Hydroponics - Indoor Horticulture represents an educational, in-depth, up-to-date, indoor horticultural growers guide that covers all principles of indoor hydroponic horticulture and gardening. This book contains 110,000 words, with over 300 diagrams, pictures, illustrations, graphs, tables, 3 dimensional CAD renderings, and is printed in full colour.

Hydroponics - Indoor Horticulture examines, explores, dissects and presents a fully comprehensive step by step growers guide, relating to all and every aspect of indoor hydroponic horticulture, with complete chapters on plant biology, propagation, hydroponic systems, nutrients, oxygen, carbon dioxide enrichment, pH, biological pest control, fungi/disease, cuttings/clones, pruning/training, breeding, harvesting, equipment, grow rooms, a full history of hydroponics, and more.

This book goes further than any indoor growers guide has gone before, presented in full colour with 3 dimensional CAD renderings. Hydroponics - Indoor Horticulture quite simply outclasses any other book on the subject... In terms of literal content, quantity, quality and presentation, no other indoor horticulture growers guide can compete, let alone compare.

(Below follows a one page sample taken from the book)

Thrips (Thunderflies)

Thrips are small, slender insects which measure about 2-3 mm long when mature. On adults, two pairs of narrow wings fringed with long hairs are visible and when at rest, the wings are laid along the back. Their colour depends on the species, but these can range from a pale yellow through to a greyish yellow-brown to black. In order to establish characteristics which distinguish the different species, magnification is required. Recently, new species have been introduced from abroad and can be potentially damaging pests, such as Western Flower thrips, Glasshouse Banded thrips and Palm thrips. Thrips like company and usually appear in large numbers on leaves or flowers.

Example of Thrips - Nymph (left) and Adult (right)

Preferred Host Plants

Many C3 plants, crops and ornamentals can succumb to infestation, most frequently on cucumbers and flowering plants.

Diagnosis

Thrips suck sap by puncturing leaves or flower buds with their mouthparts, and the affected parts become blotched or flecked and dry out. In very acute cases, the plants appear to have been burned. When leaves or buds swell, they can become contorted or torn, and form windows in the tissue. The thrips are visible, usually in large numbers, near the veins on the undersides of leaves.

Life Cycle

A female can produce approximately 60 eggs during

the course of a season. Eggs are deposited on the undersides of leaves, protruding from a tiny cut in the plant tissues. The larval stage is about 10-14 days in the case of the common Tobacco thrips, whereupon the larva drops to the ground and tunnels into the growing medium to pupate there. Reaching the adult stage takes another 4-7 days. Thrips are quite vulnerable to insecticides, but can be quite awkward when other biological control agents have been used and this prevents chemical control. Fumigation between crops can be a useful remedy, but pesticide residues can remain for some considerable time and prohibit future use of biological control in the grow room.