Updates on my Garden

After a long hiatus, I am back with updates on my Garden.
Was able to manage a descent harvest, much to the envy of my relatives, who joked on the concept of Terrace Gardening.
So far, devoured White long radish, Cauliflower, lots cherry tomatoes & birds eye chilly.
Pictures taken today:

Have planted 2 plants of Green bell pepper, 1 Yellow bell pepper, Broccoli, another variety of chilly. 

December has been a fruit full month, Strawberry has finally flowered.

A major disappointment in the last few months was a band of monkeys frequenting the terrace. A beautiful cauliflower was eaten. I didn't remove the plant but just let it grow and surprisingly many more saplings grew over and around the plant. Harvested them twice already. 

Pests in my Garden :(

My garden is under attack!!!

Aphids on Chili Plant

I had not taken a notice this, and resulted in severe Aphid infestation. Luckily, Neem Magic (picked up from VMSRF, BTM Layout, Bangalore) came to my rescue.
There are many cures for Aphid removal:
1. Spray with soap/detergent water
2. Use combination of Garlic, Chili, Ginger paste and sprinkle
3. Place an aluminium foil underneath the plant, Aphids don't like the Sun much
4. Neem solution/magic, easily available in the market. Spray everyday till you don't see the Aphids
5. Banana peel. place one near the stem. I haven't tried this, but read it works

Mosaic Virus on Tomato Plant

I had received this plant as a gift from VMSRF. Was very happy the way it was growing. Looks like I have to get rid of the plant now. :(
It is affected by the Mosaic Virus. There is no cure for this.
And the only solution is to uproot the plant and burn it. The virus seems to survive for 50years even after the plant is dead.
For now, I have cut the branches of the plant. Hoping that it'll survive, but the chances are less.
If it doesn't then, burn the plant and sterile the soil by drying it under the Sun.

Leaf Miner on Tomato Plant

My Tomato plant has become a permanent home for all different pests/viruses.
Leaf Miner is the larvae of insects, which survives in-between a leaf, eats the leaf tissues :(
There is no insecticide, neither chemical nor organic, available for this.
However, people say the following methods work:
1. Sticky yellow strips. They attract the insects to leave the larvae on the yellow strip.
2. Trap crops. Plant Marigold among your pots/plants.
3. Sprinkle Neem solution should contain the infestation.
4. Cut the infected leaves. 

Growing Coriander & Fenugreek (Methi) in container

There are few seeds which are readily available in any Indian household.
Coriander & Methi fall in that category.

Coriander seed is a dicot. It has to be split into two before sowing for early results. Sowing it as a whole just slows the process and makes no difference in quality. The seeds look like this:

Forgot to take a close up pick. Maybe you'll find a close up picture in my earlier posts or try Google images.

For splitting the seeds, you could cover the seeds in a cloth, put them in a bag and rub the seeds with a slipper. Don't apply too much pressure, you might damage the seeds.




Fenugreek (Methi) is a monocot. And the seeds like:

Following my past experience with containers, I picked up a tub which is 6" deep and filled it with a mix of cocopeat and compost. I have used 30% of compost and rest of it is cocopeat.

Draw lines with index finger or with a stick to make markings where you want to sow the seeds. I decided to go with 3 lines of Coriander & 3 lines of Methi.

And this how it looks after sowing the seeds.







I sprinkled a thin layer of cocopeat on top of the sown seeds. Now waiting to see the results.

Note: Fenugreek (Methi) needs less of Nitrogen and enriches the soil with Nitrogen.

Updates:
Was amazed to see the seeds sprout in 3 days. Really happy with the progress :)
Presenting pics over last one week and the one in the middle was taken today

Today's pic: 18/08

26/08:

Growing tomatoes in Containers

I picked most of my seeds from Lalbagh. Got tomatoes too.

Paid Rs.30 for the packet. Its one of the hybrid variety of tomato.
Read from the web, that its been derived from Marvel & Globe varieties of tomatoes. And is father to many other recent hybrid varieties.








I tried to germinate the seeds using the tissue paper. It was disaster.
Decided to directly seed them into a plastic bag:

The seeds germinated in 5 days. This photo was taken when it was 15days old. Had put in 4 seeds and all of them sprouted. Transplanted 3 saplings to seeding tray. Will have to find some new containers and transplant them.

The status of the tomato plant today (04/Aug/2012) is :

I was gifted a 20-day old tomato sapling at the VMSRF workshop, don't know about the variety. 

It looks like this now, its 27-days old now:

I have planted few spinach saplings. Supposed to grow well with tomato, but I have to ensure I keep providing them enough nutrients.

Status of tomato I planted on 18/Aug

26/08:

 Pic on the left is the one I planted and the one on right is the one I received from VMSRF

Sowing Dil in Containers

Picked up Dil in a promotion event for Organic farming. Paid Rs.10 for them:

The person at the stall said its Organic. But was worth the money spent.









Please sow Dil in a pot which is at least 9"or 12"deep. I tried with 4"containers and sprinkled the seeds on the container.

Dil is ready for harvest almost in a months time. But in my case, even after a month, there were no signs of the plant growing. They tend to grow up to a height of 12". This was the status of my plants after a month:

The leaves started to split but didn't gain height. I decided to investigate the cause and found this:

The entire container was consumed with roots and there was no space for them to spread. Hence, I recommend using a deep container, if you are not sowing them in the ground.
Instead of sprinkling the seeds. Draw lines on the ground/container with your index finger or a stick. Sow the seeds in those lines. Leave space of 3" between the rows.
To save my plants, I moved them to a deeper container:

Will wait for another week and then harvest the leaves.

