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Urinating on my Tomato Plants

There’s been a lot about urine in the news lately. Juan Manuel Marquez was saying that he was drinking his own urine leading up to his fight with Floyd Mayweather.

As fascinating as that story is, the story that piqued my interest even more was the one about urinating on your tomatoes and how it can help to give you fruits four times larger.

I decided to give it a go and urinated on my cherry tomato plant on my fire escape garden. Don’t worry before I started, I looked and gave a yell so no one got hit with some unexpected rain.

According to the research done by the Finnish team, it’s actually a mixture of urine and wood ash that is the ultimate eco-friendly fertilizer. I just used my urine.

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Pepper Plants are Blooming Again

A few weeks ago I said that I wouldn’t recommend growing red peppers in small spaces because they weren’t productive. I might’ve spoken too soon because they are starting to bloom again and are showing a lot of buds.

I’m wondering if I should’ve harvested the others earlier, which would’ve allowed these to come through. It’s started to get cold here fast with it reaching the low 70s during the day and 50s at night.

That’s making me wonder if the peppers will be able to survive in this cold weather. Guess I’ll have to wait and see.

What’s your thoughts?

httpv://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0CNRHoHcPCE

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Urban Garden Update – Sept 18, 2009

Photos from the week:
Backyard vegetable garden in Brooklyn. September 14, 2009.Cinder block garden. Septebmer 14, 2009.Red malabar spinach plant. September 14, 2009.Fire escape vegetable garden. September 15, 2009.Fire escape vegetable garden. September 15, 2009.Fire escape vegetable garden. September 15, 2009.

It’s been a while since I gave an overview on both of the urban gardens, so thought now was a good time.

I’ll start with my backyard vegetable garden in Brooklyn.

  • Changed the layout due to my Grandmother’s excessive sprinkler use.
  • Harvested my first cucumbers. Got two of them.
  • Planted some kales and more arugula.
  • Sweet pepper plant is starting to fruit more.

On my fire escape vegetable garden:

  • The cherry tomato plant continues to grow, but still producing. Harvested about a half dozen more cherry tomatoes.
  • Lettuces under the cherry tomato plant are slowly growing.
  • Harvested some of the kales and swiss chard.
  • Lettuces in the kale and chard bucket didn’t make it and got drowned out.
  • Harvested two chili peppers.
  • Looks like some more sweet peppers are starting to bloom.

httpv://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OiGQxt7GMK0

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Urban Gardening in Washington DC

Received an email from another reader, Annie from Washington DC, that wanted to start her own urban garden. She had the space on her deck that got plenty of sun. Her concern was that it was too late in the season.

She had a few questions and concerns, but just told her to stop worrying and to start growing her vegetable garden.

So I challenged her to get it done. Since she’s not one to back down from a challenge, she showed me up and planted some herbs and vegetables on her deck.

A few days later, I got an email from her with the pic above. She recycled 2-liter soda bottles and planted buttercrunch and red leaf lettuce, rosemary, chives, and basil.

All the excuses are gone and she got it done. Mariann got it done too.

You’re next. Let me know how it goes.

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Planting Some Head Lettuce

At the advice of Trina from Silver Height Farm where I buy my plants from, she recommended the Pablo Head Lettuce.

I bought a 6-cell pack and got them all in there. Each cell contained a few plants that I separated out. They were planted about 3-4 inches apart.

When planting these I noticed that the soil was pretty shallow, maybe 2-3 inches at some points. This could be a reason why the onions didn’t get to be very large. At other spots the soil was about 4-6 inches.

Either way, it should be good for the lettuce. I’m hoping to be able to harvest these for a few weeks.

httpv://www.youtube.com/watch?v=L0H-6z9uYmM

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Moving my Cucumber Plant for Better Support

Three cucumbers have started to come through on my cucumber plant, so I needed to relocate it to another part of the garden for better support. I moved it closer to the fence where I was able to train it up with some string.

I was pretty happy to see the cucumbers since the leaves at the bottom have been drying out and dying. They were picked off and the cucumber trellis that I made was readjusted and tightened.

After the trellis was tightened, the plant had to be propped back up on it and secured to the fence.

