Background
When I was a kid, my entire extended family had huge traditional vegetable gardens in the backyards of their homes. The kids were all encouraged to choose a “crop” and plant and tend their own bit of vegetable patch. It made lifelong gardeners out of some of us.
No matter where I have lived, I’ve tried to grow some of my own food. Some years, in some locations, I’ve had full-scale backyard gardens. Sometimes my gardening has just consisted of a pot of basil on the kitchen windowsill of a tiny apartment, or pots of cherry tomatoes on the front porch.
Since relocating to Arizona, I’ve completely changed my tactics. We are currently renting a home and there is no place I can put in a garden outside, nor would it flourish without much soil amendment and much intensive ongoing attention. Not to mention, the growing seasons here are still a bit of a mystery to me.
Still wanting to grow food, I started with inside container gardening. However, that quickly became untenable. It just takes too much space to produce a worthwhile amount of food. Also, the fruit fly infestation we suffered with pots of soil was annoying as all get out.
Next I experimented with microgreens. Now, this worked, but it is very limiting. Even though one can grow a wide variety of plants this way, one is still only eating…microgreens. I already grow many kinds of sprouts for food, and this just seemed redundant in many ways.
So I moved on to small scale hydroponics. And this was finally a winning strategy!
What I Grow
At the moment this is what I have going.
Herbs, in 1-gallon pails
Lemon basil; Thai basil; Italian large leaf basil (2); dark opal basil; sweet Genovese basil; flat leaf parsley (2); oregano; thyme; chives; rosemary; mint.
Salad greens, in trays
Arugula (2 trays of 18 plants each); mesclun mix. I treat these all as cut-and-come-again plants, harvesting some of the plant for use while leaving the growing crowns intact.
Tomatoes
Sweet 100 cherry tomato (5-gallon bucket on the back porch).
1-gallon pails inside: Yellow micro dwarf; Lille Lise micro dwarf (red); Orange Hat micro dwarf; Bonsai micro dwarf (red); Tiny Tim micro dwarf (red). I have seeds for another 15 or so varieties of micro dwarf tomatoes that will be cycled in.
This spring I plan to start some chile peppers in 5 gallon buckets, and I am about to take out the Sweet 100 tomato (as it’s reached the end of its life cycle) and start some peas in that container.
How I Grow It
It couldn’t be simpler.
The cherry tomato in the 5-gallon bucket is being grown with a very basic deep water culture system, consisting of the bucket, the plant in a net pot, the nutrients, and a small, cheap aquarium air pump. On the porch in natural light. That’s it. And that’s the most complicated set-up I have.
All the rest of my plants are being grown with a modified Kratky method. (I’m not using a true Kratky method because I continue to add nutrients after the initial application to extend the plant’s productivity.) These plants are all under some grow lights on two metal shelving units which are 35″ wide by 14″ deep by 54″ high, with a few of the taller plants on the floor between the shelving units.
The Containers I Use
As I said above, I use a combination of 1-gallon plastic pails, a 5-gallon bucket, and some 3.5″-deep trays.
The gallon pails are from U-Line, the 5-gallon bucket is from (I think) Ace Hardware, and the trays I have are actually meant to be drawers in an Elfa shelving system, but they were on close-out at The Container Store when I was looking for something else, so I grabbed them for $4 each. The trays are 17″ x 20″.
BUT, and this is important, you can use ANY container that will hold the nutrient solution and give your plant’s roots room to grow. Now, I wouldn’t use something that chemicals or paint or what have you has been stored in, but anything else is fair game.
I’ve used canning jars, recycled jars from applesauce or spaghetti sauce, plastic milk jugs or 2-liter soda bottles with the tops cut off, orange juice containers, and plastic food storage containers. They all work. You can even use yogurt containers for starting seeds and/or making your own “net pots” to house your growing plants. (More on that next week.)
For her birthday, I sent WebDom a basic set-up with some trays, LED lights, rockwool seed starting cubes, expanded clay pebbles, net pots, styrofoam sheets, and the nutrients to get started. Because I am familiar with her living space, I knew what she needed to start growing her own salad greens. What you need will vary depending on your particular situation. For example, if you have a good, bright south- or west-facing window, you might not need the lights.
Up Next: How You Can Do This Too
Next week I’ll take you through the details of how to start the seeds, what nutrients to use and how to mix them, how to install your seedlings, and how to take care of your plants going forward.
Do you clone at all? It’s pretty easy with rockwool,
Nice start SP, can’t wait for more details,
No need. Seeds are super cheap.