Please note: Plants need space and room to grow else you'll have dwarf varieties. 

Choice of Containers

You learn from the choices you make. I learnt mine today.

Had planted Dil seeds in a 4"container and this is what I found today:

The entire container was full of roots and no space for the leaves to grow. Dil leaves can be harvested in a months time. I had sowed quite a lot earlier and didn't see much of growth and hence decided to investigate and found this.

Make sure you choose the right container. My rough estimate is a 6"deep container should be good to grow leafy vegetables like Cilantro, Spinach etc... whereas I recommend a 9"to 12"container for Dil.

I have picked up a 6" tub for growing Cilantro & Spinach.

For rest of the plants, tomatos, chilly, cauliflower, cabbage etc... a 12"container should be ideal. You could use the 20lts plastic buckets too.

For growing roots like potatoes, carrots, radish etc... you need containers at least two feet deep for a better harvest.

Having said the above, you are free to experiment with any container of your choice. 

You learn only after trying it :)

Growing spinach in Containers

Spinach is the easiest of all the leafy vegetables. It will be ready to harvest in a month. It recommended vegetable any first time gardener. Zero maintenance vegetable.

Picked up the seeds from Lalbagh Botanical Garden. Paid Rs. 30 for the below packet.

Google for the pic of seeds, plenty available. I had read of germinating seeds on tissue paper.

Thought of doing the same for spinach. Bad Idea. The seeds should be sown directly into the soil and not transplanted. 

I had put in five seeds, all of them germinated. Transplanted them into the bottle of coke. But only one survived :(. This seeds were placed in the tissue paper on 1st July. They took 5 days to germinate. This pic was taken on 8th July.

The plant in the middle, is the only one standing from the germinated seeds. I sowed couple of more seeds next to it. The below pic was taken on 12th July. 

 And this is the one taken today, 29th Jul.

 The spinach should be ready to harvest in a week.

Spinach in the bottle wasn't enough for one meal. But it made its way into the Salad :)
I picked a tub this time to grow my Spinach:

 Medium used is Coco Peat and compost. 70% of peat & 30 %.
Made 35 holes with a stick and sowed the seeds on 11/Aug.

The pic below was taken today morning (18/Aug)

26/08:

New pots, bag and plants :)

I was given 5 saplings at VMSRF, and luckily for my mother's friend was discarding clay pots.
Grabbed the opportunity and this is how they look now:

Have applied panchgavya today. Eager to see the results.

Put in lot of efforts to dig through the coco peat. The brick was 1 feet long and I soaked it in a cement bag.

Got enough to fill the below plastic bags and this is how they look now.

The first two contain carrots and last one has brinjal seeds. The seeds usually take upto 5 days to germinate.

Eagerly waiting for the next weekend to see the results of my new experiment.  

Using coco peat for gardening

Lesson Learnt!!!

I have been reading about this method for quite sometime. There are many alternates to soil.

Water, Coco peat, Peat moss etc... Cultivation on water (Hydroponics) is clean. There is no wastage of resource and it can always be re-utilized. This doesn't work for me as I don't have enough space and not keen on spending money on this setup.

Coco peat & Peat moss can be used in pots. Coco peat works good for me. Light in weight and perfect for keeping on the terrace/balconies. 

I picked up two bricks of Coco peat from Garden Guru Store last week. This is how it looks:

You have to add water and the brick expands, giving you the medium for sowing. I a feet long.

The lesson I learnt was never to buy a brick unless you have a big bucket or a drum. I found it hard to cut into half and didn't have a big bucket/drum, so dropped it into a gunny bag and I am literally digging to get the coco peat. The material is loosely available. Recommend to use it.

About 500gms of coco peat brick would need 3lts for water. You do the math, if you buy a brick. Don't have to source water if bought loosely.

Most Important, coco peat doesn't have any nutrient value in it. You have to add nutrients. You have bags (similar to tea bags) available, that you place in the pot and every time you water the planet, the nutrients flows into the pots.

I am using Panchagavya(PG). An organic Indian mix, prepared from products derived from the Cow.

Check the wikipage for more details. However, it looks like this:

Usage: put 5% of PG in a liter of water and apply to the base of the plants. Many people are using it and the results are amazing. 

An update on my Garden

Coriander has started flowering :) waiting for the seeds now

 Spinach looks good too. Have another set of Spinach growing along.

 Dil too looks beautiful. The germinating of Dil seed was amazing.

 Proud to have this Mint. Story goes, bought at the store, cleaned, sorted and left is the refrigerator for more than a week. I realized mint doesn't need a seed to grow but only a stem. Picked up 4 from the refrigerator, only one survived. So, this one holds a special place.

Just back from Terrace Gardening Workshop

Attended workshop held at Vittal Mallya Scientific Research Foundation. Met Dr. Viswanath, a pioneer in the field of Organic gardening in Bangalore. Started promoting Organic Gardening since 1995 and has been successful in enlightening more and more people in this field.
There were 30 people who attended the course. Few pics from the VMSRF terrace

Choice of containers is up to you. Your imagination is the only limitation. Cauliflower, Tomato grown in 12" clay pots. Capsicum & a new variety of Chilly in paint containers.

 Dr. Hegde explaining seeds varieties, soil mixing, seeding, tools, pest control/management

At the end of the day we were gifted with a copy of Dr. Viswanath's popular book "A handbook of Organic Terrace Gardening"and the below five saplings. Two chilly, two cauliflower and a tomato. I picked up a Strawberry sapling :)

Will be planting the saplings tomorrow morning. will update tomorrow on how it goes and also on the technology I picked up at VMSRF.