Now I’m hoping that this will allow the plant to grow up and be more productive.

httpv://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7mdKcOfxfJ0

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Getting Creative With Cinder Block Gardening

Now that I’m a bit more comfortable with this urban gardening, I’m starting to see things a bit differently. I look at things and think, “how can I use that to plant something?”

In walking around my neighborhood, the East Village, I saw something that really struck my eye. It was a cinder block turned on it’s side with some plants in it.

Cinder blocks wouldn’t work on my fire escape garden, but definitely would work in my backyard garden, especially since my grandmother already has cinderblocks.

They are also the perfect price. Free.

So I hit up the farmers market, bought some cinnamon basil, some fancy Italian dandelion and olive leaf arugula and got them planted in the cinder blocks.

httpv://www.youtube.com/watch?v=37jBY6V0WLo

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I Wouldn’t Recommend Growing Peppers in a Small Space

Three months after starting my fire escape garden, I was finally able to harvest my red peppers.

I harvested a grand total of two red peppers with the possibility of some more. Yes, it was rewarding and felt great to put them in my salad, but I was hoping for more.

If you are gardening in a small space and looking for productivity, I wouldn’t recommend planting red peppers. I’d either experiment with something else or plant something that is productive like lettuces or greens.

For those of you with more space to grow, then plant some red peppers. I’d plant them again in my backyard garden in Brooklyn.

Not sure if it was the kind of red pepper, Jimmy Nardello’s Sweet Italian, or just red peppers in general. What I do know is that next season, I won’t be planting red peppers on my fire escape again nor would I recommend it for you.

httpv://www.youtube.com/watch?v=woZ5o3xpJ28

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Why My Tomatoes Are Blight Resistant

The stories about the tomato blight are all over the news, including this op-ed piece in the New York Times, “You Say Tomato, I Say Agricultural Disaster.”

To my understanding it is an airborne fungus that wipes out tomato and potato crops. This year it’s affecting tomatoes hard.

From what I’ve read, the way it started this is year can be traced to the big businesses such as K-Mart, Wal-Mart and Home Depot. They buy their plants from industrial farms down South, which had the outbreak.

These plants were then shipped up north and sold to farmers and consumers. Since it’s an airborne disease direct contact isn’t necessary and it can affect a much larger population of plants.

Looking at my cherry tomato plants, they seem to be blight resistant.

The main reason why I think they are is because I bought from Silver Heights Farm, a local nursery.

Trina, the gardener at Silver Heights, starts from seed and oversees everything herself. The distance the plant travels from Silver Heights to my gardens is 30-40 miles, so there is less chance for exposure to disease.

It’s also easier for a local nursery to identify and isolate any chance of blight or disease at first look. The big industrial farms have too much acreage to be able to. By the time it’s noticed, it’s already planted in your garden and effecting your crop.

While it’s not guaranteed that what you buy from your local nursery won’t have blight, I think there is a much better chance of it not than if you were to buy from a big chain store.

httpv://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yFuCHuJC62w

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Mariann Started a Vegetable Garden How About You?

I received an email from a reader this week, Mariann from Arizona. She’s planted some herbs and vegetables for the first time.

Since her 13 year old son was learning about planting and germinating at school, she saw it as a way for them to bond and share the experience.
They’ve planted tomatoes, cucumber, basil, oregano and sunflower seeds.

To me that’s just awesome.

In our correspondences with each other, Mariann had a lot of questions and expressed how nervous she was.

After some back and forth of questions and answers, she seemed much more comfortable and realized that nothing horrible was going to happen. The worst thing being a plant might not make it. If it didn’t she’d give it another go until the plant did make it.

So not only is she start growing her own vegetables, she’s found a way to bond with her son.

Mariann has started her vegetable garden, when are you starting yours?

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Stop Reading About Growing a Vegetable Garden and Start Growing One

I’m back “home” in Philly this week visiting friends that I haven’t seen in a while. My old roommate and I got to talking about the gardening thing. He dropped a comment saying that I should read some books on gardening and stop with all the experimentation.

