Turning gardening upside down

http://www.nytimes.com/2010/05/20/garden/20tomato.html

It seems like the AeroGarden plugs would be a handy way to get these started, just stick em in a hole at the bottom.

Giving thanks . . .

Lots to be thankful for on the urban permaculture front. A couple of those bean sprouts have actually emerged from the soil! Also, I was able to sprout some purple basil in an AG3 using a tea bag as a medium. Curious to see what the longterm results will be.

Oh the big news, I finally bought some test leads and merged Aerogarden with aquarium. It seems to be holding steady after a week. The main question is, why?

On the not-so-thankful front, the crayfish seems to be eating the basil roots. Which is ironic, considering that herb might join him in a sauté pan one day.

Updates

Jeremiah (my crayfish) moulted again. He looks a lot more intimidating now.

I am moving closer to merging the aquarium and the Aerogarden. In fact I have two AG's parked next to it. All I need is some more tubing or alligator clips. The fact that the aquarium's own pump stopped working adds urgency to the project.

Outside, my onion is going nuts. It's still in the 50s 'F here so I haven't had to move the plants in yet. But when I do I might do a Florida room type thing with all the Aerogardens together. I need to restock them all.

SEO triumph

If you google "Aerogarden" and "aquaponics," this blog is the #2 result! And Red Icculus is #3!

Of course, to do that you have to know what aquaponics is, and be wondering if you can do it with an AeroGarden! I must have at least three or four readers.

Nevertheless I feel like an (accidental) SEO genius. I think Barrack Obama, Megan Fox, Snoopy, Madonna, Sting, Elvis Pressley, Theodore Roosevelt, Kings of Leon, Death Cab for Cutie, Billy Mays, the Beatles, Balloon Boy, Katie Couric, Bill Gates, Steve Jobs, the LOLcats, Miley Cyrus, Twilight, Adam Sandler, and Oprah Winfrey would be proud!

Salad days

Not much to report. I still have a few leftover projects that seem to carry on of their own accord.

I am pleasantly surprized by the onions out back. After many attempts, they finally took hold and are now growing most vigorously. It is so nice to have green onions at one's disposal. I also got a nice snow pea plant going, but its pod are almost woody. Maybe I should pick them earlier.

I lost some purple plants, the sweet potato :( and the little ornamental peppers. But a couple of the poblano plants survived, just from being kept next to the window inside. They are in a big pot now; can I expect big things?

I have a couple of plants thriving in the aquarium. One is a prayer plant from a cutting I got from work. The other kind is doing so well it actually bloomed, though it doesn't get any direct sun.

The AeroGardens are all growing some type of lettuce. Only the AeroGarden classic has had any sign of spider mites so far. I will have to watch that as temperatures increase. I also planted some leftover herb pods but only a couple of them germinated successfully. The mighty basil I had going for 18 months is now just a dried out twig.

Days are getting longer

The days are getting longer, and my plants can tell. I have an ornamental sweet potato parked next to an AeroGarden and it is going nuts, sending new shoots skyward.

The salad greens seed pod I transfered to that AeroGarden is doing well, although the light is on the tallest setting due to the 1 year, 2 month old basil plants in there, which are trying to go to seed now.

My home aquaponics setup is down, as I needed the microphone stand for a recording project.

I have a couple of green beans plants going, enough to enhance a bowl of ramen every week or so.

These plants still look like crap: lemon tree (virtually no leaves), poblano pepper plants (which never did anything), and a florist-assembled multi-tropical planter is starting to go to pot after a couple of years. Also, my little ornamental pepper plants that I've kept going maybe three years are starting to look dessicated.

I have a Christmas cactus that is doing well next to the AG, but no blooms. Maybe it needs plant food.

Tersano Lotus really works

Hey, I got a Tersano Lotus for Christmas. It does all it says. These should be as ubiquitous as vacuum cleaners. It will really come in handy with my various projects.

Also, I finally got some neem oil to try to keep spider mites offa my succulent aerogreens.

