Indoor Gardening

For all you who have already read my post on the Survival Bible, I want to let you know that I have updated it to include links to the various topics. I'm not done yet as it will be a few days to complete, but check back frequently to see what is updated. And feel free to do your own searches for topics that interest you.

This year I am trying to do some indoor gardening since the cat has disappeared. In the past it would lay in my planters and use them for... well, you know what for. Very discouraging to say the least.

I have taken an old wooden rack that I built a thousand years ago and placed it in front of my sliding glass door. There are 4 areas in which I can have growing trays that get southern exposure all day.

The bottom tray has 2 types of radishes; Scarlett Globe and Scarlet White Tip. These are 22 days to maturity.

The next tray up has White Bunching Onions in the full tray. 60 days to maturity.

The third tray is half Kale, Dwarf Blue Curled Scotch, 60 days and Leaf Lettuce, Grand Rapids, 45 days. The kale is shade tolerant, and I may transplant it to the north side of the house, if it ever stops raining and warms up some.

In the top rack, I have 19 jiffy pellets, rehydrated. This tray has a clear plastic top which contains the moisture while letting the sun heat the pellets. Each pellet was planted with 3 seeds ea of: Cabbage, Golden Acre (65 days), Bok Choy (50 days), Mustard, India, Florida Broadleaf (40 days), Broccoli, Hybrid Super Blend (80 days), Spinach, Tyee Hybrid (44 days) and Cucumber, Pic-l-icious (48 days). I planted 4 of the pellets with the cucumbers in case you did the math.

Ok, stop right there.

I know there are hybrids in this bunch of veggies. I am saving my non-hybrids for when I get my own retreat property. Once there I am finally going to plant some asparagus beds as I love the stuff. Right now I just want to grow something and eat it!

Anyway, I will start a new batch of plantings when these have all sprouted, I hope within 2 weeks of my 1st planting. I will do this for 7 plantings, at which time I will switch to my cold weather crops.

As long as I use the jiffy pellets, I will be able to transplant these outside when the weather improves. I bought another 40 today for $0.15 each. I think I will buy a case of them a a later date.

What is really encouraging is that after 2 days I have some sprouts showing. And most of these seeds are 2 years old or older. I think the mini-greenhouse with the peat pellets is the best way to start your seeds. Time will tell. I have 1 Bok Choy showing and 2 of the Mustard plants.

To keep soil erosion down when I water them, I created a watering bottle out of an old plastic Gatorade bottle. I drilled holes around the bottom and it works great.

Here are some pictures of the setup. Pardon the reflection.