Life with Aerogardens

Yvonne Smith

Yvonne Smith

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Staff member
This thread will probably end up being moved once there is an area for gardening, but for now, those of us who have an aerogarden, or some similar type of hydroponic system for indoor growing, can share our stories here.

I have been in the process of straightening out the storage room where the aerogardens were at, and decided to add another shelf here in the front room and bring those aerogarden containers out here. I have an old Aerogarden Bounty (my first one, a gift from my daughter) 2 old AG Sprouts, one of which has lost the lights, and it costs more than a new one to replace the grow light , and an AG Harvest.
After the grow light on the little Sprout quit, I ended up getting two of the fake aerogardens. I have all of these set up on shelves in front of the two front room windows , and I have 2 of those little grow lights that clamp on for extra lighting for the Sprout.

I am still having trouble getting some seeds to sprout, but some are doing fine.
I started some Shiso (Perilla) seeds last month, and they grew so big that I went outside and found a planter pot and moved the Shiso into that. They are dark green and purple, and really pretty.
I also have some lentil microgreens growing under one of the grow lights. Hopefully they will all have plants coming up soon.

I have the DAY ONE online journal that I also use for sharing stories with my family, but one section is for gardening and plants, so I write in that what I planted, where, and when, and sometimes add pictures. This helps me to know whether something should be replanted or not, if nothing sprouts.

This is the Shiso, which is kind of a Japanese basil.

IMG_1188.jpeg
 
I have some of the perennial tree collards sprouted, and they seem to be growing okay. I will be able to keep them in the aerogarden for a while, but once they start really growing, I will take them out and transplant them into a container until spring, when I can put them outside. Once they are growing in the ground, they are supposed to come back each year, plus you can take cuttings and root those to grow more tree collards plants.
The people have a whole website (and facebook page) called “Project Tree Collards”, where they explain all bout growing them, taking care of tree collards, and the different varieties that exist.
 
As with most things, my enthusiasm for Aerogardening has waned. Most of the gardens are empty and dark, plus I have given several of them to kids/grandkids. Right now I have a couple of cherry tomato plants, 2 banana pepper plants, and some green onions growing. I moved a rosemary plant outside to the tall wooden raised bed and it has gotten huge out there.

I need to plant some lettuce and bok choy at some point.
 
I had two fairly large banana pepper plants in a single garden. One of them was significantly larger than the other and had begun shading it out, so I moved the smaller one to its own garden this morning. I still haven't planted any lettuce or bok choy so I need to get "a round tuit."
 
The tree collards were getting pretty tall, so I took them out of the aerogarden. I tried moving one outside just to see how it would survive out there, but then (naturally) we got all of that really cold weather. However, my walking onions and the spinach mustard that I planted outside last summer are doing fine, freezing weather and all.
The tiny Tim tomatoes already have a couple of blossoms on them, and they are barely 6-7 inches tall !
 
Today, I started a few more tree collards, and one they are up and growing, it should be warm enough for them to go outside since they are pretty hardy plants.
I also started a few more tomatoes, and those will have to be inside longer, but they should be a good size by the time it warms up enough to move them outside this spring.
 
I have definitely lost my enthusiasm for Aerogardens. Currently I have romaine lettuce in one, a banana pepper in one, and 3 gardens of cherry tomatoes. I terminated the green onions and I'm considering ditching the rest to take a break.

I'm going to see if any of the kids want any more of my AG machines and if not I will take several to Goodwill. I'll probably keep 2 or 3 of them for countertop herbs.

It's weird not having any seeds started for an outdoor garden, but I'm not planting one this year.
 
I just thought I'd post this, though I realize there aren't a lot of Aerogarden enthusiasts on the forum. (Hi, Yvonne!! :D) I need some AG nutrients so I went to Amazon to order them. The 3 oz bottle of AG brand liquid fertilizer is now $12 a bottle!!! 😦💩 What the actual hell.

So I noticed an Aerogarden "Grow Anything Kit", supplies for 50 plantings that includes pods, sponges, pod labels, seedling domes and SIX 3 oz bottles of AG liquid fertilizer, all for $31!! The 6 bottles of nutes alone would be $72 if purchased separately.

So I ordered the Grow Anything kit on auto-delivery, which gives an additional 15% off and set it up for 6 month intervals. I don't need all those extra supplies but I can share them with my kids.

I also noticed some knock-off liquid fertilizer brands so I'm going to do some label ingredient comparisons and probably order a bottle to try. Aerogarden is pricing themselves out of the "hobby" market IMO.
 
Yvonne Smith said:
This thread will probably end up being moved once there is an area for gardening, but for now, those of us who have an aerogarden, or some similar type of hydroponic system for indoor growing, can share our stories here.

I have been in the process of straightening out the storage room where the aerogardens were at, and decided to add another shelf here in the front room and bring those aerogarden containers out here. I have an old Aerogarden Bounty (my first one, a gift from my daughter) 2 old AG Sprouts, one of which has lost the lights, and it costs more than a new one to replace the grow light , and an AG Harvest.
After the grow light on the little Sprout quit, I ended up getting two of the fake aerogardens. I have all of these set up on shelves in front of the two front room windows , and I have 2 of those little grow lights that clamp on for extra lighting for the Sprout.