Finally, it's been one year since I got my AeroGarden. The basil is still going, stems as thick as tree branches.

End of passive aquaponics experiment

I just shut down the passive aquaponics experiment I had on my porch. This was basically a cheap styrofoam cooler stocked with some guppies and some AeroGarden plants floating on top.

The main reason I took it in was the cooler, the kind you get when you buy steaks by mail order, was beginning to leak too much.

Amazingly, the little experiment worked pretty well. The fish survived a couple of months with no motorized filter even though it got to up to 111'F out there. I got a little bit of basil out of the deal and my chives even came back from the dead (both of these originally planted last Christmas).

The fish are now chilling in a small aquarium and most of the plants are back in the original AeroGarden.

I do believe the concept works on a small scale. If I were to do it again, I would get a real cooler with a drain on the bottom for waste purposes. I would have to figure out some way to put in the seed pods, probably just cut holes out of the top with a template. That should make a very efficient---and portable---little garden.

Spider mites again :(

Spider mites have again proved the downfall of a promising AeroGarden. This time it was my cherry tomatoes. I did not get a single fruit off of them. They look like crap so I'm chucking em in the compost pile. I was unable to grow a single tomato this year by any method.

I suspect it's still getting too hot in my little side room, although I tried to keep the ceiling fan running. Maybe my squalid apartment is just infested, which wouldn't surprize me, as it's home to almost every other kind of bug.

I do have a few healthy plants like the pobablano and the squash... just not a lot of fruit action. One of my lemons is turning ripe though, after several months. I should get a half dozen in all.

Summer storms

Like a t-storm sweeping across the plains, is the pace of change with my plant projects.

The spider mites are kicking my ass inside, at least in the AeroGardens. My regular houseplants have not been much affected. I have also had a very hard time sprouting peas in the AGs. I think the cause for all of this is that it's too hot and dry inside. I shall have to keep more ventilation going since those lights get hot.

I finally got some containers, so I was able to transplant them outside (in as much shade as possible). These are made of compressed rice husks and things and are meant to eventually decay. Saw them at World Market. Inside the pots I'm using 1/3 potting soil, 1/3 homegrown compost (it's rich and ready), and a topping of clay pellets. I planted the plants along with their AeroGarden/AG3 pods. Mental note: water the hell out of this stuff. It's been raining a lot so it should be a good time to get them outdoors.

Out of three AeroGardens, the only things I have planted now are two little, slow-growing tomato plants and one pea plant. ALL the other peas either rotted or got covered in spider mites. My two green beans are in pots outside now, since they are too big for the AGs and hopefully that will get some kind of balance on the spider mites. The AeroGardens have really disappointed of late... two of them are unplugged. Like I said, it could be the heat; it is probably mid-80'F's where they are during the day. Still, I expected more from the AG3.

On the plus side, right now I have no plants with spider mites inside. My little aquaponic experiment is looking good outside... even my chives are coming back and the six-month-old basil plant is reaching for the sky. Also, my hops plant is looking much better outside! It has branched out like I thought it would.

Status at summer solstice

I'm sorry I have been derelict in reporting on all my various ecogronomic projects. Here is an attempt to bring things current. Overall, I have had mixed success. The sum output has been much less than I expected, but there are some positive developments.

I have so many things going on I don't know where to begin. At last count I had three dozen individual plants indoors alone. Plus an equivalent on my patio.

In general the AeroGardens have not produced as expected. I have been able to get seedlings pretty easily in most cases, but getting real plants with real fruits has been elusive. I'm sure a good deal of this was from my relentless moving plants around, trying them in bottles or outside, etc. Still, I was disappointed by some kits, like the Cherry Tomato. I have only got one big plant out of it. It's important to note that I did have that bowl outside. It also grew a giant zuccini, but it lost its blossoms too.

I was disappointed by a couple of the kits. My Aerogarden 3's Green Bean kit (out of three seed pods) produced two leggy plants that got so tall I moved them to an AeroGarden Classic. Also, the Baby Greens are gone, daddy, gone. They don't like to be above 78'F and I think my air conditioner may have dried them out. They ended up getting covered with some kind of little red plant mites.

