Rockwool for Seed Starting

I have been using Jiffy peat moss seed starter pellets to start seeds for my basement hydroponics experiments.  I've made several efforts now to use rockwool, but my success rate is terrible. 

I get a 90% germination rate using the peat moss pellets, but I have only achieved a 40% success rate with rockwool.  I don't have an explanation for the significant difference between the two methods, but until I figure it out I guess I'll be sticking to peat moss starter pellets.

Low Carb Dieting

In grade school I was in the high school section of the library and picked up a biography about Jim Ryan, the high school track star from Kansas. It was called Jim Ryan: Master of the Mile. I'm pretty sure it's been out of print for several years, but 28 years ago it was that book that spurred my enthusiasm for running. I dreamed of being a high school track star who would go on to participate in the Olympic Games.  I did earn several varsity letters in track and field and cross-country, but I never achieved elite status like Jim Ryan. I was fit and trim tipping the scales at 162 pounds as a college freshmen. 

I am no longer a runner due to years of arthritis damage and two knee surgeries. I now deal with knee pain on a daily basis.

Unless you know me outside of this website, you may not realize that I've put on a few extra pounds in the last several years. Every year after the holidays I promised myself that I would go on a diet and lose weight, but I never actually did it until this summer.

I picked up a copy of The Dukan Diet and I was losing weight in no time. Dr. Dukan promotes a low carb diet for weight loss wannabes and it actually works. During the first jump start phase I lost nearly 8 pounds in the first week. A friend of mine who has been diabetic for 20 years told me that she could have saved me the  $24.99 and put me on her diet for free. (If I'd only known.)

You don't need to buy a book or even follow a fad diet plan to lose weight. You simply need to reduce the amount of carbs you eat. You can do that fairly easily by increasing the amounts of vegetables you eat and dramatically reducing the amount of bread, rice, pasta, and soft drinks in your daily food intake while drinking more water. 

I can't promise you that you will lose 30 pounds like I did, but I predict you will lose some weight and feel better too. And besides, it will be a good excuse to start growing your own vegetables in the backyard, balcony, basement, or garage!

Willie Nelson's Editorial on the Food System

I have enjoyed listening to country music since the days of eight track tapes, a.m. radio's, and first generation Sony Walkman.  Tammy Wynette, George Jones, and Tom T. Hall were regulars on Kansas City's 61 Country station that we listened to all day long whether in the car, in the workshop, or inside the house. We didn't get very good reception on television and for several years didn't even own a working television, so we listened to lots and lots of radio.

Willie Nelson was never a true favorite of mine as a kid and even less so as an adult, but I do recognize his achievements as a song writer, performance artist, and celebrity personality. I don't really agree with his stance on recreational use of certain botanical products, but his recent guest editorial article published on The Huffington Post hits home. 

Mr. Nelson was one of the first supporters of the Farm Aid movement in the 1980's and has launched his own brand of biodiesel, but I didn't realize he has become somewhat of a food activist as well...until today.  His article on Arianna Huffington's popular political blog titled Occupy the Food System sheds light on a problem that has grown into a legitimate threat for the country.  As he explains, with a concentration of the food supply among a handful of companies, it's now more important than ever that we begin to develop our own independent sources of food and that we support others involved in the effort.  The organic famers, CSA proprietors, backyard gardeners, and small farmers deserve our support. It's a double edged sword of sorts.

While the monopolization and, some might even say, exploitation of the food supply has helped bring new products and choices to market for consumers, it is also bringing with it some negative side effects. I think there are benefits to be gained from genetically modified seeds, but I would like to see more disclosure in the market place.  I would like to see retailers offer more choice to consumers that want to have the option to purchase non GMO foods too.  I'd like to see the commericial seed companies ability to dominate certain food crops like soy beans and corn reduced. I'm not convinced that allowing them to patent a food is a good idea. I also think it's unfair that organic farmers farming their land and minding their own business are threatened by GMO seeds and crops that the wind and birds transport into their fields and affecting the independent organic farmer's ability to compete fairly.