If I were to do that, then I’d still be reading books, get overwhelmed with unnecessary info and likely get frustrated and just give up. Which is I’m sure has happened to some of you if you’ve even gotten that far.

What did people do hundreds or thousands of years ago? They certainly didn’t Google “starting a vegetable garden” to get their instructions. Nor did they pay thousands of dollars to get some certificate declaring them an expert.

Not sure what they did, but I’m sure it was much more simple than what we’ve made it into.

So that’s what I’m doing. I’m making gardening simple again. I’m not claiming to be an expert and maybe I just have beginner’s luck, but my gardens have been productive so far.

Of course there is room for improvement, and I have lots to learn, but in order to learn you have to do.

Honestly, I’ve read about a half a book and have skimmed like two others to get a basic idea.

Here’s a perfect example from my experience – from the little reading that I’ve done, nearly everyone recommends a peat moss based soil for containers instead coconut coir.

I decided to make my own organic soil using peat moss, but also bought some coconut coir based soil because it was available for cheap in my neighborhood at the Lower East Side Ecology Center.

From what I’ve read the coconut coir soil retains too much water and is bad for container gardening. Thus far, the plants that are in the coconut coir soil are producing just fine.

Now stop reading this and start growing your own garden. You have no excuses.

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Cherry Tomato Does Not Mean Small Plant

When I first started to plan my fire escape garden I thought that cherry tomatoes would work perfectly. Cherry tomatoes are small, so the plant would be small as well.

Now that summer weather has finally hit the NY and the plant is starting to grow, it’s gotten to be pretty tall. It’s about a half of a foot taller than me and I’m a giant.

I’ve had to get creative with the way that I’ve been supporting them.

I am not sure if it’s the kind that I’m growing, Anna Aasa, or it’s just the nature of the beast. My grandmother is growing tomatoes in her garden and the plant definitely isn’t as large.

The lesson learned for me is that just because the vegetable is small doesn’t mean that the plant will be.

What’s your thoughts – are all cherry tomato plants large or is it just this kind that I bought?

httpv://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pc2ncfahim8

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No Posts for the Week of August 16

I won’t be posting this week because I’m going to be working on redoing the site to be more user friendly. I’ll resume back to regular posting next week.

I know it will be rough for you during this time, not knowing how my lettuce are doing or if my cucumber plant is blooming. Just deal with it.

I’ll holla atcha next week.

I

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How to Make a Hanging Herb Garden Using Recycled Soda Bottles

The idea of the hanging garden planter using a soda bottle came after my unsuccessful attempts at upside down vegetable gardening.

One of my readers, Craig Stanton, left a comment saying that I should put the cap back on and grow the vegetables out of the top. That seems so obvious, but I didn’t think of it at all and they’re also easy to make.

These hanging garden planters are a great low cost way to start your own home vegetable garden. You can hang them in a window, on your balcony or anywhere that gets sunlight. I was able to put them on the rails of my fire escape garden.

    Here’s what you’ll need to make one:

  • Tools and materials 2L soda bottle
  • Duct tape
  • Razor
  • Hole puncher
  • Thick twine or thin rope
  • Drill or something to poke hole in bottle cap

httpv://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_gF8Re1Xi7A

    Instructions on how to make a hanging herb planter:

  • Use razor to cut off bottom third or so of soda bottle.
  • Wrap duct tape around the bottom part of the soda bottle. Make sure that half of the duct tape is on the bottle and half is above it.
  • Cut slits about 2-3″ apart in the duct tape and fold over.
  • Punch two holes about halfway down the duct tape. Cut two more on the opposite side.
  • Cut string and thread through two of the holes form the outside in. Do the same on the other side.
  • Drill hole in soda bottle cap to allow for drainage and screw back on.
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Finding the Best Way to Remove Bolting Vegetables

The lettuce in my self watering containers have bolted. I needed to figure out how to remove them from the containers, so I can plant another round of vegetables.

I’ve read of two different ways of removing the bolted plants. The first is to remove the plant from the root. The other is to cut the plant at the soil line.

To find out which way was better, I decided to do both to see the results. In the containers that there were no other plants, I pulled them from the roots. The containers that contained other plants, I cut at the soil line.