I do, however, grow food from store bought items like green onions, romaine, celery. Easy to root and grow in nutrient solution.
Heck yea, I always stick the root ends of green onions back in the dirt. I re-grew some of them multiple times. I just think it’s interesting that I could conceivably be eating the same dozen green onions all summer.
“No need. Seeds are super cheap”
This is true. I start all my plants from seed. But, if you prune tomatoes and root them, you will get another yield of tomatoes much more quickly. I see people doing this to have tomatoes ready to pick, year round.
Everybody does.
I’m in. Thanks, SP!
+1 Wheat Grass!
I’ve tried starting seeds for my peppers indoors (or only growing them indoors so the animals don’t eat them, but I keep my house too cold)
Heating pad under the seed trays. Seed trays on top of the hot water heater. Cardboard box wrapped in an old electric blanket. Loads of ways to get around a cool house.
The water heater (you don’t need to heat hot water) is in the basement with no inside access for me to easily get to until spring anyway and no sunlight, and any kind of extra power going to heating plants kind of kills the electric bill . I did offer to go halfsies on an indoor winter garden at my little brother’s house since they like peppers too and do have indoor plants, but they didn’t seem too excited about that.
Top of the fridge? One of the warmest spots in any house.
I forced an amaryllis that way. It was wonderful.
But for heaven’s sake, stay away from narcissus. Those fuckers STINK TO HIGH HEAVEN.
My kitchen is one of the colder rooms I regularly go in, that’s where the door is. /would not sell on an HGTV show.
I recently evicted my last pepper plant. I’ll get new ones in the spring to keep outside.
Pepper Joe’s ftw.
LOL. I was just there looking at Scotch Bonnet seeds. I take it you like PJs?
Yup.
Seconded.
This is pretty cool. I have a huge garden in the summer, but it would be nice to grow some things in the winter. Next year we’re planning on adding on to the garage, so I wonder if I can set aside some space in there. Looking forward to the nuts and bolts of this, especially how you keep those tomato plants in line. Those things can get unruly very quickly even when you plant them in the dirt.
Lots of pruning,
Combination of careful variety selection and pruning. My micro dwarfs, for instance, grow to only 8-12 inches tall. A 1 gallon pail is perfect and they still bear a good crop of cherry tomatoes.
Other tomatoes need a 5 gallon bucket and support.
I always thought tomatoes were a bush, but then I saw one of those “How It’s Made” shows, and they had hothouse tomatoes. They stretched the plants vertically on a frame, and they went pretty high. That’s when I found out tomato plants are a vine.
Yeah, that’s one of the reasons for ‘Tomato Cages’, the other being keeping some pests at bay a bit.
There are determinate and indeterminate. The indeterminate keep on growing and growing, mine were 6 feet long, laying on the ground but lots of big tomatoes. They also will get rotten if the tomatoes are covered with too much foliage. I use too much fertilizer, always hoping, hoping.
True, but every tomato cage I’ve used has been 2-3 feet tall. These plants were on a structure at least 6 feet tall.
I’ve grown indeterminate tomatoes to the top of a 6’6″ A-frame in the past. Not quite as “vinelike” as cukes, but close.
I want to start gardening, but I’m just a High Functioning Hockey Player®, so could you gardeners recommend a book or two to get me started?
I may have to steal High Functioning Martial Artist for myself.
One of you lunatics called me that and I liked it so much I started using it!
Johnny Appleseed? The pan on your head is the key.
I can’t pick a single book, but I always liked this guy.
Checks library, sees books that will convince Tundra that Whole Foods is only a short drive away. Threatens Tundra with the books anyway.
The first time I was ever in a Whole Foods I was visiting my cousin in Sacramento in ot 2. She was going on about how there weren’t any GMO foods there. And I asked why the corn cobs were so big, Teosinte isn’t that big. She had no idea what I was talking about.
Who doesn’t want CRISPR Corn?
I used generic corn seed last year, corn quality was poor. This year it’ll be back to the high priced seed catalog corn, the super duper high breds.
Did you plant eatin’ corn or feedin’ corn? (reference to Packer game broadcast from 90s with John Madden where in the pre-game research he had first learned that there was sweet corn and feed corn and they were different, his mind was blown and he brought it up like 5 times during the game) (In many ways I think my cartoon version Trump is based on John Madden)
Fleet Farm (Livingston brand). Sweet corn, edible but not the SWEET corn that you get at the big boy prices.
