The fight is on. But a fight continues to be one-sided, till you really know your enemy (as any professional combatant would advise). But now I know. It's some bloody ###***$$$$ (loooonnng censor-blip) bug called the 'aphid' that's killing the cucumber and brewing trouble in the lives of the zucchinis/ bell peppers/ french beans. And it's the ants that gave away the culprit.
Nature is interesting, in this case also devastating for my plants. So as I may have mentioned earlier, along with the little bugs, I saw a lot of ants (the big black ones) doing rounds of the affected plants. In addition I saw a lot of sprinkled sticky dust like residue dropped all around the plant and on the plastic tank housing the Kratky system. On Googling, I was enlightened to what was really happening. There is a large variety of aphids. These are soft bodied insects that affect vegetable/ fruit bearing plants/ trees alike. They pierce and suck on the fluids from the tender parts of plants. Alongside, they excrete a sticky powdery residue which for some strange reason is exotically called 'honey-dew'. Ants love it and feed on it. And in the bargain land up protecting the aphids from their natural predators. A complete story of 'friends with benefits'.
Aphid management is by and large similar to what I'm already doing. Except that it needs to be much more committed and pain-painstakingly more laborious than what I'm accomplishing. It would involve the physical removal of the entire colonies of aphids from over/ under each leaf/ stem/ flower...either by hand, a wet soft cloth/ paper or by a gently forceful (whatever that means) water spray. Then the use of the tri-oil insecticide I'd used or the use of insecticidal soap etc etc. It's going to be a long drawn affair. I'm prepared.
Mean-while I also felt like giving myself a kick for something else that I should have taken care of much earlier. I'd noticed that in all the three raft systems, pods of plants on either of the extreme edges seemed drier than the ones at the centre or the other extreme. So far, all I did was put a cap-full of nutrient solution to moisten the coco-peat, where I found the pod to be dry. It's only yesterday, that I realised that none of the rafts had a perfectly horizontal platform. Consequently, the nutrient solution inside was naturally tilted along the imbalanced platforms' gradient. So the roots of the plants on the edge where there was lesser nutrient were unnecessarily exerting more and were not getting as much nutrient as they should have. Lesson learnt. The platforms have been immediately changed. Their effect evidenced and verified thus...
The make-shift platform. Shows the spirit-level bubble way off the mark.
The centre-table now serving as the platform. The bubble dot on target.
Among other learning, another that dawned upon me, was when I shifted the rafts from the previous to the present platform. Each raft contains about 14 litres of nutrient solution. Given the low height of the raft and it accommodating the weight of approximately 14 kg, it understandably becomes unwieldy and tricky to lift and move about. Generally two people are the best bet to equally balance the raft when full. To my surprise, the first raft that I'd started felt so light, it seemed empty. Inspection revealed that the roots of the plants in it are well entrenched all over and have consumed more than half the nutrient solution inside. It was interesting to see the basil's roots for instance.
I immediately got around to refilling the raft to its initial level of the nutrient solution. It took almost 8 litres of nutrient solution to do that. This though, with a fair amount of trepidation. As the nutrient levels go down in hydroponic systems, the roots elongate and grow fine hair like things on them to soak the maximum life giving nutrients. When you replenish such systems, there's a likelihood of 'drowning' and thus killing the roots. But if you don't replenish, they'd die in any case . Catch 22. I am the experimenter, who likes to err on the positive. So I've done that. And I anxiously wait. The results shall prove lessons for future.
It's Friday again. I'd be absent again. I'd rush back again, come Monday.
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