I am still having trouble getting some seeds to sprout, but some are doing fine.
I started some Shiso (Perilla) seeds last month, and they grew so big that I went outside and found a planter pot and moved the Shiso into that. They are dark green and purple, and really pretty.
I also have some lentil microgreens growing under one of the grow lights. Hopefully they will all have plants coming up soon.

I have the DAY ONE online journal that I also use for sharing stories with my family, but one section is for gardening and plants, so I write in that what I planted, where, and when, and sometimes add pictures. This helps me to know whether something should be replanted or not, if nothing sprouts.

This is the Shiso, which is kind of a Japanese basil.

View attachment 17
Click to expand...
I'm checking them out on YT for now. Those are huge. :)
 
Beth Gallagher said:
I just thought I'd post this, though I realize there aren't a lot of Aerogarden enthusiasts on the forum. (Hi, Yvonne!! :D) I need some AG nutrients so I went to Amazon to order them. The 3 oz bottle of AG brand liquid fertilizer is now $12 a bottle!!! 😦💩 What the actual hell.

So I noticed an Aerogarden "Grow Anything Kit", supplies for 50 plantings that includes pods, sponges, pod labels, seedling domes and SIX 3 oz bottles of AG liquid fertilizer, all for $31!! The 6 bottles of nutes alone would be $72 if purchased separately.

So I ordered the Grow Anything kit on auto-delivery, which gives an additional 15% off and set it up for 6 month intervals. I don't need all those extra supplies but I can share them with my kids.

I also noticed some knock-off liquid fertilizer brands so I'm going to do some label ingredient comparisons and probably order a bottle to try. Aerogarden is pricing themselves out of the "hobby" market IMO.
Click to expand...
You can actually use any hydroponic fertilizer you want @Beth Gallagher. We only have one Aerogarden and, like you, my wife seems to have lost her enthusiasm for planting it. When I plant the large flats of seedlings, I use a hydroponic fertilizer that comes in three gallon jugs. I can then adjust what nutrients I am using and the concentrations. The three gallon jugs cost $100 here, but they are probably cheaper where you are due to the difference in shipping. You can also get the liquid in smaller (or larger) bottles/jugs.
 
Marie Mallory said:
I'm checking them out on YT for now. Those are huge. :)
Click to expand...
The Shiso , @Marie Mallory ?
They are huge, and they are sometimes used to make a wrap for a sandwich or a sushi type of roll, from what I read. The little leaves are great in salads, and the larger ones, i chop up and add to soups and stews for the flavor.
They have a wonderful fragrance, somewhere between licorice and mint, if that makes any sense. They self seed, so once you have some, they will re-seed and come back each year, and grow over 3 feet tall, with beautiful green and purple leaves, and tiny flowers that the bees love later in the summer.

We went to the dollar store and I got some mammoth basil and Chinese giant sweet pepper seeds to start in the aerogarden. Since I moved the herbs out, I will now start some of these new seeds in that aerogarden, and keep them here until it is warm enough to transplant outside into planters.
My replacement dwarf tomatoes arrived today, and the catnip seeds should be here soon.
 
All of the aerogardens are planted now. I have tomato sprouts and kale sprouts growing, and think I am just going to start some of the catnip outside in a planter for now and see if it sprouts. We had catnip back when i was a kid, a whole clump of it just growing wild out back and we never did anything with it. It came back each year. That was even in the north Idaho cold winters, so it should propagate just fine here once I get some started. I will start it in a planter and then move the starts somewhere in the yards that the cats spend time.
 
Yvonne Smith said:
All of the aerogardens are planted now. I have tomato sprouts and kale sprouts growing, and think I am just going to start some of the catnip outside in a planter for now and see if it sprouts. We had catnip back when i was a kid, a whole clump of it just growing wild out back and we never did anything with it. It came back each year. That was even in the north Idaho cold winters, so it should propagate just fine here once I get some started. I will start it in a planter and then move the starts somewhere in the yards that the cats spend time.
Click to expand...
You may want to keep your cat nip contained a bit. Give it a radical once it starts blooming.
 
Currently I have only 3 Aerogardens in operation, and all of them are cherry tomatoes. I'm contemplating disassembling all the setup in my dining room and getting rid of all the AGs in there except for a couple. Somehow I have lost my enthusiasm for the hobby though I really did enjoy it for a few years. Honestly, I just got a bit too "enthusiastic" and it turned into a fulltime job. Now most of the stuff has turned into dust catchers.

I'm going to see if any of my kids want any more of the stuff, including a couple of shelf units, carts, and plastic boxes of assorted supplies and seeds. What they don't want will be donated to a local resale shop or Goodwill.
 
After all the news reports about the latest lettuce-related virus outbreak I decided to load up an Aerogarden with lettuce pods and grow my own for a month or two. So I guess it's a good thing that I haven't moved all the AGs to the garage storage yet. I started 9 pods which is far too many, but the pods are a few years old so I'm not sure how successful germination will be. If they surprise me and all sprout, I'll move some to another AG or two to spread them out.

Maybe this will spur me to start a few more gardens... who knows.
 
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