All the sweetcorn in (even the local stuff) in the stores around here went to bi-color sweetcorn over the last 20years, with tiny little kernels of gold and white, not the huge kernelled golden corn of my youth. It’s kind of like when they switched to Havindish Bananas back in the 60s and all the old folks complained Bananas used to be better, but the young kids thought it was old people being old.
(That screed makes me sound almost as old as you)
For efficient use of space and ease of work take a look at Square Foot Gardening
That link just goes to this Glibs post. Did you mean this?
Ugh. Yes. I was typing on my phone while kneading bread. Fail!
Apple stuck in an extra couple spaces.
Fixed above, as well.
Thanks, db.
Lol. I just found a copy on my bookshelf. I guess my wife must have ordered it at some point.
One can grow a LOT of food that way.
In Illinois I had a large fenced in vegetable garden plot, but I also had 4 of these near the back door for the herbs and lettuce greens etc. They work well if you use the Square Foot Gardening growing medium mix. Soil is pretty heavy for them once watered.
The last year we were there, I also grew tomatoes in them. I secured trellising to the sides of the boxes and tied the tomatoes up. Got a huge crop of large tomatoes of about 10 varieties.
Cool! I had a new deck built this year and there are two decent sized boxes. I was planning to put flowers in them, but I’m thinking about veggies.
Bookmarked that box, though. It looks pretty sweet!
the Deer would have a blast eating all that,
We had a 1/2 acre fenced in and the Wonder Dog was allowed to run free in there. We had no deer problem. 🙂
My problem with tomatoes was squirrels. I tried every chemical deterrent in existence, and nothing worked. Those fuckers ate every single one, and by “ate”, I mean “ripped it off just when it’s starting to ripen, sink their teeth in, then throw it on the ground”.
Thank you for the suggestion. I just ordered a copy.
That’s the one I got.
https://www.amazon.com/Northern-Gardener-Apples-Zinnias/dp/1681340461
Awesome! Thanks, all. I’ve got a couple ordered and will get busy learnin’.
*put pan on head*
WebDom was Johnny Appleseeed one Halloween. I think she was 6. I covered a round fryer basket with foil for her to wear as a pan on her head. Yes, I have photos.
Yes, I have
photosblackmail material.Hey this looks like a good series. Looking forward to more.
Thank you.
I am the Angel of Plant Death, the guy with a skull & crossbones thumb instead of a green thumb.
Even you can do this. It’s nearly impossible to not have super healthy and productive plants!
I can do it. I’ll manage to break the key components and end up with moldy, withered stalks.
Don’t be so sure… the girlfriend has managed to kill multiple basil plants… and that’s basically a weed.
Hey, so have I!
I built a planter box for my son last spring for his gardening merit badge. We worked it together. Tomatoes went OK, peppers did well, cucumber and peas died pretty quickly, green beans lived but didn’t produce much.
Small scale hydroponics is a great method for kids.
If I want a plant to survive, it will die. If I want it to die, it will not only survive but thrive.
I still want to put an apple tree in my backyard.
I have my inside garden started, 9 apple trees growing on the window sill. I saved a lot of seeds from apples but they may not be viable. I had some old apples that were starting to sprout inside the apples, carefully planted them and now have little trees growing inside the house, waiting ’til spring.
I’ll start my other plants March/April for transplanting in June.
Here’s hoping none of the wildlife eats your trees.
By the way, how are the existing trees doing?
I over fertilized in 2019, killed 2 of 3. Planted 3 more last year, held back on the fertilizer totally, 4 did well, I expect they will do well this year, in spite of my efforts. They are all inside the chain link fence so they’ll be OK. I wrapped them with tinfoil so keep the mice from girdling them in the snow.
Be sure there is a pollination partner near by.
Plants get luckier than me, haz a sad.
I learned this from you, K. I have 3 varieties plus 2 crabs, not counting the missus.
Hat’s off to you, SP.
I don’t have the patience for gardening (I’ve tried). When I was growing up, though, my family had a big garden at the back of my grandmother’s land. I remember my mother canning veggies all summer, when we didn’t have air conditioning. She told me some winters, that was the only food we had, but I don’t remember that. I still love green beans and beets (which was what she canned most of).
This requires no patience and about 30 minutes a week.
Metoo on the beets but pickled only
This is very, very interesting. I’ve been wanting to get into gardening for a while now, but living in a small apartment has always been my excuse. Clearly it’s not much of one.
Maybe I’ll start out with some herbs. Everyone needs fresh herbs…
So easy, so fast. I encourage you to do so.
