The Laboratory

[ERR0R1755]

I've moved most of the seedlings into their final homes. A few (the ground cherries and Jamaican bird peppers) have been persistent in not germinating, but they also haven't molded over, so I'll set those aside and continue to let them grow.

My hope is to clean up the Bounty that I am using as a light for starting seeds and other plants - and instead use Sprouts or Harvests for that. Then I can use the Bounty for a new, larger plant

[ERR0R1755]

I may have finally found a way to grow plants, in soil, without fungus gnats or fertilizer! I will have to keep an eye on it, but I have some promising results coming from a bottle at the moment.

What I did was I filled up the bottom 60% with a mix of 20 parts "no fertilizer added" organic potting soil to 1 part dehydrated and powdered food scraps (bread, meat, bones, fruit, vegetables, etc) and 1 part powdered crab shells. Then I filled up the next 30% with just the "no fertilizer added" organic potting soil, and finally the last 10% with coco coir.

I did not add any springtails - but when I initially watered it, the bottom 60% was filled with mold as the food powder started breaking down, and then springtails (from eggs in the potting soil?) appeared and started breaking down the mold into nutrients for the plant.

This container does not have any drainage holes, so I will have to be careful to not overwater it.

[ERR0R1755]

I started some more seeds tonight!
Ashe County Pimento Pepper
Golden Beet
Mignonette Strawberry

My hope is to move all of these to their final homes once they sprout - the pepper will end up in a Bounty, but I am not sure where I want to place the other two yet.

[ERR0R1755]

Some updates:
1. I am going to cut back on the AeroGardening a bit and limit myself to just two Bounties - I have discovered that I greatly prefer the larger units with larger reservoirs and less maintenance needed. I am also planning to set up both of my 5 gallon DWC buckets again, so that I can grow plants in those for four total.

2. My method for growing plants indoors, with no fertilizer or fungus gnats, has been working great! I am still experimenting with different ingredients and ratios, but so far the best method I've found is to bake/sterilize potting soil, then mix together one part potting soil with three parts coco coir, adding in a 1/2 part ground up eggshells, food scraps, and powdered mushrooms to make a rich organic soil for plants. At the bottom of each container, I have been either adding drainage holes or adding sawdust and being careful not to overwater - both methods seem to work equally well.

3. My outdoor barrel garden has been doing great this year - I still have not had to water it, and when I tried digging down in one of the barrels, I was able to dig through the logs with a hand shovel just as easily as I could dig through the potting soil.

[Shawn]

You have a plan and that is good.  Summer is upon us and everyone seems to slim their growing as vacations and outdoor time is coming.

[lynnee]

ERR0R1755, your experiments are always fun to watch, no matter how many you have going at once!

[ERR0R1755]

Cleaning things up, preparing some new soil/compost to try that indoors again (now that the gnats are gone for sure), and I'll be setting up my AeroGardens and other hydroponic setups soon!

Once I finish cleaning up all of the outdoor stuff I'll be back to regularly visiting these forums and posting weekly updates for my plants

[Shawn]

Great to have you back

[lynnee]

Missed you, ERR0R1755!

My first thought on seeing the new posts was, "Oh, the Laboratory is back!"

[ERR0R1755]

I am still figuring out how to best do so, but I want to keep track of the water usage for future plants, both in soil as well as those grown hydroponically, like the AeroGardens.

I think it would be interesting and provide a bit of guidance for Kratky setups, since if (for example) a radish plant used half a gallon of nutrient solution, then it might be possible to grow a plant from start to finish in a half gallon bottle with no refills.

Likewise, for soil plants, I want to record how I put together the soil for each plant, and if I planted anything special in it (like one I have now where I buried a corn cob that I had cut the kernels off for cooking), then I want to record that as well.

I'll also start assigning numbers to future plants for my own use, so I can easily find all of my images and notes by looking up that particular number.

[lynnee]

I'll be very interested in your water usage experiments, because of California's drought situation. We got a couple of days of rain at the beginning of November, but nothing since. ☹️

[ERR0R1755]

Nov 20, 2022 15:47:25 GMT -5 lynnee said:

I'll be very interested in your water usage experiments, because of California's drought situation. We got a couple of days of rain at the beginning of November, but nothing since. ☹️

We had a two-week stretch of time with no rain during the summer - it was the one time I had to actually water my outdoor garden :(

[veng1]

ERR0R1755

I'm getting ready to experiment with a laser time of flight sensor that (theoretically) should give an accurate indication of water level.  Parts are supposed to arrive this week.

learn.adafruit.com/adafruit-vl6180x-time-of-flight-micro-lidar-distance-sensor-breakout/overview

[ERR0R1755]

That looks interesting! Does it work with the reflective/transparent properties of water?

So far all of my tracking is manual, since I don't have enough space to build anything automated.