You Don’t Need Natural Light or a Yard to Grow

“I don’t have a yard.”
“I don’t have room to grow.”
“I don’t have natural light in my home.”
“I don’t know when to water.”
“I kill plants!”

I hear these things all the time, including in the comments here on Brooklyn Farm Girl, but I heard them especially often at NYC’s Garden Party which was packed with city dwellers wanting to green their lives.  After they said these things I usually asked:
“Do you have a roof?”.  
“Do you have a fire escape?”
“Do you have a balcony?”
“Do you have any windows?”

It’s rare that all the answers are no, but if they are then I always introduce them to hydroponic growing or just flat out telling them they can grow with artificial lighting.  We have a garden on the roof but we also have a dark corner in our loft that has no natural light.  And in that corner we grow lettuce, cherry tomatoes, jalapeno peppers, basil, parsley and more!  So what I’m saying is there are no excuses for not being able to grow.   You just need to try!

I want to introduce you guys to Aero Garden, because even though this is going to sound like a sales pitch, it isn’t, I really do think it’s amazing.  I think it’s great for gardeners of all levels, but especially helpful for beginning gardeners because it’s going to tell you EXACTLY what to do.  It tells you when to water.  It tells you when to add nutrients.  It tells you when to replace your lights.  It tells you how long your plants have been growing for.  It tells you everything. It will literally say on the screen “THIS NEEDS WATER”.  You will add water into a hole and then the “THIS NEEDS WATER” screen will disappear.  It’s that helpful. It’s easy!

I have worked with Aero Garden alongside Miracle-Gro in the past to make some helpful videos to show you how easy it is to set up the garden and then actually grow.  If you guys know me then you know I’m pretty weak so if I can snap all these parts and bulbs into place in a few minutes then trust me, you can do it too.   Even though I have worked with them, I would never advertise to you guys a product that sucks.  After using the Aero Garden for close to a year (lots of testing!) I just had to give it a shout out here so there can be no more excuses for not having light, space or habits of killing plants.  This completely takes care of all these things for you.

The Aero Garden is about $100. I’ve seen them sold at Home Depot if you want to check it out.  I know $100 is not cheap so I consider this a con.  But because the only thing you will have to replace is the bulbs (ours lasted 8 months) it’s going to be reused for years.    You will also need to buy the  Aero Garden seed starter kits that already have the seeds in place so you literally just snap these in (easy).  For more advanced gardeners you can grow everything from seed in the Aero Garden so I just start them outside the machine then replace and snap them into place (MUCH cheaper).  The seed kits they sell are pizza herbs, traditional medicinal herbs, lettuce, strawberry, tomatoes, peppers, every herb you can think of and flowers.  I haven’t tried the strawberries yet but since it’s a new product I think I’m going to give it a shot next in ours.   They also sell a salsa kit which includes cherry tomatoes and jalapenos but I don’t honestly think you’re going to grow enough tomatoes to make a big bowl of salsa.  I mostly used these cherry tomatoes for salads and tacos as I was able to just grab a few and go.  

The coolest part of growing indoors while not worrying about the light is that you can grow 12 months a year. The seasons don’t matter.  During the Winter while the garden was in sleep time we were still able to grab fresh lettuce to eat taco salads with.  

I think the basil grows fantastic in the Aero Garden, possibly even just as good as in a real garden.  We had multiple basil plants that just grew into true plant monsters.  They actually grew so tall that I couldn’t extend the Aero Garden arm to go any higher (it adjusts with plant height). It seems like everytime I would prune the basil plants I’d come back a few days later and they would need more pruning, they just grow and grow and grow.    I think the basil plants really get the best out of your buck as well just because the pure amount of basil you’re going to get.  We’re talking cups of basil at one time. I easily made giant batches of pesto with the basil from these while the plants were still stacked with more basil to pick.  In fact I think I can even say at times I had too much basil which had me cutting some off to dry it for dried basil just so the plants come keep growing.  You’re going to basil crazy people!

Here’s one afternoon of basil I picked!

And more basil..

Here’s the basil plants before I cut them down.  The funny thing is they grew these tall even with only having 2 lights on instead of the usual 3 for multiple weeks (I was cheap and didn’t want to buy bulbs)! I’m about to replant some new basil and replace the bulbs so we’ll be set for the next batch.

And lettuce grows excellent in it. It’s pretty great to be able to just walk a few feet in your home, grab some lettuce and then go get your grub on.

And this is just herb city.  They grow really well so it can become a great smelling jungle pretty quick.

Lastly, a bunch of cherry tomatoes growing! 

And like I mentioned earlier, I made some videos with Aero Garden last summer so I wanted to post them here as well.  If a goof like me can put these gardens together then you definitely can too.

Then there’s one more video of how to make some delicious salsa. Watch the video until the end where you can see me take a bite, realize it’s extremely hot (I got a jalepeno seed!) then then try to act professional while my mouth is on fire. It worked.. kinda! 😉

 Have you guys seen the Aero Garden yet in stores?  Does anyone have one?    Tell me in the comments!