![Ring culture of tomato plants](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/d/d0/Ring_culture_of_tomato_plants.JPG)
Ring culture is a method of cultivating
tomato
The tomato is the edible berry of the plant ''Solanum lycopersicum'', commonly known as the tomato plant. The species originated in western South America, Mexico, and Central America. The Mexican Nahuatl word gave rise to the Spanish word ...
plants. Tomato plants are grown in a bottomless pot, a "ring", and the pot is partially submerged in a tray of water. It is perhaps best described as Two Zone Culture. The gardener aims to have one layer or zone of roots in a container (bottomless pot) and a second layer or zone of roots in some permeable material like gravel, sand or coarse ashes below. Ring culture forces the plants to develop two
root
In vascular plants, the roots are the organs of a plant that are modified to provide anchorage for the plant and take in water and nutrients into the plant body, which allows plants to grow taller and faster. They are most often below the sur ...
systems: one which will absorb the
nutrient
A nutrient is a substance used by an organism to survive, grow, and reproduce. The requirement for dietary nutrient intake applies to animals, plants, fungi, and protists. Nutrients can be incorporated into cells for metabolic purposes or excret ...
s contained in the soil and another which will absorb the water from the tray. It enables a gardener to grow an excellent group of tomatoes in shallow soil. It is used in greenhouses largely for tomatoes and enables a heavy crop to be grown above, for instance, a gravel path or an ash bed.
See also
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Deep water culture
Deep water culture (DWC) is a hydroponic method of plant production by means of suspending the plant roots in a solution of nutrient-rich, oxygenated water. Also known as deep flow technique (DFT), floating raft technology (FRT), or raceway, this ...
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Hydroponics
Hydroponics is a type of horticulture and a subset of hydroculture which involves growing plants, usually crops or medicinal plants, without soil, by using water-based mineral nutrient solutions in aqueous solvents. Terrestrial or aquatic plan ...
References
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Tomatoes
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