Since Monday we lost one plant. Like before, the water pushed the radish plant out of the grow medium during the wet cycle. Unfortunately, the plant looked dead and we decided that replanting it would not work. To try to alleviate this problem, we placed the two remaining plants in rock wool and put that system into the clay. We are hoping that this will allow the plants to take root and not pop out like before. (Joe Steinmacher)
Extraction of the two downed plants proved that they had very long tap roots. Unfortunately, the singular roots don’t have any media to effectively bite into in the hydro clay. Settling in the grow bed has demonstrated almost an inch of depth-loss due to compaction. During the flood cycle, the clay spheres float free; we believe this is the cause of the plants laying over. There is some minor speculation that the worms burrowing through the media may loosen it as well.