Next Event ---> Lakehills Artisan Village & Produce
Saturday January 11, 2025
101 Center Street, Lakehills TX
You are more than welcome to call or text me for goodies
before the next event !! The cell is 210-260-2323 !
Last Updates :: Sunday December 15, 2024 - The community purchased alot of Garden Goodies as Christmas Gifts during yesterday's Pipe Creek Dancehall Christmas Market Day !!
Microgreens
Experiment Number 1 - Hydroponics - Start Dec 28, 2022
Spicy Salad Mix + Yellow Mustard + Basic Salad Mix
( 1 ) First step is to use pH balanced water.
My tap water is about 7.5, but microgreens prefer more of 6.0.
I added 1/4 teaspoon lemon juice to 8 cups of water, then retested - now I am at 5.93. That is good enough.
( 2 ) I put the hydroponic grow pad in the bottom of my 10 x 20 tray.
Then I gently poured pH balanced water over the pad, soaking it well. This used about 1.5 cups of my water.
( 3 ) Then I laid two straws in the tray to mark out three equal areas in the tray.
( 4 ) I sprinkled Basic Salad Mix seeds in one of the thirds, Yellow Mustard Seeds in the second one of the thirds, and Spicy Salad
Mix in the third one of the thirds.
( 5 ) I then poured some of the pH balanced water into a squirt bottle, and saturated all the seeds.
( 6 ) Then I covered the tray with the blackout / humidity dome. The dome should stay on until all the seeds have germinated.
( 7 ) Because I forget to be attentive, I set an alarm on my phone for twice a day to check the microgreens.
( 8 ) Lastly, the instructions for growing microgreens say to follow this schedule:
Use the squirt bottle with pH balanced water twice a day to keep the seeds moist.
Once the seeds all germinate, remove the blackout / humidity dome, and put under grow lights. This will be about day 3 to 5.
Harvest can begin at about day 10 to day 12.
If the harvest is more than one meal, store leftover in a ziplock bag in the crisper in the refrigerator.
They say you don't have to harvest all at once, you can harvest just enough for one meal, then harvest more the next day.
I started these microgreens on Wednesday morning Dec 28, 2022
Here is a picture this morning, Saturday Dec 31,2022. A lot of the seeds have germinated, but they are not ready to remove the dome.
Experiment Number 2 - Soil Based - Soak Dec 30, 2022 - Start Dec 31, 2022
Cilantro
I grow a lot of herbs in my gardens. I have had great success with chives, sage, basil, thyme, oregano, rosemary, parsley, dill, tarragon, marjoram, and Mexican oregano.
During the summer months, I harvest just enough fresh herbs for the dishes I am seasoning. Also during the summer months, I harvest a basket full of herbs, wash & trim them, and dehydrate them. I then store them in a mason jar with an oxygen absorber. This gives me fresh herbs to use during the winter months.
The one herb I really like, but have a very difficult time growing, is cilantro. It's either too hot or too cold or the soil is not right or it bolts too quickly. So I thought, I can grow cilantro as a microgreen, then dehydrate or freeze in silicon ice trays, to store.
They say that cilantro does not like to be grown hydroponically. And the seeds ( coriander seeds ) are very large and so should be soaked for several hours before planting in the microgreen tray. They also say that one of the best growing mediums is coconut coir, which I have for my vermiculture.
So yesterday, Friday December 30, 2022, I put my coriander seeds in pH balanced water - 5.98 - and today I will prepare the growing tray with coconut coir, plant, and document the progress.
Today, Saturday Dec 31, 2022, I drained the coriander
seeds, soaked the coconut coir, and placed enough coir
into each tray to fill to within 1/4 inch of the top of the
tray. Then I added enough PH balanced water to ensure
moisture is present. I had three ounces of seeds, so I
put half in each tray, ensuring they are equally spread
out, and lightly packing them down. Next I topped
each tray with a touch more coir, and then lightly
packed down the coir to ensure good contact with
the seeds.
I will document as these develop.
Experiment Number 3 - Hydroponics - Start Dec 31, 2022
Red Cabbage + Radish + Red Garnet Amaranth
This is the starting point for a hydroponics grow tray.
The grow pad is the white median in the green tray,
and it is soaked with PH balanced water. Then, I
placed two straws to mark three separate grow
areas for three separate crops.
Next, I sprinkled the seeds, using about an ounce for
each grow area. The red cabbage is in the first grow
area, the radish in the second, and the red garnet
amaranth in the third grow area.
I will document again as these develop