hydroponic window salads

**Ceashels** · 12-14-2011, 10:26 PM

I found this very interesting. They built a business in the USA by getting orders upfront for their product kits, then manufacturing the kits. DIY instructions for building your own are on there webpage.

How to Grow a Salad in Your Window | This Could Be Big - Yahoo! News

Windowfarms

**Sara Noel** · 12-14-2011, 10:55 PM

Love it. Great business idea.

**Durgan** · 12-15-2011, 02:54 AM

Entertaining, a bit of a conversation piece, but of no practical importance.There is a sucker born every minute. Plants need heat,light,nutrients,a substrate. If one of the four is missing from nature, it is expensive to supply the deficiency. The whole presentation is about selling kits.

Can you just imagine the labour necessary to grow using the method presented to produces a few greens?

A bit of soil in a plastic cup on a window shelf shelf would produce the same with little effort, but don't imagine you can start a viable market garden.

**Ceashels** · 12-15-2011, 08:37 AM

They aren't advertising the product or the concept as a viable market garden. There is a substrate, there are nutrients, there is light and there is heat for the system they are promoting. They also provide do it yourself plans if you register on the site.

I don't think anyone seeing the video or browsing the website would imagine they could make a profit from growing a few plants in a window. But as a winter project for an urban gardener, it could be a great hobby and outlet for them to get more in touch with a food source. Who knows, they might have fun!

**Spirit Deer** · 12-15-2011, 09:37 AM

I've grown plants from the same seed using the same grow lights side by side in dirt and in Aerogardens, and there is no comparison between the results. Hydroponic wins every time.

This video may have been produced by AeroGarden to highlight their products, but in my experience it is NOT an exaggeration. The difference is really that dramatic.
AeroGarden | Meet The AeroGarden - Watch It Grow Indoor Garden, Seed Kit, Grow Light

We may be suckers, but we're suckers enjoying homegrown tomatoes fresh off the vine all winter long here in northern Minnesota. The intense labor to accomplish this consists of pouring some water into the bowl a couple times a week, adding 11 ml of nutrients every two weeks, and shaking the tomato plants every day to facilitate pollination. I've never worked so hard in my life!

I've grown lettuce and it's been so hectic adding water and nutes every couple of weeks, I could hardly keep up! It was exhausting! And of course having fresh homegrown organic lettuce in the dead of winter was simply torturous, too.

Hydroponic gardening is a great way to grow. It's not all that expensive to set up home-brew rigs, and once you figure out what you're doing, it's also pretty simple.

Here's a picture of our tomato crop growing in one of our AGs last April.

Here's some of the peppers we grew in another AG last winter.

And while we're at it, here's a couple of cucumber plants started the same day from the same package of seeds, one in dirt, one in a hydroponic system.

**Sara Noel** · 12-15-2011, 09:43 AM

I'm all for entrepreneurs. No one forces people to buy anything.
I like that they've created something that promotes gardening and they give plans for an alternative to buying their product. I won't argue there's a sucker born every minute. LOL But I think it's great when people create something and find a market for what they have created.

As someone that won't plant in her backyard soil because of the chemicals, I enjoy seeing options. I'm certainly not running out to buy one or make one, but there's a big market for kitchen gardening (not higher yields) and the more people that find it personally accessible/achievable, the better imo. Many people like easy solutions that make them believe they can actually Do something. Many people believe they have a black thumb simply because they weren't willing to put forth a little effort after one or two failures or fear of even getting started in the first place.

It's better than them eating glue meat and sugary cereals, no?

**Lady_V** · 12-15-2011, 09:55 AM

Hiya, I'm a sucker and I was born last night!

Living in a condo, and not have great results (actually NO results) last year, I was looking for a new way to grow.

When the new condo management company put a ban on growing food (it promotes wild animals) I thought I was going to be stuck having to buy everything from now on.

I love the idea, I can grow them in my bedroom window, I won't be breaking the condo rules, and I will know where my food came from.

**chowder** · 12-15-2011, 10:19 AM

Wow Spirit Deer,thanks for the pics.This looks great and I for one would love to be involved in this through the winter.Just for fun and hobby interest if nothing else.I like FRESH basil and it is in the winter I could use the most,but the store crap is expensive after a while and not that good.Yes I will watch for an AG after Christmas.I believe last year at that time they were on sale and I passed it up-------sigh.

**Spirit Deer** · 12-15-2011, 01:08 PM

AGs are not cheap. But I do think if you use it for growing herbs and you use a lot of herbs, you can break even on it. I recommend the seven-pod Classic if you want a variety. Lots of herbs do well in an AG. I'm attempting to grow cilantro in a three-pod right now. (Cilantro can be difficult to grow in an AG.)

Basil is easy to grow and there are lots of varieties. It would probably do well in the hanging garden that started this thread.

**SwirlyThing** · 12-16-2011, 06:43 AM

I'm glad you posted this thread. I moved from a 2/3 acre lot to an apartment without any outdoor space. I really miss my home grown tomatoes (as well as other veggies and fruits, but especially the tomatoes)! But this thread has got me thinking... it actually didn't occur to me to grow them indoors. The only problem I see is that, though I LOVE tomatoes, I don't like the smell of tomato plants.

**Spirit Deer** · 12-16-2011, 08:38 AM

You don't usually smell the tomato plants that much. The scent doesn't diffuse in the air like flowers do, for instance. I smell them when I shake them, but not from across the room. I also smell them on my hands but only if I put my hands to my face. I don't wash my hands after shaking them either. I'm sure you could wash the smell off if it bothers you. Personally, I think it smells like summer and that's part of why I like growing them in the winter.

Light is the most difficult element to provide, IMO. Our winter days are short and overcast here, so it's not possible to get enough natural light to make a plant produce. (Well, maybe lettuce.) Lighting is also the most expensive because you have to use full-spectrum lighting and the bulbs or tubes are expensive and have to be replaced before you think they should.

Liquid nutrients are expensive upfront but a bottle lasts a long time.

We are on well water and have to buy distilled water, so that's an expense. If you have a water softener you can't use your tap water either.

Our electric rates are low so even when we have all nine gardens running, we don't notice much of an increase. If your rates are high, that could be a different story.

Tomatoes do very well grown hydroponically.

**SwirlyThing** · 12-16-2011, 08:53 AM

Maybe I'll give it a try. I live in Florida and have a huge sunny window that I could put plants in.

**Spirit Deer** · 12-16-2011, 09:21 AM

I would try growing them in dirt to start with. That would be the least expensive way if it works for you. Be sure to fertilize regularly.

Since there are no bees to pollinate them in the house, you must be the bee and shake the tomato plants every day once they start to bloom. Don't be shy, they can take a pretty good shaking. That distributes the pollen so they'll produce fruit.

Peppers grow well in pots too. They will also need to be pollinated. Some people have success shaking them like the tomato plants, but it seems like that just makes the flowers fall off mine. I use the tip of my finger to transfer pollen around. It's simple and quick, just touch the middle of a flower and then touch the middle of another till you've touched them all. It's fairly quick, not what I'd call labor intensive.

**CrazyCat** · 12-16-2011, 09:36 AM

thanks for the links Spirit Deer. VERY interesting~

**laura-n-sasha** · 12-20-2011, 03:46 AM

In case you do not want to do the major plants like spirit deer, I would suggest sprouts. I have found I do not need much, just some seeds and a few containers. The Grooviest Sprouting Seeds on Our Planet!

You can get all different kinds of seeds and most of them are organic as well. I have radish and the Russian mix going right now.