My plants after 10 days

I had hoped that my plants would start growing so well that i’ll upload the photos again today. But unfortunately most of my seeri kheri had died and my radish plants have bent so much that they are touching the mud and my palak also has not grown well. May be it happened because i kept my pots inside the house. I wanted to protect my plants from pegions.

So i am a bit disappointed. I again sowed seeds of seerikherai and this time i kept my pots in sun. Let me see how it comes up.

I also sowed seeds of mirchi and tomato on 19th march. Plants just started to show up.

4 days after sowing

I sowed the seed on 13th and already small small plants have come.

Radish

I actually planted only 12 seeds. Rest plants would have come from the seeds present in the home made compost.

Palak:

Seri keerai:

 

 

sowed seeds

Today i sowed seed of amaranths, palak and radish. Amaranths and palak take approximately one month and radish crop takes close to one and half month to grow fully. This sunday i am planning to sow seeds of brinjal (egg plant), tomatoes, chillies and beans too in protrays, so that by the time by saplings are of reasonable size, my keerai and radish crop would be ready to be removed and i can grow the above vegetables in the same bags.

Companion planting

Companion planting: It means plants being friendly with each other(Nutrient uptake) and helping each other through its rough patches(Pests trouble).They also help each other in pollination and crop productivity.

1. The smell of the foliage of marigolds is claimed to deter aphids from feeding on neighbouring crops.

2. Basil with tomatoes to improve growth and flavor. Basil also does well with peppers, oregano, asparagus and petunias.It is said to repel flies and mosquitoes.

3. Mint : Deters white cabbage moths, ants, rodents, flea beetles, fleas, aphids and improves the health of cabbage and tomatoes.

4. Okra: Plant lettuce around your okra plants and they will shade the lettuce in the summer giving you some more growing time. Okra also does well with peppers and eggplants as it helps protect these brittle stemmed plants from high winds. It also gets along with basil, cucumbers, melons, and black eyed peas. For planting with the peas,plant your Okra first. When the okra is up and established plant the peas around the edges of the okra planting. You may find that the peas are far less bothered by aphids when near okra.

5. Radish: Companions for radishes are: radish, beet, bush beans, pole beans, carrots, chervil, cucumber, lettuce, melons, nasturtium, parsnip, peas, spinach and members of the squash family.

6. Spinach: Plant with peas and beans as they provide natural shade for the spinach. Gets along with cabbage, cauliflower, celery, eggplant, onion and peas.

 

Gardening tips for roof top vegetable garden.

1. Always start with fast yeilding plants like amaranthus, coriander, radish, spinach, mint etc.

2. Apply a coat of epoxy to water proof your terrace or else put down some sort of polythene sheet or at least old cement bags and keep the pots on top of them.

3.Prepare your own manure. Collect all your kitchen waste as well as the waste that develops from the plants once they have completed their growth cycle and place them in a compost pit.

4. Use vermicompost, vermiwash and bone meal about once ot twice a month

5. For pest spray a concoction of garlic ,ginger and chilli paste, sometimes a diluted neem spray.

6. Use cocopeat as a growing medium since it reduces the load on the terrace and holds water for much longer. Enrich coco-peat by adding vermicompost.

7. Soil should be moist and not wet. While watering sprinkle water away from the main stem, under the canopy. Too much water creates anaerobic conditions in the soil, kills microbes and causes disease and pests.

8.Prune regularly to encourage bushy growth.  As a thumb rule cut off the branches growing towards the ground. Cut off the smaller dead stems/branches jutting out from main stem. Try to prune and maintain an umbrella shape of  the plant.

9. Always keep the soil mulched eg with dried twigs, leaves, sugarcane bagasse, shredded paper, wasted jute bags .Mulching keeps the microbes happy, prevents evaporation of water and adds carbon to your soil.

 

Our terrace garden

My dad has been working a lot on our terrace garden. And we have quite a lot of plants and pots already. Now i have got 20 more bags along with the kit and i am scared to put them on the terrace. Since i live in a flat and the terrace is actually for all the residents, may be someday someone will object to too many pots on the terrace. I am adding a few pics of my already existing plants. I slowly intend to replace everything with vegetables… but lets see!

We have got close to 6 or 7 brinjal plants on our terrace. But yeild is only 1 brinjal per week.

This is a mirchi plant. So far we plucked some 10 mirchis. This gives a purple colored mirchi.

My dad’s crazy about cactus. Though i personally dont appreciate them much.

Apart from the above we have a few pots of olender, ixora, roses, hybiscus, crysanthemums and 5 pots of adenium( my dad’s fav).

My vegetable garden

A few months back, on random browsing i came across a blog” riperedtomatoes” and suddenly i felt may be i should also start my own vegetable garden. Like there is a saying when u want something badly, the whole universe conspires and see that u get it. may be it is true , because after that i have come across a number of interesting sites on gardening and also by chance i came to know that jayalalitha has started a scheme for terrace gardening called “do it yourself kit”. I applied for it. And then i never got any response from them. So i soon forgot about it.

But suddenly, one fine day, i got an sms that my kit is ready and i can pick it up. So again i got interested and now i am gonna start my own vegetable garden.

Day1: 08-03-2014

i started as per the instructions. i made my soil ready in the polythene bags. now i have to wait for 1 week.  I made my soil by mixing cocopeat with vermi compost,  fugicides and pesticides given along with the kit.

pic of my bags