You can even start with a living basil plant from the grocery store. Wash the soil from the roots and pop it into a container with nutrients. Stick it in a window. Done.
You can also do this with a rosemary plant. Same steps. Rosemary can be difficult to grow from seed and is sometimes tricky to grow from a cutting.
I have three landscape rosemary bushes in the front. Never without and it grows like a weed out here.
This plant was recently started for a friend. I rooted a cut stem of basil purchased in a plastic box at the grocery store, to get a jump on having a large plant for her. (I had just done a major pruning of my established plants, the week before or I would have taken a cutting from my own plants.)
*drools*
When I bury a body, I like to plant one lone flower over it.
You’re an incurable romantic, Bro.
Our new home, which we will be moving into at the end of the month has an atrium. The house is a giant square donut with the atrium being a 20 x 20 column of earth in the donut hole that the lower portion was built around and the atrium on the upper floor is about 20′ high. The original owner/builder grew a banana tree in there. In Oregon.
I’m thinking about having some stuff like a key lime tree or a lemon tree or some such in there. Or maybe avocados to go with my toast.
Whatever you decide, bear in mind that most of the produce will be ripe at the same time, so you wil have a glut for a span, and will either need to preserve a lot, give it away, or throw it away.
That’s a big problem. You quickly run out of friends if you grow zucchini. I gave many gallons of tomatoes away last year. I love watermelons, easier to give away but still need friends. As UCS said, everything at one time. Still eating fresh cabbage but I’m getting a little tired of coleslaw after 4-5 months.
Zucchini bread, freeze, give out at Christmas.
Love me some zucchini (or pumpkin or banana) bread with butter and sharp cheddar cheese.
I might have one tree of each (Avocado, Key Lime, Lemon) in the atrium. Still likely to produce more than we need but that fits with The Plan. The wife is going to be getting into permaculture. I should write an article about it. I don’t want to be only the rope and weed guy.
In Central Florida they sell “cocktail trees”, which are meyer lemon and key lime grafted onto a single tree. If mine ever flowers, I’ll let you know how it goes.
Please do. that sounds about perfect.
You sound fancy.
I don’t like fancy.
That’s awesome!
If I were to design a house, it would have such a thing, that and a Batcave. Just be aware, what happens in the atrium may not stay in atrium, drones exist now.
If I built a house, I’d like it to have rooms like in Clue (or my favorite, Clue Master Detective). The Conservatory, Study, Billiard Room, Library, etc.
“Kevin in the Gliberarium with the Keyboard”
The whole house is the Gliberarium. Weed growing in the conservatory, smoking in the study, gambling in the billiard room.
Where do you store the Mexicans?
Please don’t tell us you are as conventional as to confine the ass-sex to the sleeping chamber.
So cool!
Pics when you move in?
I’m hoping to write an article or two about it once we get moved it. It’s a gorgeous property. I’ve talked about it some on the Glib Discord. 22 Acres roughly, house is a little over 5k sq ft. It has a shop and a barn, both in good shape. Far enough away from PDX to feel relatively secure.
Congrats! That sounds fantastic.
I need a Fourscore-style compound, too.
Very exciting.
Do grow lights have higher UV than regular bulbs? Or are they just visible spectrum?
Different spectrums are available. Some mimic natural sunlight. Others use different spectrums to encourage different parts of the plant lifecycle.
Which spectrum alerts law enforcement?
IR
So, convert the walk-in freezer?
Now I’m wondering if you could hide a grow operation with a sign out front saying “Tanning Salon.”
> Hey Clarence, have you ever noticed that all the people who walk into that Tanning Salon are all Skinny and White?
> Yea So what?
> They all come back out that way too.
Need to sleep, but must post link!.
Too much.
Thank you for writing this! I skimmed through, but I’ve flagged it for a more focused read tonight after work.
I have a couple pots sitting outside (rosemary, blueberry & strawberry), and a small setup of herbs, flowers, cacti, and carnivorous plants in my home office, but I’m planning on going hog wild here later this month.
I once read an article from a guy who was able to fully feed his family from the produce he grew in his 0.1 acre backyard. I may not go that far, but I’m looking forward to sharing pics of a backyard stuffed with vegetable bearing containers.
Shows the advances we’ve made in agriculture. Used to take a full acre to do that.
You are welcome.
Next week is where the actual “how to do it” will come.
I find it disturbing that they won’t just take their asterisk victory.
