‘Dig’ The Earth

What is hydroponics?

The easy answer is growing plants without soil in a nutrient rich solution. There are several ways to set up a hydroponic system but each have a few things in common.

• They must allow enough room for the roots to grow.
• They must offer proper aeration for the roots so they do not drown in the water.
• They must offer a pH balanced and nutrient rich solution specific to the types of plants you are growing.
• They must offer sufficient lighting of the proper spectrum to support photosynthesis for proper growth

What is aeroponics?

Aeroponics is a division of hydroponics that suspends the plants above the nutrient rich reservoir.  The roots are fed the nutrient laden water either by drip irrigation, misting, fogging or highly aerated bubbles.  The most widely recognized aeroponic system is the Aerogarden by Aerogrow.

If you have the cash to lay out for the Aerogarden it is a very nice system that has all the necessary parts, pieces, nutrients and even seeds to make a small seroponic system work.  Whether it’s for flowers to britghten your mood or herbs to brighten your food there are a number of plants that can be grown in the Aerogarden appliance.

If you are more frugal and like DIY projects search for homemade aerogarden and you will find a number of alternatives.  None of them are as pretty as the aerogarden and it will take some time and expertise, but the DIY systems all seem to be practical and will grow plants.  Make sure you have enough space to accommodate a Rubbermaid tub with a lid and an external lighting apparatus.  Space issue and the potential for marital problems because of a loud ugly tub sitting in the front window.  The only place I have that has the space is the back porch, but it is way too cold out there right now so I’d have to rig up heating to.

Year Round and Urban Applications

Upon doing further research on hydroponics and searching on ebay I came across another idea – vertical hydroponic gardens.  I searched how to make a vertical hydroponic garden and I found a grass roots movement called WindowFarms.org.  They encourage the use of hydroponics to grow herbs, greens, and fruit crops year round in available window spaces.  Their system can either be purchased or built with readily available tools and items and repurposed plastic water bottles (they suggest using ones made by Nestle).  Their community forum and blog, our.windowfarms.org, offers the opportunity to read about the experiences of others using the windowfarms idea and how they have succeeded, modified and improved the basic windowfarms concept.  So whether you are a gardener that longs to have fresh produce from your garden in the dead of winter or an apartment dweller who does not have an outdoor space available for gardening a window farm is a space saving way to “get your green on” .

There are many products on the market that are made to make remembering to water your plants easier.  Whether it’s a ceramic worm that changes color or a glass globe with a long tube that sticks into the soil and self waters there is one thing you have to do – PAY ATTENTION.  Neither of these products tell you when the plant needs more if you aren’t looking right at them.  I’ve been known to neglect watering my indoor plants to the point of utter dehydration.  My “alarm” is a very observant 3 year old who notices when the plants look “sad”.

The talented people at the Botanicalls Project have found a way to bridge the gap of communication between people and plants.  They have created a sensor which monitors the plant’s moisture levels and sends Tweets to your mobile phone when it needs watered.  It even sends a “Thank You” when you show it love by watering it.  In an effort to show the public how this works they have a tweeting plant set up named Pothos.  As of today it has 3,025 followers and 152 updates and indicates it is in Urgent need of a watering .  How cool is that!?!

This would be a great gift for the avid gardener in your life. (*hint*hint*)

The weather has turned colder.  It’s as if the calendar told the weather, “Hey, it’s October.  It’s time to get cold.”  And it certainly did.  We went from a balmy 80 the week before to mid 50s and low 60s all last week.  There is hope for 70 degree weather this week which would be nice, but I’m not holding my breath.

There are still some fall cleanup and and preparation tasks that need to be undertaken in my garden and yard.  Weeding, soil amending, sowing cover crops, planting spring blooming bulbs and mulching are all on my list.  I actually considered starting my winter sowing project a little early this year.  Most of the seeds that should grow after being in a period of cold/freezing weather are from plants that self seed.  Setting them in the mini-greenhouses merely gives them protection from the animals and elements for the season until the spring.  For being almost 7 months pregnant this seems like a long, almost impossible list.  Today my gardening has been reduced to indoor herb gardening since I can’t get outside in the cold rainy weather.

About a month ago I spent the day with my mom and I found a cute glass jar with growing medium and basil seeds.  I love basil and gardening so I thought I’d give it a try.  Unfortunately, it did not dawn on me to take a picture of the soil pellet before I added water so you could see just how much it fluffed up.

What gardening tasks are you still undertaking?