Once the plants were removed, I added a little bit of compost to them.

I’ll leave them alone for a few days to if the plants continue to grow before I get my next round planted.

Which way do you think will work better?

httpv://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6lXC-Xflexg

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How to Make a Cucumber Trellis for a Self Watering Container

It’s been a few weeks since I planted my cucumber plant.

It was starting to grow outside of the container, which is a good thing (at least it ain’t dying). So I built a cucumber trellis for it using mostly recycled materials.

    Tools and materials:

  • Old poles put out by someone for garbage. You can use anything that is sturdy enough and stands upright such as tree branches, old crutches or broom sticks.
  • Strong tape to tape the poles to the container.
  • String to tie around the poles and make the trellis.
  • Scissors
    Steps to build:

  • Cut the poles to your desired length. I cut mine at about 4 feet each. Since I planted slicing cucumbers, this length should suffice. If not, I’ll have to add extensions.
  • Tape the poles to the container individually, then wrap tape around all of them. I taped mine about 4 inches from the top of the container.
  • Tie the string about 6 inches from the top of the container to leave room to water through the pipe.
  • Wrap the string around each pole with about 3-4 inches between each level of string until the top of the poles are reached.
  • Place the cucumber plant inside of your newly build trellis.

httpv://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UPi0X9MICbI

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Planting Kale and Chard Because My Lettuce Died

I planted some kale and swiss chard out on my fire escape because there is no doubt that my lettuce died and weren’t growing any more.

Before I planted the kale and chard, I had to prepare the soil in the self watering container first. The dead remains of the lettuce were removed and some of my indoor compost was added to the soil and mixed in.

Even though I only bought one cell of each, there were many plants in the cells. There were about 3-4 plants in each. I separated them out, but still bunched them together when planting.

There’s still a bit more room in the container, so next week I might buy some more kale and chard or lettuces to put in the container as well.

httpv://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vBrodD9uDPs

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Allow for Drainage in Your Self Watering Containers

I learned a valuable lesson in gardening (and life) this week, it doesn’t pay to be lazy.

A few weeks ago, I transferred my celery into a new self watering container and didn’t poke a hole to allow for water drainage.

Sure enough with all of the rain that we’ve been getting here, the bucket became nearly submerged under water. The celery was getting water logged and starting to die off. Celery drinks a lot of water, but not that much.

I had to poke a drainage hole in the container to allow the water to drain out and remove the dead ribs. I’m hoping that I caught this early enough and am able to prolong the life of them.

In this video, I show the water in the container and how I poke the hole to drain. My grandmother also tries to make her way on camera (again), but I cut her off. Gotta keep her ego in check 🙂

httpv://www.youtube.com/watch?v=m3ieAXunaaM

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Do Not Use Soda Bottles for Upside Down Herb Planters

It’s been a bit over a week since I planted my upside down herb garden on my fire escape again. I planted them in soda bottles that were recycled into the upside down planters.

The results are the same though. Death.

So unless I am doing something horribly wrong, I wouldn’t recommend building and using this contraption to grow your herbs.

The first time I planted them, the herbs died quickly as well. It could’ve been because the soil was too heavy or because of my not so gentle hands. So I decided it was time to give it another go.

This time I used the coconut coir based soil and was definitely much more gentle, but the results were still the same.

httpv://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NPitnVwVY8s

Now I need to figure out another way to grow herbs on my fire escape. I need something that I can hang from the railing. Any ideas?

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Plant More Lettuce or Is This Still Growing?

Last month, I was nervous that I killed my lettuces when I harvested them. Luckily for me, the lettuces were fine and grew again.

So now, here I am one month later and facing a similar situation. I’ve gotten about 4-5 harvests from this container of lettuce and it’s starting to show.

I’m not sure if this lettuce better days are behind it or if it still has some fight left. I went to Trina from Silver Heights Farm and asked her what she thought since she is who I bought them from.

She said that they still be good for a few more weeks. Once they start shooting up in a tube like shape that is when they are finished growing.

That got me thinking some about what I’ve been seeing in my Brooklyn garden. Hmm…

httpv://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yJ1LY6YACFE