“Donald Trump needs to be removed from office, and we are going to proceed with every tool that we have to make sure that that happens to protect our democracy. If the reports are correct and Mike Pence is not going to uphold his oath of office and remove the president and help protect our democracy, then we will move forward with impeachment to do just that,” Clark threatened.
“[W]e know that we have limited time, but that every day that Donald Trump is President of the United States is a day of grave danger,” she added. “So, we can use procedural tools to get articles of impeachment to the floor for a House vote quickly. We have already had Chairman Jerry Nadler, chair of the Judiciary Committee, say that he will use those tools to bring the articles as fast as possible.”
Seriously. Your election coup was successful. You get to be president and control the federal government. Idk what they hope to gain. This is just going to further damage political discourse in the country.
I hope they do it. It will be a shit show, and very clearly demonstrate how unhinged they are, yet again. Can anyone imagine a fair trial in any way?
Nadler can’t get thru a speech without shitting himself anymore. Should be entertaining.
“As early as mid-next week”….so, like, 5 or 6 days before he’s leaving office anyway? Fucking clowns.
The pearl-clutching must continue unabated.
He won’t leave office until we force him to.
When he leaves office they will say they forced him to, avoiding a coup. /prog
Me- Correlation does not imply causation
It’s pure theater. They have zero intention of ousting him in the next two weeks. This is just to show their constituents that they’re “doing something.”
And, since there’s no way to get rid of him in the next two weeks, this also shows how much they need more power.
I’m casting the horoscope, and I wouldn’t be too sure about that. Shit gets freaky on the 17th.
Pretty much, and it shows how much they aren’t worried about this.
Just like adoration of Obama, hatred of Trump will never go away. Everything bad that happens will be portrayed as a lingering effect of Trump’s presidency. Even after he’s dead, every time right-wingers do something bad, they’ll say it was because of a “legacy of political violence started by Donald Trump”.
Our new place has a big greenhouse and a sizable garden plot. No hydroponics but we’ll have plenty of growing room, and figure on taking advantage. Alaska has a short growing season but makes up for it with lots of daylight, and there are quite a few truck farms and dairies in the Matanuska and Sustina valleys, as I understand.
Here you go:
https://www.farmmatch.com/
Excellent resource for small farms from whom you can buy directly.
Pretty cool SP. I’ve been interested in Aquaponics (not a lot of research lately). One of my old coworkers (different location) started a backyard business on the side selling fish and veggies.
That’s takes quite a bit more work and determination than I can manage at present, but it’s a great way to go.
Dunno if it’s been mentioned recently, but Mencius Moldbug’s two appearances on Unregistered with Thad Russel this past year have been excellent. Definitely worth a listen – and his white pill take on the election results are a nice change from doom and gloom.
every day that Donald Trump is President of the United States is a day of grave danger
What/who will the Doomsday LARPers come up with to replace President Cartoon Villain? You know they’re not going to declare victory and go home.
They’ve got the plague, and they’re flogging that dying donkey for all they’re worth, but spring is coming.
Easy the people who disagree with them.
Trumpers basically. Just as Californians still blame Republicans for the failure of their state. In short they’ll find a new Emmanuel Goldstein.
I forgot Kulaks, Wreckers, Hoarders, and Saboteurs.
White supremacists, etc.
Of course, according to critical race theory, all white people are white supremacists, whether they know it or not.
Google’s new union is demanding that badthinkers be banned from all of it. Youtube, the goog, you name it. Because GamerGate kills people.
YouTube must no longer be a tool of fascist recruitment and oppression. Anything less is to countenance deadly violence from Gamergate to Charlottesville, from Christchurch to Washington, D.C., from Jair Bolsonaro to Donald Trump.
SV tech companies are starting to come apart at the seams. Our biggest recruiting pitch at law schools this year? “Come be a social justice warrior while bringing down a six-figure salary”
It’s not a new union. It’s a front organization for CWA.
Well, new to Alphabet. Although I’ve heard rumors it’s legally a PAC.
Yeah, but CWA has been trying to organize there for a while. They’re ready or they’re hopeful the new political climate will be favorable to making gains now.
So all of the Middle East too? China? Oh I needed that laugh.
Rubin interviews Gabbard – the last sane Democrat?
There’s also Manchin.
He’s just a worm. But he might roadblock some bad stuff in hopes of being reelected in WV.
Gun control will be a non-starter there, so hopefully he’ll be a vote against adding things to NFA or creating new outright bans.
