How many plants can a hydroponic system support. Say a hundred gallon system of nutrient soup a week. Let’s be generous and say fifty. Every week your flushing a hundred gallons of waste soup down the drain. Don’t let anyone fool you into thinking you can spray it on your lawn. Your lawn would be dead by the second spraying. The white elephant in the room with hydroponic is the waste water. So little return for so much waste.

Working Water on the other hand….ever wonder how a tree can sit in the same spot year after year. What’s keeping them growing and alive. With hydroponics you have to take trips to the plant grocery store to buy it. With Working Water each container is it’s own grocery store. The food for the plant is produced by the plants own waste that ‘s consumed by the bacteria in a boom an bust cycle of growth. During the boom cycle the bacteria is chewing up the nutrients in the food to concentrate it in their bodies along with the plants waste. The bacteria dies in the bust cycle which is then consumed by the plant as food. Very little food is needed for the bacteria. So there’s no waste water. The plant lives in the same amount of water it starts in. You only need to account for the water that transpires thru the leaves. The mix itself lasts for years without replacing every three like dirt.

As for energy, the only needed is sunlight. Painting the containers heat up the side facing the sun. The shadow side is cooler. The water starts to move up the warmer side back to the cooler. That’s Natural water convex ion free from the sun.