Thanks to Willie Nelson for using his notoriety to bring this discussion toward the forefront of the media.  I hope he continues discussing this issue in the media.  I urge you to forward this article and others like it that you run across to your friends and family to encourage them to consider these issues and make their own decisions about the foods they purchase and whether they want to begin growing a portion of the food they are eating.

I don't think we need to eliminate agri-businesses or corporate farming, but I think consumers deserve more input into the process and more choices in how they spend their hard earned money at retailers.

Basement Gardening Project - Day 13

It's been 6 weeks since I started my hydroponic-lettuce-kale-collard-spinach-growing-system in my basement.  The kale and collards are not quite ready to eat, but today we harvested 3 servings of lettuce and spinach for a nice healthy lunch.

Here are some pictures:

Lettuce in the salad spinner

Spinning out the water after washing

Fresh lettuce home grown in Michigan during winter

With some additional toppings and a little Light Rasberry Vinegrette

Worms for Your Garden

I ran across this video tonight on You Tube, but before you watch it I need to add a short disclaimer. I haven't actually tried this method of attracting worms to my outdoor gardening efforts, so I can't say for sure how well it works.  Judging from the video below though, it must be working pretty well.

Collard Greens With Bacon Recipe

I moved to Tennessee from Missouri after college graduation.  Being new to southern style food, I was amazed at the large number of "meat and three" restaurants in the Nashville area. In some areas of town, they seem to be on just about every street corner.

I was in the Army Reserves for 12 years and had drill once a month at a facility located on White Bridge Road in West Nashville behind Nashville Tech.  A group of us often ate lunch at a nearby restaurant that served a choice of meat and a choice of three side items for something like $6.99 for lunch.  The meat was usually country ham, roast beef, and meat loaf.  The side choices were typically black eyed peas, red beans, green beans, rice, corn on the cob, and collard greens. The first time we went there everyone was ordering collards for one of their sides, so I decided to try them too.  I had never eaten them before, but after trying them that first time they became a regular favorite for my monthly lunches on drill weekends.  When in the South, do as Southerners do...or is that Rome?

In the past 20 years, I've eaten collards prepared many, many ways.  They are all basicallly the same with a twist here and there according to the particular region of the country.  My wife has been making collards with bacon pieces using the recipe below for several months. I've found it on many of the typical recipe websites, but I've recently learned that the basic recipe was originally printed in the Wall Street Journal. 

Here's the version from Simply Recipes:

• 4 strips thick-sliced bacon, sliced into 1/2-inch pieces
• 1 small onion, chopped
• 2 garlic cloves, minced
• 2 TBSP sugar
• 1 teaspoon kosher salt
• 1/2 teaspoon freshly ground black pepper
• Several dashes hot sauce (we leave this out)
• 1/4 cup apple-cider vinegar
• 2 pounds collard greens, stems removed, sliced into 3-inch-wide strips (can substitute kale or chard)
• 1 cup chicken broth (or water)*

This can be prepared easily and quickly in a skillet on the stove top.  (Remember to fry the bacon first.)  It's good!

Learning to Grow Collards

My wife and I live in Michigan, which is several states away from our families in Tennessee and Missouri.  We generally exchange gifts with my family during the second weekend in December each year. This year I spent an hour catching up with my eldest uncle, who also does some amateur cattle ranching to supplement his retirement income. We talked about his growing herd of black hereford cattle (who knew?), politics, and eventually the conversation turned to food.

We don't always agree with each other, but we generally gravitate toward common ground during our talks. Putting it all together, so to speak, we ended up agreeing that some of the stress for families who are less fortunate financially than we are, could be reduced if more people learned to grow some of their own food.

It doesn't take a lot of land to grow enough food to supplement several meals a week. And...if you want to get serious about it, you could grow a substantial amount of food in the backyard to reduce the family grocery bill significantly.

What strategy could you use to get started on a small scale to learn the how to's and why not's for growing your own food? Plant some collards.

