2022-08-14
I had given up on growing anything in the iDOO 2-in-1 Hydroponics & Soil Growing System, 6 Pods Hydro Indoor Herb Garden Up to 13.8", Plants Germination Kit with LED Grow Lights, Automatic Timer for Kitchen, Countertop, Home White. Given that name, you could see why. The problem was that Sheba (short for "She-Bucket") lacked an easy means of monitoring water level and I had successfully murdered a crop of lettuce already.
If you follow the link to Amazon, the photos of the bucket show how it can be configured for soil, with a reservoir in the bottom, or for hydroponics, with the bottom for storage. Every plant I grow in soil dies prematurely. I am strictly a hydroponic farmer.
And it isn't as though I couldn't readily use the space for any of the other models of hydroponic garden. Four more Click and Grow Smart Garden-3s, or another AeroGarden Harvest (this time, a tall one) with a reservoir, or another iDOO 12-pod unit. Not black, not white, Minty green. Teresa (an AeroGarden Harvest) and Annie (an AeroGarden Aerovoir) had occupied the shelf briefly before moving down one shelf under Sheba.
I rescued Sheba from the Goodwill Box because I found a lampshade. It's as simple as that. Sheba needed some form of light abatement to keep her lights from blinding me. The lampshade does that while transforming Sheba into a table lamp... with benefits.
I have (slowly) learned not to overwhelm my gardens. Harvey, with six pod bays, hosts only two Red Fire Pepper pods, because they need room and spread to block light to anything else. Phredd has eleven green onion plants and a single lettuce. Green Onions take very little space. Ethel supports two purple chilis, a parsley and a basil. Purple super hots want all the space.
If pepper plants like to get tall and spread out, they can't hold a candle to tomato plants. My lone healthy tomato plant is the Golden Harvest residing in Sheba. Sheba's grow lights are now at their full 13.8" extension and the Golden Harvest is heavy with tomatoes ripening "on the vine." And now for the photos.
While not a close-up, this photo is close enough to make some of the tomatoes easy to see. It also shows a fair amount of the "Pipes & Connectors" being used to support the plant.
This was the same view closer in. I've counted over twenty l'il green tomatoes. When ripe, they are supposed to turn "golden." I'll settle for some shade of yellow.
This view is supposed to display the Table Lamp with Benefits nature of Sheba. The lampshade is actually suspended from a plant hanger mounted to the window frame, conveniently left over from when I was slowly killing soil rooted plants. Sheba is carefully positioned so the shade looks like it is supported, but the only contact is spreading branches.
2022-08-22
