With my new plant setups, I'm going to try for more side light and scatter, less from-above. I'm convinced that's kinda crucial with tomatoes and peppers. And probably even more so with cucumbers. Otherwise, it's like the plant acts near-dead metabolically anywhere more than 6" from the lights.
Been really busy the last few days.. AG maintence/modding kinda just running in the background but thats good.
Heres the current direction of the aerogardens.. 1) Training not pruning. When you grow with lights on a single horizontal plane like the aerogarden, you create plants that have apical traits, if I simply bend the tops allowing light to penetrate the canopy, I will promote lower canopy growth, this so far has led to a bushy look. This is soo much better for the plant, usually the lower leaves will die off, so far the plant looks more uniform. Also the adjacent HID light helps too.
The basil is well established, I need to refill it with at least a liter of water everyday. Mebby its time for another batch of pesto.
2)Improving my HID light selection. As much as I like 4000K light I think it might be a little bit too blue.. So with that said, I'm looking at a 2800K light, this is closer to sunlight. Still researching..
3)Going to increase the HID light hours, and pump on hours. I've had zero heat problems with the HID light. No signs of melting or distortion, the only problem I saw was the sticker on the hood was comming off. No big deal.
So far the mods seems to be working well, no leaks, no clogs.. running smoothly as planned. PH/PPM meter looks like functioning correctly I might go and recalibrate PH probe.. when I have time.. but just correlating the reading from my pen meter leads me to believe that the PH/PPM monitor is working fine.
4) Tarragon/Chives running in the aerogarden I think the PPM is a little hot @1030PPM and 5.8PH, the seem to show a little bit of tip burn. I'll keep running it for now.. just kinda watch things.
Thats all for now..
Recently installed extended aerogarden arm.. picts to be posted soon.
Gisette,
Thank you for your thoughts...I thought that the light might be a problem...I will wait to grow the cilantro. I am growing basil and
parsley right now...very successfully!
It's tricky to add a new plant-from-seed to an existing garden, because the baby won't get enough light. If you could maybe juryrig starting the plant under another light, or in a bottle, so it's closer to the lights, then transfer it into a hole when it's established-but-not-too-big-to-get-roots-into-hole, that might work. Cilantro is also a little tricky to germinate in the Aerogarden. (Basil is easy.)
White ag with pump. Plants are less than 18" tall. Did not prune. Set many tomatoes that are now ripening. Not as messy as some tomatoes I've grown. Excellent variety for the ag. Have it on my desk so overhead cabinet limits the ag height, but great teaching tool for engineers who have never seen a tomato plant! Seriously, these guys don't even know the name of "the red bird that comes to the bird feeder" (cardinal!!). They think I'm magical for growing anything. Women engineers aren't so impressed... Beth
I've had great luck with ag jalapenos and Johnny's seeds Ace bell pepper (in an ag 7 with the pump. They don't seem to like the ag 6 - YMMV). Not spectacular yields like outside, but enough to keep us content through the winter months. I have grown cherry tomatoes. I have 2 Florida Petite tomatoes growing and fruiting right now at work. Not the best tasting tomatoes - need summer temps for that, but acceptable. The plants stay small enough not to overwhelm the ag. I got the seeds from tomato growers supply but they don't have them in the catalog anymore! I'm looking forward to Gisette's new grow. Good luck with your grows and let us know how you make out!
Grow begins! Started Park's Better Bush tomatoes (2) in a Park Starts block on an Aerogarden deck, to age 1.5 weeks. One moved to soil, the other to my (sort of) Aerogarden Deluxe. This isn't really an Aerogarden anymore... The base died. So, using its bowl with an external air pump, and lights plugged in with an external power cord.
General Hydroponics Flora nutes, 0.8 EC, and 2 Deluxe bulbs. (I yanked one bulb for now - even two is serious overkill for a seedling...) I think these are 27W bulbs at 4200K light temperature.
New experiment begins! I have my new grow rack. And a 1.5 week old Park's Better Bush tomato, started in a Park Starts block on an Aerogarden deck. This is a compact indeterminate (aka indeterminate short internode) plant. Which should fit comfortably in my rack, with the pepper. The companion carmen pepper just germinated yesterday. These are not randomly selected varieties...
20W 6500K full spectrum CFL, 14 hours a day. Tomato planted in Miracle grow potting mix, with a bit of extra perlite and dusting of lime. The second tomato seedling moved to a parallel AG Deluxe.
Another 4 cukes this week - avg 4 cukes/week in January. The Tasty Jade is definitely outperforming the Socrates lately (much bigger cukes, though one fewer harvested). They both taste great.
P.S. Among the fruiting plants, I've had best luck in the AG growing fairy tale eggplant. Beth has success with jalapeños and Ace bell peppers. Pete and Beth can grow cherry tomatoes, too... I don't really like cherry tomatoes - I like the mid-size. That I haven't succeeded with - yet.
Sounds like tough growing conditions. Are you on the Front Range? (I graduated from Boulder - lived in Denver / Boulder / Fort Collins for 3 years.) I'm in Connecticut now.
I just started a new tomato-in-AG experiment today. Though in truth, if your goal is tomatoes, I'd really recommend saving the AG's for herbs and lettuce, and doing an early indoor/outdoor scheme for the tomatoes. This thread was an experiment, that turned into that, and I got quite a bit of May/June harvest out of it, so now I do it every year. Aside from serious wattage on the lights (probably 100W of 6500K in CFL's, more for T8 fluorescents), it's key to pick a tomato variety that's going to be happy in its indoor/outdoor pot for the rest of its life.
I'm trying to develop a product line along these lines. Wish me luck!
Awesome, Squerl!
