DWC Hydroponic VS Kratky Non-Circulating Hydroponic - Which Grows Lettuce Faster? 

I’m shocked! I thought the kratky wouldn’t grow nearly as fast as the one with the air circulation water system. Thank you for stopping me from wasting time and money on pumps and electricity

The top roots are called air roots. Too much bubbles can cause the water roots to slow but in longer grow time plants dwc will catch up and surpass. Lettuce grows in short spans especially indoor and hydroponically so they do well in kratky, low maintenance setups. I run my pumps at the same time as my lights and my 5 gallon bucket dwc is growing basil, tomato and watermelon 2-5 times faster than my soil comparisons.

Your channel is really really useful and so well done. No nonsense- you just get to the point and your experiments are really thorough. I'm trying hydro for the first time ever, after decades of soil growing. I'm not getting around so well after cancer surgery and this seems like a great gardening option for folks with limited mobility, like seniors. Thanks for the inspiration!

Thank you for showing us this comparison. I'm starting out with Kratky and am happy to know it works as well, if not better than, DWC. I'd love to see a comparison on fruiting vegetables as well!

Your test produced some interesting results. Its amazing how the roots adapt to the different environments. The results of this test give us a better understanding of the plants oxygen needs and how it develops to achieve survival. I very much appreciated this comparative test on video.

Great experiment, since root size with Kratky can depend on container size and the amount of nutrient drop, using 5 plants in a 5-gallon bucket might create competitive growth and nutrient use that would make bigger lettuce heads.

The difference in the roots is super interesting. Explains a lot. Everytime you mention disturbance I think about Star Wars and the Force 😊

Great experiment ya done here. Kratky works super well no doubt. Lettuce is easy to grow so not much needed for them. Would like to see this same experiment done with tomato plants.

Kratky, what an amazing method!

Great experiment. On the Kratky lettuce, it appears that the 3 plants in the 5 gallon bucket produced more than 3 times the amount of lettuce than the single plant in the 1 gallon container. Please confirm if this is the case. If it were the distance from the light, I would expect the 1 gallon lettuce to look leggy which it did not. What would cause this since in both cases, there were plenty of nutrients/water left. I look forward to hearing your response. Thank you.

Hi Khang. I have been enjoying ur videos for a few years now. Thank you once again for all ur informative videos. As for this experiment, my opinion from my experience is the dwc using rockwool and peat pellet is that they are so saturated with splashing water that make the lettuce plant struggles at the seedling/young stage. Once the water level from the container drop enough to not get saturated by the splashing water, the plant will start to thrive. And i also think there is a relation with the water consumption from each type of plant. Lets say dwc bok choy vs dwc lettuce. Bok choy intakes more water than lettuce so it does not matter that the rockwool or peat pellet is wet from splashing water. Now as for dwc lettuce vs kratky lettuce...they all touch the water at the beginning thus they all get saturated. Then...wich one will have a dry rockwool/peat pellet first as water drop? I am no expert. I just want to share u my experience as i once had to ask myself why my kratky lettuce grows better than my dwc in a 30 days frame. U should try dwc lettuce in only clay pebbles without rockwool.

I have used the aero garden solution as well. Their 3 pod system is actually less then a gallon and I have the 6 pod system that is close to a gallon and on the bottle of the aero garden it suggests 2 teaspoons for the 6 pod one gallon system with that Same metrics it would appear that 10 teaspoons would be good for for the 5 gallon system however many recommend using much less with new plants but I’ve never had a problem when I used the full solution on young plants in the aero garden. I thank you for the demonstration, I love the large bucket would be super good for some large plants. If your plants are growing well with much less fertilizer solution, I might cut back on the fertilizer a little as well.

Trying hydroponics for the first time this week and this has been super helpful. Thank you

"Expert" is a relative term! 😁 leadership changes with perspective

This answers my earlier question to you on why my the roots of my cherry tomato cutting keep dropping off and rotting. I cut some of the roots off and changed to the kratky method and it began growing roots and leaves again!

Excellent experiment! I grow Kratky and was thinking of experimenting with DWC. But you covered it. Thank you.

I believe the DWC should maintain high water level, with floating raft being the extreme. Advantage is many different age plants in the same system. Also, the air flow may lower water temperature and possibly react with some forms of nutrient to change pH or availability of difficult nutrients like iron.

Great experiment! Try weighting the produce!

That's interesting. Every other DWC vs. Kratky had the DWC growing faster and the root systems always much denser.

Thank you for posting! Personally I like the Kratky method, less work and just easier in general. Thank you

I greatly appreciate your testing things, the results were amazing and unexpected !

Thank you for doing this, this is a great low-cost method of hydroponics that I am absolutely going to do myself.