So, the theme for the last couple of months has been disappointment, be it self-induced or not. To have four AeroGardens going and an empty salad bowl is a little discouraging, and I have spent around $50 on seed kits alone. My little cherry tomato plant looks like shit. It had some blooms but it lost them. I dumped out all the old water and started anew in an attempt to revive. Right now it is parked in a Classic AeroGarden with just the two leggy Green Bean AG3 refugees. My last remaining hops plant is hanging on, beginning to branch out, but it's still just a sad little diseased looking twig. The little coffee plant I got on eBay has some leaves but it is an unhealthy yellowy shade of green. These last two, parked outside.

My pride and joy is my little lemon tree. I think I got this thing started earlier than the rest. It has about eight fruits on it and they are larger than limes. Also, one of my several poblano pepper plants is looking like something after I moved it to get a lot more shade during the day. It has been so hard getting stuff going on that baking (115'F) patio, but the lemon tree is full sun all day. The key is, use oversized pots and get stuff established early in the season.

My aquaponics experiment is going, though I downsized it. Now it's basically a styrofoam cooler with a raft on top holding some AeroGarden refugees. The basil is alive, after all the abuse it's been through in the past six months (I planted it around Christmas).

I also have a purple basil in the window in a vase, and a cutting from it is finally establishing itself in a pot on the patio.

Dis-Mayed

Suddenly it's June 1... May was filled with joyous events but before you know it, it's gone.

How are things im mein garten? Alles klar, Herr Kommissar? Well not really. It has been getting into the 100'F's on my porch, and the heat is really getting to my less-established plants.

My hops plant was not doing so good after I pruned it, attempting to get another one going with the pruning. It is leggy and some of the leaves at the bottom are yellow and covered in spider mites. I brought it inside under a grow light in case the heat was a factor, but I really have no idea what is going on or how to fix it. I might have been keeping it too moist. There is some brown on the tips of some of the leaves, which is usually a sign of dryness.

Some things are positively thriving outside. My lemon tree is going bananas, so to speak. It even has a few new blossoms! The little lemons are about half the size of ping pong balls, larger than marbles. They all look healthy. I have been watering the crap out of it. Ditto for my strawberry plant: it doesn't have any flowers or fruits, but is putting out a runner.

I have some new additions to the fambly. I started another AeroGarden 3 with green beans. These sprouted in just two days---not the six to eight days the label indicates. I'm taking that as a good sign. I would really like to get some protein into the urban homesteading equation, hence the legumes. The only other way I know to do this is grow mushrooms or raise chickens or something. I will be on the lookout in case a chicken falls off the 10:50 a.m. chicken truck that passes my house.

I have been having mixed results with my AeroGarden Classics. One of them has evolved into a sophisticated, successful, and diversified mini-garden with a magnificent cherry tomato tree (it looks more bonsai than bush), parsley (planted at Christmas (!), it's been thriving since I removed the basil), a couple of newly planted snow peas (no sprouts after two days), and a very precocious zuccini I grew from my own Burpee seed. The first zuccini I transplanted outside in a little pot got flowers but then it got burnt by the sun or perhaps excessive nutrients from the fish water. However, my newer zuccini plantings have been really taking off. I have been able to get them started quite easily just by placing them in some foam at the top of a water-filled bottle. It's that easy. I have a couple of plants floating on top of the fish vat outside, but the one in the AeroGarden is outgrowing all the others.

A day in the sun

I put the original AeroGarden and the AeroGarden 3 out in the sun today for several hours. I didn't kill anything. Temps got into the mid-80s'F, and I thought it would be too hot for my vulnerable baby greens AG. While the pump was no longer circulating water over the roots, I expected them to stay moist since the tank was enclosed.

Here are the AGs with some of my seedlings and other projects. The AG is in the center with the flower. Front left are some poblano pepper plants; the one I put in the terra cotta pot has been flopped over for a couple of days but seems OK otherwise.

