I pulled the beefsteak tomato, green bell pepper, Brandywine tomato and flat leaf parsley – each in their own one gallon pot (which is only 6″x 6.5″high) from the planter they shared with a single gravity feed valve.  Of all the hydroponic designs I played with this summer this simple configuration – 4 pots in a single tray, with a single valve, from a single purposed nutrient reservoir- was the most successful.

when I pulled the plants from the pots, I was gratified to see the kind of solid mass of roots that you’ll be shown in any picture that demonstrates what a root bound plant should never look like.  But since I had no intention of either increasing the pot sizes, planting them into the ground or extending the life beyond a single growing season the solid mass of roots was good news to me becuase the purpose of the exercise was to confirm that – You Can Grow a Full Sized Tomato or Pepper in a Six Inch Pot!

OK,  so neither the beefsteak tomatoes nor the peppers will yield Fall Fair Blue Ribbon sized fruit ( yes they’re fruit!)  but they will yield a steady, generous crop of food – and you can do it in the lowest maintenance container garden that you can imagine.

Since I’m about the worlds worst artist,  I won’t be sketching out the designs but I’m going to create a PDF with photos to show how to make these gardens.  I hope that for anyone who would love to grow their own organic vegetables and herbs, but don’t have the space to plant a garden – these designs will set you along the road to your first harvest.

I’ll post information about the designs here – and probably post the PDF on my ecommerce bonsai site – Zen Garden Bonsai.

Oh – the flat leafed parsley is actually still good until a hard frost takes it out – here’s a shot of what it looks like.

First it was a matter of getting rid of the overly complicated mixing and balancing of nutrients that are an inherent flaw with traditional hydroponic systems.  At least they’re a flaw if you want to get regular consumers interested.  Then it was about ditching the reliance for electricity – and luckily both of the first two problems had the same solution.  I thought the gravity fed valves were my answer but now I’m not so sure.  I think they’re overpriced and I can’t seem to do anything to bring the prices down and they are still a mechanical element that is subject to a few hiccups.

If it doesn’t work flawlessly, it can’t be foolproof and I want foolproof.

The second season is starting and the new lettuce garden is still hydroponic, still small space, still organic – but this time it might also be foolproof, too.  You see, I’ve ditched the valve for now and I’m working on something that is sooooooo simple – if it works – it will take the container and balcony gardening world by storm.  On the other hand – maybe I’m about to find out why this technique hasn’t found broader adoption.

I’ll let you know.

BUT – Everything and I mean everything that relied upon my hydroponic watering system including tomatoes, herbs, peppers and all the salad greens were in perfect condition.

I’m struggling with an affordable way to bring this system to market.  The problem being that I’m just too small to buy the volumes that will command a great price so the cost of goods will be ugly and unless I want to market these for free ( or worse yet at a loss- which I can promise you is deadly easy to do) they are going to cost about twice what I hoped to bring them to market for.  Still – They work.  And the relative benefits just keep stacking up so I’ll just have to wait and see what I can do.

Gotta run.  Late for work – again.

And of course the vegetables would need to be organically grown- to do anything else runs so far against the trend as to be a waste of time.

The first bonus was a cut and come again salad greens garden that not only grows well in its hydroponic garden but has produced a better yield than expected.  In fact that advantage continues to grow.

Even though the lettuce has bolted....

The oak leaf lettuce in the shot to my right has got leaves that have extended a long way up the stem.  if this lettuce had been planted in the ground it would be completely inedible, since once it starts to bolt salad greens are incredibly bitter.  This lettuce still tastes terrific.  It’s still tender and not bitter and a true delight.

I’ve concentrated the harvest lately on one half of the garden so I can pull it up and reseed for the second season – which should be good becuase it seems that summer does not really want to come to Toronto this year.

Still many salads left on the left

As you can see, the left hand side of the garden where I backed off a bit for the last three meals has tons of greens left, so while the right hand side re-sprouts, I’ll be dining on the left.

I’ve also been playing with the design for the tomatos and the real question is just how small can the pots be to produce a good yield.   I’ll let you know more about that soon because I’ve got a Brandywine heritage tomato and a beefsteak tomato in what are definitely undersized pots.  They got a later start than I would have liked, but they’re starting to take off now.

Looking over the numbers I’ll be able – I think- to bring different variations of this garden plan to market starting at about $60.00 . Still sorting out the line up and confirming what works.

Beefsteaks tomato

New Tomato Garden Test

Salad Greens

And everyone is working with the same simple equalizer- sunlight.  If you want to grow vegetables you need sunlight and lots of it and preferably you need sun morning – noon and afternoon.

The amount of sunlight you get is the number one factor you need to take into consideration if you want to grow vegetables in containers and it’s probably the only consideration that you won’t be able to find a work-around for.

I’d say as a rule of thumb your bare minimum to grow vegetables is 5 hours of direct light and I mean direct afternoon sun.  A spot that only gets morning sun simply will not cut it- sorry.  So think of sun from lunch to 5 and remember that’s the minimum.  You’ll get growth and a few things will grow reasonably well- but most of your plants will never hit their maximum potential unless they get the light all day.

This is especially true of tomatoes. They are -without a doubt -the numero uno vegetable choice, which you have to admit is a little ironic since technically, tomatoes are not a vegetable- they’re a fruit. sorry I couldn’t resist.

I shouldn’t have put the aggregated clay at the bottom of the bags, not sure why my brain was dead that day but until the roots reach into it, the clay doesn’t allow the moisture to work it’s way higher up into the bag.  And the roots aren’t likely to reach the bottom when the top and the middle – where they’re living now doesn’t get the nutrient.  I made the same mistake with the pipe gardens, but I used very little aggregate so some of the coir still made contact with the moisture.  This is not to say that any of the plants are doing anything less than thriving- they’re growing like gangbusters!