I love the Kratky method, the man is a genius for food production.

excellent video! Blowing all preconceptions out of the WATER.... haha.. So air pump causing more oxygen and circulation is not a guarantee to a better crop, at least on lettuce. I am going to be trying cherry tomatoes on kratky, it was a real pleasure to see you had the exact same nutrient that I have ordered - Arogarden - that's the only one I found that's one simple container to measure and pour in. Also, one could do with less height on the container with Kratky, as it hasn't used that height, roots are not even 1/2 way down, so thats an eye opener when deciding what container to use. You have clarified so many things for me that I can't even list them all! Very impressive video. Just what I was looking for!

What temp. Is the grow tent kept at for the lettuce. Great experiment. I love those kratky roots. Almost like a birds nest. Take care. Thanks for videos.

I HAVE SMOKED FOR 50 YRS NOW. WHAT IS MISSING IN TODAY'S POT IS THE BLACK RESIN THAT DRIPPED OUT OF THE END OF THE JOINT ON TO MY LIPS AND TEETH. THAT POT GOT YOU HIGH LONGER IN TIME AND BETTER HIGHS THAT MADE POT FAMOUS. I GROW THAT POT ITS THE BEST IN THE WORLD

I will recommend you to keep doing more research on this topic !!

Pretty cool to see the differences, and to see how it didn't really make the end product better. The KISS principle strikes again!

Thank you so much for this demo. Very well done. I learnt something very important to air pumping vs still water with Kratky. Also its still cheaper to do kratky, saving electricity. It would be interesting to compare taste because the more green (healthier) the better taste.

Leave more gap between water and net level when using dwc and the finer the bubble the more explosive the growth. Good video mate👍

Hi Mr. Khang, i'd like to know by any chance did you conduct the weight comparison between the 2 experiments.? More informative video indeed. Keep it up!

What an informative video. Thanks a lot. I think maybe there is algae on the small dwc due to the size of the leaves and their transparency. Since they are smaller than the kratky ones, and much lighter, there is more chance for the light to pass through down the container.

Thank you this was very informative I'm considering this because I've had a double lung transplant and I can no longer mess with soil

Thanks for making this great video, well done experiment, love the side by side comparisons!

Excellent video! Thanks for your effort on this experiment.

A very cool experiment. I'll always add an airstone though, especially for longer growing plants.

Very interesting experiment. I thought for sure DWC would win by a long shot in both the big and small buckets. And how interesting that the Kratky method had greener leaves! What?!? Now if I can only get my stupid Kratky to work properly...my plants are always dying or on the verge of death. I even bought the special amber half gallon bottles for them to block out light! Ugh. LOL

Thanks for sharing that experiment. I truly learned and understand each method better now.

The important question I never see addressed is: How do the two test subjects taste compared to each other and compared to regular in the ground lettuce?

Great experiment with the two methods. I'm attempting Kratky at the moment

Great experiment and great results! Bravo!!

A great experiment indeed💚👏 Congratulations po.. Happy planting. Happy growing More blessings to come😇

Expected results. Nature is always best.

nice experiment just discovered kranky method and this really shows viability

Great video. I’ve a question. How often do you change the solution on both systems ? I mean How often do you add the nutrients ?

the air will make the ph swing high. that locks out nutes. ph that down you have a big difference.

I'm not altogether surprised, since roots are not normally subjected to aeration or continuous disturbance. interesting experiment, though.

Great experiment, thanks for sharing with us.

Ph is extremely important on what nutrients the plants can uptake!

probably the air would work better on a NFT system, the roots would be 'safe' from the air bubbles. nothing like trying to see what works best, so thank you for that.

Your narration is incredible 👏

thanks thoroughly enjoyed your watch..

They all look very similar. Good experiment

I'm going to try this with my broccoli baby plants.

how many hours of light do u recommend per day?

Thanks for recording this experiment.

Great experiment…I wonder if some plants would do better with kracky and others do better with the air pump. Maybe some plants need more oxygen to the roots than others. I’m thinking about trying this with other plants. Baby bok choi? Green onions, or kale?

Its a very good experiment. Keep it up. Im excited to see more

I would like to see an experiment where there is intermittent airflow; running five minutes every hour, or 15 min every 3 hours

Air injection in DWC will cool the water by evaporation and perhaps slow growth.

New sub after a few pepper vids and finally this one. I have a nice large unfinished basement Im planning on starting small and when Im good at it and Im looking towards aeroponics since atomizers put off more heat, it gets cool here in the winter.