The original AG in the back has the original herbs kit in the middle, and the corners have tomato plants---the seedling on the left is from the cherry tomato kit; the colossus on the right is my Burpee BigBoy freak. On top of the AG on the left, you can see I have started making my own seedling cups out of newsprint, thanks to a tool recently given to me by my bro.

Aerogardens gone wild

My original AG is a mess: the dill is dying out, and there is a mutant Big Boy tomato plant hanging off the left side of it. On the other side I've got a single cherry tomato grow pod, breaking all rules of spacing and propriety. I removed the thyme and put it in a sports bottle as I did not use it that much. The Italian basil has grown completely to the top and I have to trim it to keep it from touching the lamps. I've resorted to giving the excess to acquaintances in a vain attempt to curry favor. Also, there are various seedlings and sick plants huddled about the periphery. It's a mess.

Catching up

I have not posted in a week but things have been happening with the AG's. Not all of them good.

My cilantro in the peat cups is doing very well, same for the zuccini, which is growing tall and a very dark shade of green. However, the tomato seedlings are all turning yellow. Is it chlorosis? Is it because I have not thinned them? Also, even some of the seedlings in my AeroGarden baby greens have dried up. Is it because they were crowded by so many peat pot stowaways? They seemed to be getting enough light. It says you don't have to thin them.

I have also been doing some top secret bike mod stuff.

AeroGarden magic

My second attempt at cilantro is proving successful. I have made sure to keep the stuff moist, even putting a little clear plastic hat on the peat cup. Also, I've started a half-dozen pea plants pretty easily this way. The peas I planted outside in the dirt haven't done anything as it's still too cold.

AG2 4ME

The Universe and a terribly generous friend have conspired to provide me with a second big AeroGarden (as opposed to the miniaturized AeroGarden 3 I mentioned earlier). I actually got this for Christmas but only recently set it up after giving up on trying to return it. The FedEx man left it at my door and sped away before I could answer, disappearing like a bandit. I tried to return it numerous times but was thwarted or refused. Like Caesar accepting the crown after thrice turning it down, so do I accept the electronic garland. [THANK YOU.]

So after three months I finally plug it in. I ordered some baby salad greens for it as I already have intense herb action in my original unit. It is supposed to be a mix, but all the seed pods have the same label. I think they are all going to be different plants though. It would be nice to know what is what for planning purposes. I'd like to just plant half of them---I mean I don't want to explode from eating too much salad---and maybe start a trade in surplus pods on eBay. I never did use the mint seeds from my original AG, as I am already growing a boatload of the salvia via soil and toil.

I have lots of other stuff going on right now, and I have been lagging behind in the blogging. I shall summarize. Working: new patio (meyer) lemon tree, PEAS!, tomatoes. The new greens sprouted after a couple days and then grew freakishly fast: a measureable difference in just a few hours (the two pics above were taken at noon and 8 p.m. on the same day). Not working or unsure: hops seed :(, zuccini in styrofoam egg crate near under AG3, green onions. The cilantro seeds bloomed but I think they dried out. It's odd to think that three months ago I had no AeroGardens, now they are a critical tool steering me into urban homesteading.

AG hacks that worked

I am happy to report a couple of my tricks for capitalizing upon the excess energy flow of the AeroGarden have proved fruitful. What you do is plant seeds in the little peat pots and set them in range of the grow lights. In this environment you have to water them every day; in some cases I recycled the little clear plastic caps that came with the AeroGarden seed pods.

Peas sprouted in a couple of days. So did cilantro, an herb that AeroGrow removed from its herb kit because it is so hard to grow! Hopefully it won't curl up and die on me.

The aquaponics experiment has also proved successful. Basil will root very well within a week.

Instant aquaponics

I have also started an aquaponics experiment buy putting a basil clipping into a vase with a fish in it. It is parked in the light of an Aerogarden 3, which by the way warms up the water quite a bit; I'll have to watch that.

Back at the AG

Back at the orig AG, the tomato seedlings are leaps and bounds over their soil-bound brethren.