*remembers Manchin-Toomey “common sense” gun control proposal*
Yeah…
https://www.toomey.senate.gov/newsroom/press-releases/manchin-toomey-statement-on-president-and-rsquos-support-for-background-check-bill
Still not dead. And now they’ll have the Senate and Presidency to pass it.
Ah yes of course. How could I forget the loathesomeness of my own dear Senator Toomey.
Hopefully he and a few others will slow some of this down. But if it’s a big thing like universal health care, raising taxes, hate speech, or the green new deal, I’m sure they will all get in line.
As I said in the dead thread, Mittens is chomping at the opportunity to be the great bipartisan bridge that passes Democrat agenda. Don’t need Manchin if Mittens, Collins, or Murkoskey vote with the Dems on a bill.
Shit, Mittens will probably just flip parties himself. Why not? He’s never been anything but an opportunist.
At least his dad claimed an excuse of brainwashing.
The hero got arrested in Arkansas.
The man photographed with his feet on Speaker Pelosi’s desk during the Capitol Hill siege has been arrested, @NBCNews has learned.
The best sieges are when they open the doors and let you in.
Tampering with the mail was a bad move on his part.
Thanks, SP! I haven’t tried the hydroponic thing before. Might have to give it a try.
I got some seed packets for a bunch of different types of peppers (to go with the Fiery Ferments book) and I’m about to start them in the little trays with peat/dirt. I think there is enough natural light in the room I’m starting them in but I have some full spectrum LEDs from when I had airplants in a former office.
The intent is to transplant them to outdoor raised garden boxes. There are 4 of the boxes, inexplicably located facing the NNE. One box is fine as is with its rosemary, thyme, and oregano.
The other three are fair game. One or two will get the peppers, and then one or two will get tomatoes. I’ve never grown tomatoes from seed, so I was planning to buy some plants in Spring.
Is growing tomatoes from seed difficult?
(Low temps are in the low 40s lately, so I still have to start stuff inside.)
Easy-peasey where you are. I grow about 50 from seed every year, start inside. Until they pop through the soil there is no need to use lights. If it’s warm outside shuttle them back and forth for a couple weeks and they’ll be big /strong enough to survive 40 degrees.
Don’t let they dry out though, tomatoes can stand heat and water.
Thanks!
No, it’s really simple to grow tomatoes from seeds. And then you can have any varieties you desire.
Thanks for the link.
I want some cherry tomatoes for salads, and some Romas. Then a couple of medium to large.
The raised beds have sprinklers on timer. I will watch and adjust the amount once Spring is here and I’m ready to transplant.
You’re not on Minnesota anymore. You’re in SoCal. Everything grows. Alot.
I’m in Michigan, with some nice Tomato plants growing like Mad, what was that about SoCal?
Hello SP great stuff and I look forward to reading more. By the way I’m trying to convince my MIL to start doing something similar in her house. She is a great gardener and flower grower (she focuses on orchids).
My friend used to work in a local greenhouse. They used chemicals, changes in light, and nutrients to retard and accelerate the plants to ensure they could meet flower demand for holidays or for spring planting season. Have you tried using these techniques to ensure you can get consistent yields all year for your favorite food plants instead of one harvest? Can you accomplish the same or similar results with planting from seed at different intervals?
I would try the staggered “planting” intervals and maintaining a constant environment at first. It’s the easiest. The rest sounds like it takes a lot of work.
This. I’m surprised that a commercial grow operation wouldn’t have a pretty dang good idea when their busy seasons are and plant accordingly.
They do, he was using some type of chemical to delay or accelerate the optimum bloom for a group of live plants (poinsettia) so that they could make them look great prior to sale instead of having a few great some over and others too early. Essentially tweaking the plant prior to sale to maximize the number or plants peaking in the week or retarding others that are peaking a week or too early.
Ah, that makes more sense.
with artificial lighting and timers, it’s any season, any time, that’s how we grow all year,
and you drop the Nitrogen and boost the PK ratios, a little at first then nuts on the nutes,
I have a pretty continual harvest. From my salad greens/arugula trays, I get about 4-5 harvests, then cycle in new plants that I’ve started.I have several trays going at once usually. Plants grown hydroponically still have a natural life cycle.
The herbs keep going and going. I prune and dry them when they get too big. And I also do replace them from time to time after a few months. I’ll be taking the lemon basil out and making lemon basil simple syrup to can for cocktails in the next week or so.
I choose tomato varieties with varying harvest intervals and start new plants as they hit the end of lifecycle. The 5-gallon cherry tomato plant on the back porch has been bearing since June. (It was in the house until the weather cooled off.)
