Kevin Espiritu

So these are methods of growing where either the water or air does the work instead of what?

Instead of soil, right?

Which is where pretty much every plant is.

Neither of these are soil-based plants.

ways to grow.

Um, and so if you, it's kind of, it's kind of weird because if you think about it, you think, of course a plant needs soil to grow.

And I might even argue as a gardener, that is kind of true.

I do prefer it.

But what, what a plant really needs is what's in the soil or what the soil is providing.

And the soil is almost a medium for oxygen, water and nutrients.

Um, and so when you're growing in a hydroponic environment, like my cucumbers, um,

Well, there's no soil.

So the plant, you start a seed in a little growing medium.

In this case, it was something called rockwool, kind of like spun molten rock in this little fibrous cube.

You put a cucumber seed in that.

It grows up.

The plant, the tissue grows up, but the roots grow down.

And those roots grow down and hit the water.

That water does have to be oxygenated, which is crazy because you think, well, you know, plants are taking in CO2 and releasing oxygen, right?

Roots, though, respire.