Posts Tagged ‘seedlings’

While Washington may get a cold streak this weekend, the balcony garden enjoyed a relatively mild and sunny weekend and beginning to the week.  The strawberries, zucchini, and peas have all taken root and are getting stronger and stronger by the day!  How are your seedlings doing?

Spring has sprung in Washington DC, and even though it doesn’t officially arrive until tomorrow, that hasn’t stopped the seedlings in my balcony garden from taking root.  What do we have to look forward to this year? Romanesco Squash Garlic Chives (left) and Garlic Chives (right) Early Glow Strawberries

It’s been almost a year of blogging, and over 200 posts! (March 10, 2010 is the actualy “birthday” of Grown in the City). In that time, there have been a lot of interesting posts covering balcony gardening. Since it’s almost time to start thinking about this season’s planting, here’s a few of my favorite articles. It’s never too early to start saving your yogurt containers or building those self-watering planters! Anatomy of a Yogurt Container Self Watering Planter DIY: Building Self-Watering Grow Boxes (18 Gallon Tub Edition) Step by Step: A Simple Guide to Starting Seeds Step by Step: Making a Self-Watering Planter from Yogurt Cups Gardening with Kids – Lifetime Engagement Tips for Growing Zucchini on a Balcony – Be sure to Pollinate! Growing Your Own Sprouts: Indoors Advice for a “below-novice gardener” The Most Indestructible Trellis Ever, 2.0 And remember, if you’re looking for seeds, some books on

A few days ago, I asked if anyone had a solution to keep plants safe from the wind up here on a 6th floor balcony. Lilly, over at The Bird and the Bee, has a cheap solution that reuses old blue jeans in a creative new way to keep plants safe and warm.

Yesterday, I posed about the wind storm that blew through DC. Here’s a video I took at a friend’s house in Adam’s Morgan: I tried to put up some cardboard windbreakers, and it seems as though the plants made it through relatively unscathed.  The biggest problem was broken leaves and stems on the zuchinni, tomatoes, and peppers.  Also, the heatwave lettuce that just sprouted got pretty decimated.  It could have been much worse, but I am still disappointed with the setback.

Last year, my friend Shannen was raving about the Topsy Turvy, an “As-Seen-On-TV” product that grows tomatoes upside down – the idea being that you don’t need to stake the branches, and the roots grow upwards toward the water.  For those of you who know me, you know I can’t resist a good As-Seen-On-TV product (I have a coffee table book and I spend hours in the store at Pier Point when we’re on vacation in Florida).  So, when I saw this on sale while shopping yesterday, I thought I’d give it a try. Anyone have any experience with these things?  It will be interesting to see which grows the better tomatoes – this or my self-watering planters!

With wind gusts up to 45 mph yesterday, I had to think quickly to prevent damage to my garden.  When I looked out the window in the morning, the tomatoes, peppers, and eggplant were bending and swaying violently in the wind.  At first I tried a tarp over all of the planters to break the wind, but the tarp ended up blowing off itself.  Then, I decided to break up a cardboard box and place it between the young plants in order to deflect some of the wind.  It seems to have worked. Does anyone have any better methods for breaking up the wind on a 6th floor balcony?