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I am currently working in a Biology lab where we have to come up with and perform our own scientific experiment. My group has decided to determine whether potting soil or regular ground soil is better for growing plants (I know. Not much of an experiment. I'm an English major, and this is a first-year biology class.). At any rate, we're planning on growing two different types of plants for about 7 weeks to see which type of soil produces better results. I've been digging around for good plants to use, but I'm not finding much. So does anyone know of some plants that are very easy to maintain, that can grow indoors, and can grow from seeds in 7 weeks?
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Boris, Coleus works very well indoors from seed. It grows quickly. It is a standard n many preschool "gardens."
Will you have good lighting, or will you be relying on filtered sunlight? That makes a huge difference. If natural light, through a window, I would say go with the coleus.
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My mom used beans a lot in her science classroom. They sprout quickly and easily and grow pretty fast. You can also use dried beans from the grocery store rather than seed packets if your budget is tight. You just might get a slightly lower sprouting rate, although all of the grocery beans I've used have been near 100%.
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Thanks a bunch The beans sound great, I'll see if I can find Coleus around here or on the internet.
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Oh, I should add that beans don't generally take that well to transplanting, so if you use them be sure to plant them in their final container from the beginning.
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Radishes were the standard when I was in elementary school, since they mature in a matter of weeks.
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That's true. If one of the "better results" you want to look at is the flavor of the crop, radishes are a good choice. However, and this is probably just because I live in Arizona, we've had far greater luck growing beans than radishes. Beans seem to have a much higher sprouting rate, at least for us.
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We're mainly measuring growth rate. Flavor is a little harder to quantify, which is very important in this particular class. Radishes might be a good idea, though, since Idaho dirt is known for it's ability to grow quality root-type vegetables. Shouldn't be too hard to find, either.
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How big are your containers? If they're not too big (say, each cell is less than 1" x 1" x 2") then radishes are best. A seven-week old bean plant will grow to be 12-18" tall, and its roots would probably get frustrated in too small of a container.
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I have a gardening question too, as long as there's a thread with that title. Last summer I planted a garden of entirely nightshade plants, bell peppers and tomatoes. I read that you shouldn't grow nightshades in the same soil twice in a row, so what else should I plant for the spring growing season to get the soil back in balance so I can grow more tomatoes and peppers this summer?
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There's two different things going on when folks say not to play crops in the same place twice in a row. One is that different crops take different nutrients out of the soil, and so you'll have a healthier soil if you grow a variety of crops.
The other thing is that you avoid a lot of bug and disease trouble by rotating your crops. If possible, it's a good idea to avoid planting the same crop in the same place for four years. (But this is kinda hard, and in practice many folks will just try to avoid back-to-back plantings of the same crop.)
Anyway... on a home garden scale, bugs and diseases are usually less of a problem. But if you had any bugs munching on your tomatoes last year (such as the dreaded blister beetle), it might be a good idea to have your tomatoes in a different place this year, because the next generation of blister beetles will emerge where last year's tomato crop was.
Getting more specifically to your question, Stray -- anything that's not in the nightshade family (tomatoes, tomatillos, peppers, eggplants, potatoes) should be fine as a spring crop. Since you'll probably want to get tomatoes and peppers in by -- letsee, late May in your area? -- short-term crops such as lettuce, radishes, spinach, etc. are probably best.
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I'm assuming that you live where spring is a cool season. Peas are a good choice for cool season legumes. I like Sugar Snaps or Snow peas, because the entire pod is edible. You can also get shelling peas. You should plant legumes at least every other year, more if your gardening is more intensive.
Other cool season crops are the various cabbages: radishes, broccoli (although it's too late for broccoli this year unless you do transplants), cabbage, kohlrabi, brussels sprouts, etc. You can also do lettuce or spinach.
If this is something you're planning on doing every year, you might want to split your garden in half so that each half is planted with nightshade plants every other summer. You could plant corn or other non-nightshade summer plants in the other half. This will help keep nightshade specific diseases from building up in the soil.
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Cool, I'll probably do spinach, lettuce, and peas, then--I like all of those. Thanks for the advice!
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quote:Originally posted by plaid: How big are your containers? If they're not too big (say, each cell is less than 1" x 1" x 2") then radishes are best. A seven-week old bean plant will grow to be 12-18" tall, and its roots would probably get frustrated in too small of a container.
I was actually thinking of using styrofoam cups for this. Do you think beans would work well in something that size?
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Have you thought about using various herbs perhaps? I know they grow like weeds (well, they are weeds I suppose, so go figure)? Organo, Dill, and Sage are three that can grow at a fairly impressive clip from seeds (not to mention germinating in a matter of hours).
I think Lima beans were the pant of choice at my elementary school, though my memory maybe faltering on this one.
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The beans sound great, I'll see if I can find Coleus around here or on the internet.