Collards are easy to grow.
If I can do it, anyone can. They grow like weeds almost.

Collards give you multiple harvests.
You can harvest them once and they'll grow back in a couple weeks.
You can harvest them a second time, a third, or maybe a fourth before they become a little bitter.

Collards grow well in cool weather.
You can plant them early in the spring and again in the late summer to get eight harvests per plant.

They are easy to cook.
Boil them. Cook them in a crock pot. Saute them with some bacon (my favorite). Use your imagination.

Once you get some confidence growing collards, it's easy to add lettuce, spinach, radishes, carrots, and much more to the backyard food distribution system.

I'll leave out some of the colorful language my uncle used, but to summarize in politically correct terms...growing some of your own food really can save you money and stretch the money you have just a little farther.

European Nightcrawlers vs. Red Wigglers for Home Composting

Eisenia foetida

I have been composting with worms for almost 3 years in my home.  I started with 1 lb of eisenia foetida and in a two year period I grew that amount to more than 19 lbs. I supplemented my composting efforts with rabbit manure purchased locally from a rabbit farmer to help multiply my worm population faster. If you have lots of worms you also need lots of food for them :-)

After our move from Florida to Michigan, I started my worm composting efforts over from scratch with 1 lb. of eisenia hortensis worms.  If you have never compared the two worms up close here's a quick description based on my experience and observations.

EF's

• 2-3 inches long
• small and skinny worm
• eat almost anything
• tendancy to ball up and group together in the bedding
• multiply quickly, 1 lb can double in size within a couple of months
• will compost and reproduce well in temperatures up to 100 degrees air temperature
• lots of room for error in bedding, they will tolerate poor bedding conditions for short periods of time
• commercially viable for vermicomposting ventures

EH's

• 5-6 inches long (even longer when extended)
• fatter worm than EF's
• a very active worm compared to EF's
• do not multiply as quickly as EF's, 1 lb can double in size in 5 or 6 months
• tendancy to roam and will escape if conditions do not suit them
• favor cooler temperatures
• favor lots of neutral material in their bedding
• do not like bedding that heats up
• do not like bedding that is too wet
• appear to do well in paper and cardboard bedding with small amounts of food material
• commerically viable for retail and wholesale sales as a fishing worm
• less desireable for vermicomposting and home composting, but acceptable

I have no plans to switch back to eisenia foetida for my home composting efforts, but if I do decide to get back into the business of selling worms to other home composting enthusiasts on a small scale I will add EF's back into the equation.

Using T8 Flourescent Lights for Hydroponics

I've been using T8 flourescent lighting in my basement gardening project. I chose T8's because they are inexpensive. At 36 watts, they also use very little electricity. After using the lights for 5 weeks, I have a few observations I'd like to share.

Pro's:

• Inexpensive price
• Easily accessible
• Low energy usage
• Little heat build-up

Con's:

• Low light intensity
• Short coverage area
• Low heat build-up

You may have noticed that I mentioned heat build-up as a positive and a negative characteristic of the lights. A larger light with more intensity sometimes requires a cooling fan to ensure safe operation. The T8's low heat characteristics help make these lights safer to use indoors. I am using the lights in my basement where it does tend to be on the cooler side with temperatures in the mid-sixties or sometimes lower during the winter months. A warmer light would probably promote faster growth for my lettuce, spinach, collards, and kale in my deep water culture system, but in my own personal view I'm not sure the increased purchase price for the fixture, long term energy cost, and risk of excessive heat build-up would be worth it. I am personally satisified with the T8's so far. But, as you can see from the picture of the kale and collards below, I need to purchase additional lights to get proper light coverage for a wider area.



Kale

Collards

These pictures demonstrate growth, but at a much slower rate compared to the spinach and lettuce that are located more directly below the four T8 light bulbs that I am using. I have no doubt that if the kale and collards were located more directly below the T8 bulbs, the growth would be greater.  I plan to add two additional T8 fixtures in the future to improve my results.