With my new plant setups, I'm going to try for more side light and scatter, less from-above. I'm convinced that's kinda crucial with tomatoes and peppers. And probably even more so with cucumbers. Otherwise, it's like the plant acts near-dead metabolically anywhere more than 6" from the lights.
Been really busy the last few days.. AG maintence/modding kinda just running in the background but thats good.
Heres the current direction of the aerogardens..
1) Training not pruning. When you grow with lights on a single horizontal plane like the aerogarden, you create plants that have apical traits, if I simply bend the tops allowing light to penetrate the canopy, I will promote lower canopy growth, this so far has led to a bushy look. This is soo much better for the plant, usually the lower leaves will die off, so far the plant looks more uniform. Also the adjacent HID light helps too.
The basil is well established, I need to refill it with at least a liter of water everyday. Mebby its time for another batch of pesto.
2)Improving my HID light selection. As much as I like 4000K light I think it might be a little bit too blue.. So with that said, I'm looking at a 2800K light, this is closer to sunlight. Still researching..
3)Going to increase the HID light hours, and pump on hours. I've had zero heat problems with the HID light. No signs of melting or distortion, the only problem I saw was the sticker on the hood was comming off. No big deal.
So far the mods seems to be working well, no leaks, no clogs.. running smoothly as planned. PH/PPM meter looks like functioning correctly I might go and recalibrate PH probe.. when I have time.. but just correlating the reading from my pen meter leads me to believe that the PH/PPM monitor is working fine.
4) Tarragon/Chives running in the aerogarden I think the PPM is a little hot @1030PPM and 5.8PH, the seem to show a little bit of tip burn. I'll keep running it for now.. just kinda watch things.
Thats all for now..
Recently installed extended aerogarden arm.. picts to be posted soon.
Hi, Suszua, welcome.
It's tricky to add a new plant-from-seed to an existing garden, because the baby won't get enough light. If you could maybe juryrig starting the plant under another light, or in a bottle, so it's closer to the lights, then transfer it into a hole when it's established-but-not-too-big-to-get-roots-into-hole, that might work. Cilantro is also a little tricky to germinate in the Aerogarden. (Basil is easy.)
Good luck!
White ag with pump. Plants are less than 18" tall. Did not prune. Set many tomatoes that are now ripening. Not as messy as some tomatoes I've grown. Excellent variety for the ag. Have it on my desk so overhead cabinet limits the ag height, but great teaching tool for engineers who have never seen a tomato plant! Seriously, these guys don't even know the name of "the red bird that comes to the bird feeder" (cardinal!!). They think I'm magical for growing anything. Women engineers aren't so impressed... Beth
Ooh, cool, Beth, that you've found another tomato that works! Is the work one an AG6 or AG7? (aerator or water pump?)
Hi Doug and Betty!
I've had great luck with ag jalapenos and Johnny's seeds Ace bell pepper (in an ag 7 with the pump. They don't seem to like the ag 6 - YMMV). Not spectacular yields like outside, but enough to keep us content through the winter months. I have grown cherry tomatoes. I have 2 Florida Petite tomatoes growing and fruiting right now at work. Not the best tasting tomatoes - need summer temps for that, but acceptable. The plants stay small enough not to overwhelm the ag. I got the seeds from tomato growers supply but they don't have them in the catalog anymore! I'm looking forward to Gisette's new grow. Good luck with your grows and let us know how you make out!
Beth
Grow begins! Started Park's Better Bush tomatoes (2) in a Park Starts block on an Aerogarden deck, to age 1.5 weeks. One moved to soil, the other to my (sort of) Aerogarden Deluxe. This isn't really an Aerogarden anymore... The base died. So, using its bowl with an external air pump, and lights plugged in with an external power cord.
General Hydroponics Flora nutes, 0.8 EC, and 2 Deluxe bulbs. (I yanked one bulb for now - even two is serious overkill for a seedling...) I think these are 27W bulbs at 4200K light temperature.
New experiment begins! I have my new grow rack. And a 1.5 week old Park's Better Bush tomato, started in a Park Starts block on an Aerogarden deck. This is a compact indeterminate (aka indeterminate short internode) plant. Which should fit comfortably in my rack, with the pepper. The companion carmen pepper just germinated yesterday. These are not randomly selected varieties...
20W 6500K full spectrum CFL, 14 hours a day. Tomato planted in Miracle grow potting mix, with a bit of extra perlite and dusting of lime. The second tomato seedling moved to a parallel AG Deluxe.
Pansies graduated to cells yesterday.
Another 4 cukes this week - avg 4 cukes/week in January. The Tasty Jade is definitely outperforming the Socrates lately (much bigger cukes, though one fewer harvested). They both taste great.
P.S. Among the fruiting plants, I've had best luck in the AG growing fairy tale eggplant. Beth has success with jalapeños and Ace bell peppers. Pete and Beth can grow cherry tomatoes, too... I don't really like cherry tomatoes - I like the mid-size. That I haven't succeeded with - yet.
Welcome, Doug & Betty!
Sounds like tough growing conditions. Are you on the Front Range? (I graduated from Boulder - lived in Denver / Boulder / Fort Collins for 3 years.) I'm in Connecticut now.
I just started a new tomato-in-AG experiment today.
Though in truth, if your goal is tomatoes, I'd really recommend saving the AG's for herbs and lettuce, and doing an early indoor/outdoor scheme for the tomatoes. This thread was an experiment, that turned into that, and I got quite a bit of May/June harvest out of it, so now I do it every year. Aside from serious wattage on the lights (probably 100W of 6500K in CFL's, more for T8 fluorescents), it's key to pick a tomato variety that's going to be happy in its indoor/outdoor pot for the rest of its life.
I'm trying to develop a product line along these lines. Wish me luck!
Nice, Beth! Impressive pepper production for AG's!
You starting your spring stuff in the Aerogardens, or just clearing room?