Urban Garden Fence Gardening #6

Urban Garden Hydroponic Fence Gardening #5

Urban Garden Hydroponic Fence Gardening #4

Urban Garden Hydroponic Fence Gardening #3

Urban Garden Outdoor Fence Gardening #2

Urban Garden 800 plants in 90 square feet!

Urban Garden Outdoor Fence Gardening

Urban Garden Hydroponic update #6 (Spring times here)

Here is an update on my indoor garden. We're in a transition phase right now. It's almost time to start the outdoor garden. All the peppers in the red solo cups(40 total), are going outside to grow in containers. The same goes for the tomato plants in the sleds. I have 35 tomato plants going outside to grow in containers. In the seedling trays, I have 50 each of Brandywine, roma and better boy tomatoes. I will be selling them in the farmers market, as seedlings, next month. Each week, I will plant another 3 trays for sale, the following week.

The pepper table is growing well right now. The plants are really starting to produce peppers everywhere. Underneath, the lettuce has been trial and error, to say the least. First there wasn't enough light, then the nutrient level was too high. I've added more light, over 20,000 lumens total and somewhat corrected the nutrient level. I also added a small pump in the reservoir, to circulate and aerate the water. It pumps water up a pvc pipe, that has a air stone in it and the water falls back to the reservoir, to aerate.

I had a good idea the other day, to fix the nutrient imbalance. Bare with me. My thinking is that the lettuce need lower nutrient levels then the pepper plants. So instead of trying to meet in the middle, didn't work, I'm going to use the lettuce formula in the reservoir, where they grow, and supplement the peppers with hand watering from the top, with a higher level of nutrient. The next time I flood, I will change the water in the reservoir, so the lettuce doesn't get overdosed. It might sound complicated, but it really isn't. The only thing changing manually is hand watering 20 plants, with a quart of nutrient rich water apiece.

Hydroponic Pepper/Lettuce Table.

I finally got around to installing the lettuce raft system, on top of the pepper tables reservoir. They are growing under 2- 2tube T-5 fluorescents, that total 112 watts and produce 10,400 lumens. I also set all the other plants outside, except the tomatoes. The strawberry plants I bought from Home Depot had thrips on them and they were spreading to other plants. It's still pretty cold outside, so I'm not sure if they'll make it but I wanted to make certain the bugs didn't spread any farther.

Urban Garden update #4 (Hydroponic Pepper table)

I just got done with the flood and drain pepper table. Well, almost done. The table will actually only grow 20 pepper plants(over 50 right now).The reservoir will house lettuce and spinach, grow on a 2" styrofoam raft. So when it's all done, one reservoir will be feeding two grow beds. I'm not even sure if this will work, but I have a pretty good feeling it will. I'm using botanicare coco grow compressed coir mixed with silica stone for a medium. The containers are 9"x9"x5" tall plastic mesh. They will be sitting on top of a 1/4" coconut mat, where the roots will grow underneath. The plants will be grown using botanicare CNS-17 coco nutrients. For supplements, we're using aquashield and CSN ripe.

Urban Garden update #3

Here's some pics from Feb. 8th. These were taken over a week ago. I've been pretty busy at my other job. This weekend I am finally building the flood and drain hydroponic table, for the pepper plants. I'm so exited. I'm going to grow them in coconut coir as a medium. It's made from the husks of coconuts. It looks pretty much like potting soil when wet, but it holds a lot more air. Around 25-30% to be exact. I'm also going to add silica stones to the coir, for added air.

Here's what we did today.

Today we built a semi- igloo and a temporary push cart with wheels for my tomato plants. They were getting too tall and I have at least a month and a half before I can put them outside.

-On a side note, this is the first significant snowfall my 3 year old daughter has ever seen. Today was a good day!

Hydroponic Grow Experiment Update # 3

Here's some pictures taken a couple days ago.

Garage Indoor Garden update #2

I am moving right along in the grow room. Thanks to a donation from one of our readers (thanks mom) I was able to build my first of three grow bed tables. I built a 3x6' grow bed and stand for under $100 and it's totally waterproof. This is a bargain when you consider just a 3x6' plastic grow bed costs $170 without a stand! I will show you step by step how to build it in my youtube video, soon to follow.

As far as the Cocogrowers go, the cherry tomatoes are looking extremely healthy. Together, they have about 20 tomatoes and are growing about 3 inches a day! They are also drinking over a half gallon of nutrient rich water every day. The Brandywine tomatoes are still puzzling me. I do have 2 tomatoes starting on one of them though.

The seedlings, now small plants, are looking healthy as ever. They were just planted in the red solo cups about 10 days ago and already need bigger containers. I have about two months before I can move the tomato plants outdoors. I hope they don't get too big, too early! I am planning on growing them in 5 gallon buckets, instead of planting them in ground. Should be interesting.