Basement Gardening Project - Day 12

We have been out of town for a few days visiting family for the holiday season. The lettuce, spinach, collards, and kale have grown quite a bit while we were gone. Here are a few pictures I took this afternoon.

You can see from these pictures that the net pots are not seated down in these storage containers very far.  That was not my intention when I started building this cheap hydroponic growing system. I purchased a 3 inch holesaw and 3 1/2 inch net pots, so there is a mismatch. When I made this discovery during the construction phase I made the decision to go ahead and use the net pots "as is" rather than spending more money to get 3 inch or 3 1/4 inch net pot (if there is such a thing). I did wrap a single width of electrical tape around the lower portion of the net pot to keep light out of the growing chamber in hopes of reducing potential algae growth. In retrospect, I should have delayed starting my project a few days and purchased the correct size net pots, but I doubt the growth has been impacted much at all.

This photo gives you some insight into how close the vegetation is to the 36 watt T8 bulbs I am using in these inexpensive fixtures purchased at Lowes.

Catfish in a Barrel Tomatoes

If you do a Google search for "catfish in a barrel" you will likely find an article from a 1973 issue of Organic Gardening and Farming about a farmer from Alabama who raised catfish in a barrel doing frequent water changes to keep them alive.

I recently ran across a modern version of this concept on You Tube. The first video shows the system shortly after it was set up.



The second video shows the growth on the tomato plant after two weeks. 



You can read more about this project / experiment at Clark's Homestead on the web.

Basement Gardening: Vermiponics

If you have been following along with my budget minded hydroponics project, you have probably wondered whether buying nutrients really qualifies. For $20 a quart, I've been wondering that too. Rest assured that my long range plan does not include purchasing nutrients. I plan to add vermicompost (i.e. worm castings) to my deep water culture beds in place of the expensive hydroponics nutrients. I simply started with the nutrients to validate that the other parts of my system (lights, aeration, etc.) would work properly.

I have a spare deep water culture bin that I'm not using at present and a spare air pump so it's time for a vermiponics experiment. Rather than starting my project by putting the worms directly in the bins, I'm going to let the worms reside in the vertical worm bin tray system I have been using for a few years, and place the worm castings in a paint strainer bag inside the aerated deep water culture bins. I think it will work, but I won't know for sure until I try it. I love experiments!

Stay tuned for future updates.

Winter Gardening with High Tunnels

In many areas of the country it's too cold to garden after mid-October.  A few hard core enthusiasts move their gardening efforts indoors to a basement or garage, but most put away the rakes and hoes until spring time. It doesn't have to be that way. By using a 'high tunnel' it's possible to garden year round (most places).

Johnny's Seeds wrote a recent blog post about using commonly available chain link fence metal poles to build a tunnel over your garden to extend the growing season. Think of it as a version of portable greenhouses.  As an additional source of information including a cost sheet and estimates for monetary return for farmers is provided by the University of Vermont's Center for Sustainable Agriculture.

Basement Gardening Project - Day 11

My deep water culture hydroponic bubbler project just passed the fourth week. Things are really growing now.  It took a little while to get the momentum moving, but weeks three and four have been tremendous.  

Spinach



Lettuce in the foreground spinach nearest the camera


(Here are some pictures from Week 3 for comparison purposes.)

It's hard to know exactly, but I think this round of growth has been influenced by several factors:

• Root Rrowth - the roots are beginning to extend far below the water line
• Lighting - last week I lowered the T8 lights to within 1/2 inch to 1 inch of the vegetation
• Air Bubblers - I adjusted the timing cycle so that the bubblers are on 24 hours a day

It shouldn't be too long before we have the first lettuce and spinach harvest, but the collards and kale are a little behind the curve. I attribute the lag to the lights not reaching far enough with enough intensity to penetrate the outer edges of my growing beds. When I replant this spring I'm going to re-configure the overhead lighting and add an additional light T8 light bar to get proper coverage over all 4 growing beds.

Baltimore Aquaponics - Urban Farming Operation

Build an Aquaponic System