Lemon basil simple syrup…yum. We just got a bunch of lemons and today we are making our sweet n’ sour syrup.
I had orange mint and was thinking of using that but I neglected the little guy and nursing it back.
I’m into that. I could have lemon basil with everything.
Back in Minnesota I grew tomatoes in one of these beds from Amazon. Worked really well. Has a spigot to control water retention.
I ended up giving it to a friend when we left MN. It grew mighty maters.
https://www.amazon.com/dp/B00BJFJCSQ/ref=cm_sw_r_cp_awdb_imm_t1_gVk-FbX4WWCPN
I follow a yooper mechanic on youtube, and he says “spicket” instead of spigot. Is that widespread? Seems old fashioned.
I don’t know that I would be able to tell any difference, the way I say it.
I think he spelled it like that in the titleif a vjo, too. I suppose it depends on your accent. Lots of words sound plenty different. I have noticed a lot of Americans say “mayzhur” and “playzhur” for measure and pleasure, etc.
I’m used to hearing it pronounced “spigit,” so it wouldn’t take much to get to a k.
They are called Hose bibbs in Plumber speak,
Sillcock around here.
Yep,
Growing up in the Laurel Highlands of PA, it was “spicket” but no one around here (further west, almost Ohio now) seems to use the word at all that I can tell. Hose bib, as Yusef notes, is used among the crack-displaying trades, I think.
I can go into Home Depot and say, “spigot”, “sillcock”, or “hosebib” and get what I want.
I had to school one of your fellow countrymen, who, by the way, was a writer, on the proper British pronunciation of “waistcoat” (weskit), “breeches” (britches), and “lieutenant” (leftenant). He did not appreciate my helpfulness.
Aw, I rawther like his way. A bit Lewis Carroll + trivia quiz, those throatwarbler-mangrove shibboleths.
“The Father, the Son, and the Holy Spigot.”
?
Manchin just gave a big “negatory” to the Democrats $2000 stimulus bill.
Most powerful guy in the senate now.
This may not be as easy as they thought.
“Hey Joe, remember all that NSA apparatus you voted to fund in the last budget bill? Yeah, it got some really interesting videos of you wanking it to goats. Oh? You’ve never wanked it to goats? Well, we can keep that between you and me. The video will say otherwise. “
He has a lot of leverage, that’s for sure. He’s going to bring home a tremendous pile of pork over the next however many years.
And….he walked it back. That was quick.
But how many republicans support it?
Even Mitch said he would support a bill that had less bullshit in it and was just the $2000. They could easily get that passed if that’s what it was all about.
Good stuff SP! In my raised garden out side we have scallions, garlic and broccoli growing at the moment. I do have some romaine in there too and that is our pick and use when we need leafy greens.
I need to step up the rest of the raised beds (its 3 sections) for the upcoming season. Just not sure what I will do in there yet. Vegas is great for spring time but once that summer heat hits it just hammers the crops.
Dallas doesn’t get quite so hot, but I had a soaker hose on a twice per day schedule (early morning as the dew* burns off and evening an hour or so after peak heat), and the plants did fairly well. No tomatoes would set in the hot months, but that’s to be expected.
*what passes for dew down here, at least
I have some seeds that OMWC would like.
That is a Wednesday conversation..
Brownie seeds?
‘Iwwegal Dwugs!’ Kamala Harris Recalls Busting People For Pot Possession As A Child
Trump Walks Away From Republican Party Without Even Looking Back At Explosion
The dig at Libertarians at the end is apt. There’s a large political opportunity here but the LP establishment is full of grifters and inside-the-beltway thinkers who are more afraid of disapproval by the elite than capitalizing on it.
Yeah that’s a good one.
Definitely gonna leave a mark.
You’d think all that coke would have sped him up a touch
A cute powicy of mandating singew pawent famiwies by incawcewating young fathers for minor dwug offences.
Congress finally built a wall – around themselves. I was told fences don’t work.
Good. Let them turn the Capitol into a new Green Zone. It makes the lack of legitimacy more apparent.
“Green Zone” was supposed to be a link to the Wikipedia page but it got swallowed.
I was hoping they’d bring in some APCs – make it look like some Eastern European dictator trying to hold on.
It’ll never come down either.
It will be torn eventually.
That’s not going to be a pleasant era to live in.
The People’s House
The People Who Matter‘s House, comrade.
Oh, and if you have to ask if you matter, you don’t.
