Hydroponic home gardens are becoming increasingly popular for a variety of reasons. They are easy to manage, are small enough set up inside the house and the equipment needed is relatively inexpensive. They are easy for even a novice to manage and are ideal for many varieties of vegetables, including my favorite, the tomato.

What is hydroponic home gardening? The term itself comes from the Greek words for water and labour - hydro and ponos - and is a method for growing plants without soil by using a water solution rich in mineral nutrients. A distinct advantage of this method of cultivation is that it is much easier to control the pH, water, light and nutrients than when using traditional 'dirt' gardening. Because you have so much control over all the growing conditions it is essential to find out the exact requirements of your plants before you start.

Hydroponic cultivation can be very simple or very complicated! The simplest set up would be a single plant and a hand watered bucket. The most complicated a complete computer controlled system. Most peoples hydroponic setup will fall somewhere in the middle of these two extremes. The most common setup would consist of a growing tray, a reservoir for the nutrient solution, an artificial or natural light source, a pump to circulate the solution and an air pump to oxygenate the nutrients.

A wide variety of materials can be used for the growing medium including gravel, sand, coconut fibre and vermiculite. Kits are readily available at gardening stores with everything needed to get started.

Nutrients that are needed by the plants in small amounts include zinc, copper, manganese, cobalt, calcium, magnesium and sulphur. They are needed, not only for optimum growth of the plant, but also to ensure that any vegetables you produce are healthy to eat. A good quality fertiliser is absolutely essential for your hydroponics garden. In order for your plants to absorb nutrients correctly the pH (i.e. how acid or basic the nutrient solution is) must be carefully controlled. When you are using a hydroponics system testing and balancing the pH is much easier than in a traditional garden.

Making a hydroponic home garden is not as difficult as you may imagine and once set up is easy to maintain. You will soon have a cheap, easy to look after system that will produce vegetables, herbs or flowers throughout the year.