I think it’s a flawed experiment if you didn’t test and adjust ph. In both videos you thought that the air stone root disturbance limited plant growth in DWC, but what if it just so happened that the Kratky buckets had more ideal ph for nutrient uptake? I’m just curious myself and thanks for listening

Watching from Japan

Wow nice lettuce Thanks Khang Great video 🙂

Maybe, or likely, the DWC bucket has a water PH level higher than the kratky’s as with the air stone bubbling the water creates disturbances/friction and therefore causes the PH to rise. If the PH has surpassed the “safe zone” or “best zone” then they’re may be nutrient lockout… You should test the PH and see if both buckets are the same, and if not then fix it.

I have a question. I have hydroponic systems and I'm wondering if the pump stops working, won't they still work, only now as a Kratky system without a pump?

I can not see a benefit of air vs. the Kratky system for lettuce. Thanks for running the experiment! Now you get to eat the results of your test. Enjoy!

I wonder if you time it, Keep the air stone off untill 10-15 days Once it reach 10 or 15 days turn the bubbler on for the rest of the days Cause it looks like dwc was slow to start But finished a little stronger

Another excellent video Khang! You've inspired me to start hydroponic growing.

Can you check the pH value of both systems? May explain the color difference.

Is this comparison also in 55 F temperature? I watched the earlier salad culture comparison. At temperature of 55 F there is probably no benefit in terms of mechanical aeration, I'm thinking. Reasoning logically, I would guess, that you would begin to see benefit from mechanical aeration only past 70 F / 20 C degrees water temp.

I have to say I am so happy I found your channel a little while ago. It/you have helped me so much with things I just didn't know, being I am pretty much a rookie at gardening/growing veggies. I am hopeing you or anyone can help me with this. You made a comment you will have lettuce for quite a while, well I don't seem to have much time with my lettuce after cutting down. It goes very limp almost soft looses the crunchyness in 2-3 days. Is there a reason for that maybe I'm doing something wrong possibly?? Thank you in advance for any help you can give me.

Thank you for this video excellent information for a beginner.

Great video. Thanks for sharing. I’ve made up my mind thanks to you!

dwc should have started 50 to 70mm below net cup thats why it took off slower the air bubbles need room for misting effects

I’d imagine since the roots of the smaller Kratky container circled the sides, it blocked out the light and prevented the algae from growing

DWC grows faster but you have to keep up with the nutrients or you're not going to see much of a difference in growth those water roots absorb nutrients too they were less green because they needed more nutrients, and if they needed more nutrients then it means they want to grow but need something like Nitrogen. Great Video none the less!

DWC makes more efficient roots. DWC needs more nutes because the roots can take it.

My friend I'm afraid that you should have started the dwc water level about a half inch below the net pot and allowed the root to grow down into the water. The splashing effect from the bubbles Keeps The Roots hydrated until they actually hit the reservoir. What happened was the roots became totally saturated whereas the kratky was able to develop two distinctive types of roots. one that stays dry up towards the top and one that stays wet actually touching the reservoir. This caused the aeroponic dwc to be stunted and gave you a false test.

The roots look yummy

Khang Starr, contact Space-X, they need you for their Mars project asap! No martian-soil problem to figure out!

I can tell by the sound of planes major metro probably tampa area maybe st pete fl. Also oscillation sound of air density southern us maybe Georgia probably florida

Great side-by-side experiment! Did you have a warming mat in your grow tent?

OUr water is so hard we always use filtered or distilled when growing plants or in any machines we use water in. I.E. steam mop, humidifier, kuerig.

Great video! Thanks!

Thank you for another informative video brotha. I am new to hydro and tried to do the same experiment with my lemon tree seedlings. I started two months ago and my seedlings haven't died, but there has been no growth all. Do you have any idea why they are so stagnant?

Is there a difference in ph and or how the water smells or looks after some time spent in the buckets

Hi Khang, can you re-use the water after the cycle? I noticed that there's plenty of water left after the 32 days. Water is a precious commodity in Cali so it would be nice if it can be re-used, maybe just add the right amount of nutrient and additional water?

Great video!

Awesome comparison 👏 👌 👍

thank you so much.great experiment!

HI. I think what happens in the DWC, wrt to the Algae. Just a thought. When the air bubbles pop on the surface, the slight explosion happening, causes tiny amounts of mist to rise into the air, and the supplied lighting is able to refract along the mist, and assist in the growth of algae. I hope this means something. Just a thought. Thanks. Graham from South Africa

excellent video

Excellent experiment! Can you pls share the brand name and specification of your grow light. Where did you buy from? Thanks

Thanks bro, great video!!!

Late here but glad i watched...THANKS !! Where'd ya get the black buckets ?

I wonder what exactly, the 5 gallon buckets are best suited for? I would prefer the fill it and leave it method. I would LOVE to know that answer.

Love from india ❤... Great 🙏🏻

Thanks for your presentation. Can you calculate how much electricity you are using and estimate the cost?

How often did you change the water for the kratky method? Great video I am learning so much 😀