Looks like it it ain’t the people’s house any more not that it ever was.
Figures
Osama would be jealous.
Where’s my shocked face at?
https://www.oregonlive.com/portland/2021/01/portland-mayor-ted-wheeler-walks-back-strong-proposals-on-protest-related-vandalism.html
“Everyone has a plan, until they get punched in the face.”
– Some Gap-Toothed Motherfucker who could box.
I think, “Had a jab like a jackhammer,” was an apt description.
I didn’t think jellyfish were allowed to be mayors. He knows the crackdown was the right thing to do and it’s personal fear that’s keeping him from it.
At least try to sell it as an anit-Trumper legislation. That would get it passed.
Mayor Pajama Boy.
Very interesting. I grow a little in summer in containers outside, but the house has little natural light in winter so growing inside always seemed more trouble than it was worth. But this looks pretty simple, with a few grow lights.
and they are very cheap now, many Lumens, little energy consumption,
FTW!
It’s confirmed. I’m working next week in Brewster, WA. Snow. Cold. Farmland. Mountains? Rivers and lakes. At least I’m driving so I can take a guitar. The hotel I booked looks pretty nice.
Meth and Mexicans. Of course the Mexicans are probably first generation orchard owners and the whites are the meth heads.
Indoor ‘Maters, 3 weeks old, in 1 gallon porous pots, transplanting soon,
https://photos.app.goo.gl/zBPpayxF21SKhgFw8
SP, I wanted to say that i think this is great, and i’m excited for the next article!
Thank you!
I’d like to see the US legislators, both Senate and House, work from home from now on.
They will be able to stay in touch with their home constituents and live among them and the consequences of legislative actions on their territory.
They can read the 1000 page bills prior to voting for them, tapping into local staffers for help. They can debate over Zoom. No need to stand in front of that one CSPAN camera and deliver a speech to an empty chamber. We could then open up the Congress as a part of the Smithsonian.
They would save so much money on travel and they wouldn’t need housing in DC. They wouldn’t have to fear for their lives when citizens come to demonstrate. And they don’t have to break quarantine to fly back and forth.
If the Senators and congresscritters claim that they must meet in person to talk, read, and write, we can remind them of the resounding success of the Work From Home new normal that they’ve forced on the rest of us.
How could they object to that money-saving, safety-enhancing measure? Win-win!
Euphemism spotted.
They wouldn’t have to fear for their lives when citizens come to demonstrate.
Many of them have already expressed approval for protestors going to the homes of officials, after all.
I know it wouldn’t happen in a million years, but it would be awesome to witness the wailing and gnashing of teeth from the lobbyists and their creatures.
I’m sure they’d quickly learn how to service lawmakers at home on an outcall basis.
I’d like to see legislators have to take a test, 2 questions per page of bill, and have to score 80% or higher in order to be allowed to vote yes on the bill. 70% or lower means an automatic no vote.
This. The Capitol building can be given to the Smithsonian.
The People’s House
No People Allowed
I am immediately skeptical of anything called “the People’s_____”.
As a kid I asked Dad about the official names for East and West Germany. East was the German Democratic Republic and West Germany was the Federal Republic of Germany. Why is the “bad guy” the one with democratic in the name?
He said it was like the People’s Republic of China compared to the Republic of China (Taiwan): A country or group that insists on putting its freedom credentials in its own title is likely covering up for the fact that their demonstrated behavior is the exact opposite.
Same thing applies to the way leftists affix “smart” to their desired policies: smart power, smart growth, smart diplomacy.
If you have to tell me how smart you are…..
It’s only common sense.
“I continue to be deeply concerned about repeated acts of vandalism and violence within the City,” Wheeler said in a statement Thursday. “I’m in conversations with my colleagues on Council and others about the best approach to address the challenge.”
Run, hide, pay the fucking ransom.
the best approach to address the challenge
Arrest, indict, prosecute, sentence if convicted, isn’t on the table, I presume.
That only works if it’s deplorables.
https://www.oregonlive.com/politics/2021/01/portland-will-build-new-homes-apartments-business-incubator-designed-to-benefit-black-portlanders.html
“The site, once the heart of Portland’s African American community, was among those areas demolished in the 1970s through eminent domain to make way for an expansion of Emanuel Hospital, now called Legacy Emanuel Medical Center. The expansion never occurred.”
Government giveth, and government taketh away.
what lights are you using?
Never mind, I see you did a link.
I have something similar for starting my seeds indoors, but I never expected it’s possible to get fruit from something like that.