Hydroponic grow experiment #3 update

This is week 3 of the hydroponic experiment #2. Everything is going great. The Growlab temp. is 78 in the day and 68 at night. The humidity is around 45%.The timer on the turbogarden is a great addition. I can't tell if the plants are growing any faster, but they're definitely not slowing down. The ph is 5.9,the ppm is 620 and the water temp. is 70-74. I'm already pulling off the bottom leaves on the lettuce for salads.One thing I have noticed is the basil plants in the turbogarden system have a stronger smell then hydroponic and soil grown. I credit that to the extreme health of the plants. The plants in the turbogarden are also growing bigger, faster then the other growing methods. It's the Ferrari of growing systems.
The Ecogrower is looking great also. I am adding a gallon of water with 1/4 strength nutrient every day to the reservoir. I've harvested three peppers so far from the relleno, compared to no peppers from the soil grown relleno. They are the same exact age and receive the same nutrient.
The pepper seedlings are sprouting away. I have 33 sprouts out of 50 so far. I can't wait to get them growing in the flood and drain table. I'm not sure which medium to use yet. I'm open to suggestions.

Hydroponic grow experiment #2 update

This is week 2 of the second experiment with hydroponics. As you can see, everything is going pretty well. I have a little helper, who has really taken to growing. I've moved the tomatoes out to the garage. I installed a timer on the aeroponic system. I programed it for 15 min. on and 15 min. off. 24/7. The plants grew just fine with the pump running 24/7 without shutting off. The only problem I ran into with the water pump running continuously was, it caused the water temp. to rise above acceptable levels. I fixed this problem by rotating a frozen 3 liter bottle of RO water, twice a day, to the reservoir. Every third bottle, I took the cap off and let it drain into the reservoir for topping off. I added the timer for three reasons. To save money on my electricity bill, lower the water temp.(which it hasn't), but more importantly, the off time allows the roots to absorb more oxygen which breeds healthier roots and a healthier plant. So it's a win/win situation.

The Ecogrower is really a maintenance free system. You can see the relleno peppers are getting bigger. There about 6 inches at less then two weeks. Since the plants are getting bigger, I have to top it off with a gallon of 1/4 strength nutrient water every two to three days.I am using the same nutrients, with the following levels:

-Turbogarden 6.3ph- 470ppm- water temp. 70-76

-Ecogrower 5.9ph- 700ppm- water temp 69

I've planted 50 pepper plants, for the garage grow room. Half the tray is sweet peppers and the other half hot peppers. There are about 10 different varieties total. I plan on growing them in a 4x8 flood and drain table. We're still about a month away for that.

Garage Indoor Garden

I'm at a stand still right now until I get more funds for the rest of the room. Here are some pictures of the progress to date. It continues to change daily. I'm taking baby steps to a bigger goal. So far I have a room I've built out of metal piping with metal corner brackets. It was a frame for a golf driving net in it's previous life. The dimensions are 9'x10'x8' tall. I wrapped it in 6 mil black poly film and bought a tarp zipper for the entrance at home depot. It works better then expected. I used emergency blankets to add reflection inside the room. They don't seem to be very reflective, so I'm planning to order some white poly film to cover the entire interior top to bottom. I have two 600 watt HID lights running on Galaxy digital ballasts. In the near future, I plan on installing a 4'x8' ebb and flow table and two 3'x6' tables. I am going to experiment with the 3'x6' tables by growing the same seed stock, one in dirt and one in hydroponics.

Hydroponic grow experiment #1

Dec. 26, 2009

The lettuce in the turbogarden are really filling out. They are almost ready to pick. I think next time I will try other taller plants with the lettuce, to give them more room. I'm getting ready to switch things around a bit.

Here are the nutrient levels and ph in each system:

-Turbogarden 500ppm and 6.1 ph

-Ecogrower 450ppm and 6.2 ph

-Cocogrower #1 (Chadwick cherry) 600ppm and 6.0 ph

#2 (Brandywine) 330ppm and 6.0 ph

-The turbogarden runs 24/7 misting plant roots.

-The Ecogrower runs 24/7 dripping water over the top of the plants.

-The Cocogrowers run while the lights are on and off when the lights are off. I have added an airstone in every systems reservoir that runs 24/7 for the roots.

Hydroponic grow experiment #1

Dec. 10, 2009

I am experimenting growing vegetables and herbs in hydroponic and aeroponic systems as well as soil less potting mix. In the turbogarden (aeroponic) I am growing four varieties of lettuce including red oak leaf, outstanding red romaine, buttercrunch and waldens dark green lettuce. I am also growing a basil plant and garlic chives. In the ecogrower I am growing a relleno pepper, two basils, bouquet dill, english thyme and peppermint. In the Cocogrowers I'm growing Chadwick cherry tomatoes and Brandywine heirloom tomatoes.

The primary nutrients I'm using are General Hydroponics 3 part flora series. I supplement with Florablend, Floralicious plus, Cal/Mag, Koolbloom, Sweet and Silica blast. I am using Great White Mycorrhizae for the roots.

The lighting system I am using is a 12 lamp T-5 Badboy, with red and blue spectrum lamps. I am growing in a Growlab 5'x5' grow tent with exaust ports and a viewing window. For an air intake, I went to home depot and bought a 6" inline fan for $30. I put a 150 micron stainless steel screen on the outside of the fan to catch carpet hairs and dust as well as pesky bugs. I don't have an active exhaust, meaning I let the air naturally escape through the 6" exhaust hole in the ceiling of the tent. By doing this, I can keep the humidity up around 65%. The temperature is steady around 78F. during the day and 69F. at night.