Even though the hydroponic test plants were 1-2 weeks behind the plants I potted into traditional containers with compost and soil,  they have pretty much surpassed them in size and have started to flower sooner.

The pipe gardens so far are total winners ( a.k.a. nothing has gone wrong yet) I’ve had 3 salads so far from the container greens- very satisfying and once the cukes take off I’d better dig up the pickle recipe again.

I now just need to refine the pipe gardens and figure out the most economical way to produce them- and I need a stand for balconies and patios that don’t have a place to affix them vertically and for people who don’t have the time, tools or the desire or skills to do that kind of job.

This was a lot more work than I expected it to be, but things always are – however  I’m very excited to say that I have the pipe gardens up and working and the tub garden is just waiting for my tomatoes to arrive.

I have  some pictures of the current state of affairs in my crowded little backyard and only wish that I had the energy to haul some of the ugly stuff out of the background before I took the shots.

The pipe gardens might need a little more waterproofing. I’m not sure yet because it won’t stop raining long enough to tell if the outside is wet from rain, dew or leakage – I’m hoping for the first two.

Hydroponic beans in the pipe garden

On top of everything else – it’s been so bloody cold here that on the evening of May 30 ( if you can believe it) I almost lost my hot peppers from the cold – one of two degrees colder and it would have been a frosty death.

The Hydroponic Pipe gardens

I have set beans, and peas on the top shelf so that they can climb up the deck posts.  On the second level I have my cut and come again baby salad greens.  and on the bottom shelf is basil, Thai basil and some small Thai peppers – The valves seem to be working just find and so I’m ready now to start tracking the growth and comparing it to the plants I’ve set up on the deck that are planted in compost.

One job not connected with my project will be cutting a new bed that will serve as the “fattening up” ground for about 70 tree seedlings – a mixture of Amur Maples, Larches, a handful of Spirea and soon some Crabapples. Why?  Well – did I tell you I also have a site that sells bonsai trees?  I market in both Canada and the US using local growers and in Canada it is very hard to find a good supply of outdoor trees – so I’ve decided to start up my own.  This project will take a little while to bear fruit so check back with me in ten years and I’ll let you know how it’s coming.  In case you’re interested this is my bonsai site – Zen Garden Bonsai.

Naturally I won’t be doing the digging myself – my chiropractor has already put his kids through college so he doesn’t need my help and I frankly have spent too much of this spring on my back with ice packs.  So my best friend is bringing in her son and a friend of his and I will attempt to roust mine away from his computer (paying for the work helps) and all these young strong backs will first cut a home for the baby bonsai.  Then they’re  going to dig in one of the big containers that will serve as the base for my hydroponic tomatoes,  cukes and squash.  The peppers will go in another spot.  They they’ll cut the sod and lay down some crushed limestone and patio paving stones so that the lucky man in my life has clear access to build the upright supports for the “pipe gardens”.

While all this is going on I expect to be doing my Martha Stewart impersonation ( not usually a very good one) and painting a few terracotta pots to look like copper with a green patina.  If it doesn’t work out, maybe I’ll just supervise.  I do that quite well.

Here are my vegetable seedlings – don’t they look terrific?

My Seedlings are all still alive!

And in case you’re wondering, yes they do so need the labels – mostly so I can tell the peppers apart.  I’m not really that picky!

I also couldn’t choose all that many, because like the people I’m doing this for I’m pressed for time and space. Finally I wanted to work with plants that would let me test some different container styles – particularly for the soil less containers where I want to be able to check out larger single plant pots, smaller individual plants set into a pipe garden configuration and also I wanted to check out a “broadcast” planter box.  I want to check into cut and come again salad greens so I wanted the most surface area I could acommodate in the space.

Here’s the list so far- Cherry tomatoes, beans, acorn squash, picking cucumbers, lettuce varieties (loose leaf) and hot peppers.  If the hot peppers seem like a strange addition – all I can say is that they can be dried and held for a long time, I like the taste of hot peppers and I happen to really like the look of them too.

Although I’m kinda late getting off the ground, if I can I’ll try and also get some snow peas added into the mix and that will probably be it.

The seeds are sprouting – I dont’ have any pots and I haven’t built the hydroponic planters yet … got to get this in gear!

Today, I took the first step in setting up my project for the summer and I’m very excited about it. You see, I’ve loved gardening all my life and lately I’ve been really interested in things like small space, urban and container gardens, vegetable gardens, the whole idea of eating as much locally grown food as possible and what are the best ways to make that happen. I put myself in the shoes of someone working outside the home, maybe travelling a lot and maybe living in a condo or simply having only a tiny amount of ground or just a deck to work with.

So, here are the questions my summer project is going to solve:

1. Can I make it easy enough for busy, inexperienced gardeners to successfully grow vegetables in containers on decks, patios and postage stamp yards?

2. What vegetables will give them the best bang for the buck – so to speak?

3. Can they maximize the yield and minimize the work at the same time?

4. How does hydroponics play a role?

5. How can I make it affordable?

I am intrigued at the role that outdoor hydroponic systems can play to solve this problem and when I first started looking into it couldn’t understand why they aren’t used more widely. Now I understand all too well – the currently available systems are too expensive for broad adoption – unless of course your aiming for a far more lucrative cash crop than tomatoes and as far as hydroponics goes right now it’s WAY TOO COMPLICATED.

I want to fix that and that, is the project. I have some tomato seedlings on the way (I hadn’t really thought of my grand plan when I first ordered them) and today I started acorn squash, two types of hot peppers and pickling cucumbers. I have half the seeds started in jiffy pots and the other half in rockwool. I’m going to grow them side by side and compare the results.