Soilless Culture : Theory and Practice

During the second half of the twentieth century soilless crop production advanced from primitive mimics of conventional agriculture, to highly advanced technical systems and methods. Plant production in hydroponics and soilless culture is one of the fastest changing facets of agriculture, rapidly expanding throughout the world, raising a considerable interest in the scientific community. For the first time an authoritative reference book covers both theoretical and practical aspects of growing plants without the use of soil. Soilless Culture provides the reader with a thorough understanding of the physical and chemical properties of the various soilless growing media and how these properties affect plant performance in relation to basic horticultural operations such as irrigation and fertilization. It describes the current knowledge in relation to technical equipment and methods in soilless production systems, both for traditional run-to-waste systems and recirculated systems. An entire chapter is devoted to management of recirculated systems. Another chapter covers issues related to plant protection in soilless media, with emphasis on closed systems. For the first time in the scientific literature an entire chapter is devoted to analysis of growing media.