Wordpress!!!

I have found another blog hosting site- Wordpress. I am through with blogger, and will be moving my blog over with the new year (changing from kmgx3x to kmgx3xi).

My new blog can be found here:

12/21/10- 1st Day of Winter

Since I haven't updated in a while, I'll just throw everything together in one post.


First, here's the introductory video I took today to record my progress and give a virtual tour of the side yard.


Next, I have just returned from the hydroponic store in HB with a half sheet of a "styrofoam" raft to put in the fish tank for cover and to grow some lettuce or mint- just to get something growing. I also bought a starter package of rockwool A-OKplugs (98 1.5" plugs) to get some kale, cabbage, and cauliflower going as well. I already have the seeds for the plugs, going to get on google in a minute to find some heirloom mint seeds for the raft.

Rockwool Plugs

Foam Raft

My mint raft idea came from Kalani:

Lastly, my ice cream banana is going finally to fruit after 2 years! I separated one pup from it about a month before it went to fruit, so I can stop stressing about losing it. Two years ago, I bought it from a new company for under ten dollars, but since then the company has grown and to buy the same pup would be two or three times that amount now. 

Well, that's all I have to update, so I'm off to check for some mint seeds and start planting my cabbage, kale and cauliflower for transplants so I'll have to get the grow bed done in time for them.

P.S. While at the hydro store, I noticed they sell 50L bags of hydroton for $37. To get enough for my grow bed, it would cost $200 including tax, so I might go for the good stuff and spend a little more rather than trying to juggle around and get the lava rock that would probably end up costing over 200 anyway.

Blogger

Well, I can not seem to get Blogger to format anything correctly, so I'm just going to stick with a plain template for the page layout. Sorry, but the pictures and text will overhang the edges sometimes- there isn't really much I can do about it. It's either basic and hanging over, or designed and unreadable. I'll be trying to figure it out, or possibly switching to another blog site because this one is really getting annoying with all the auto formatting.

Anyway, put up with it for now, I'll be searching for a remedy.
-- kmgx3x

Medium

After a long search, I have finally found a source for my grow bed medium. There is a place near my school that sells stone, so I decided to check if they had any gravel. Luckily, they have lava rock (my preferred medium of choice after Hydroton) and it is the cheapest of all their types of gravel.

The only problem now is transporting it. They sell it in a 1/3 yard bag (about 60 pounds) and we have no means to get it home. We might try breaking it up in a couple of smaller containers and making several trips, but at least I finally found my medium and it's relatively inexpensive!

Aquaponics Update 11/3/10

Here's just a quick update (more pictures coming) of the system and how it's coming along. Since my last post, I have temporarily installed the water lines, connected the pvc water bed feed line, set up a timer (which still needs tuning), and have been thinking about the return system. I will most likely have a bell siphon to get rid of the water in the grow bed, then transport that water to an intermediate sump tank before returning to the barrel (pond). I just bought the pvc for the bell siphon and will be working on that tomorrow. Today I also bought a valve to regulate the flow of water into the grow bed, as it was overpowering the output and would quickly overflow otherwise. At this point, I only NEED the fish, gravel, and bell siphon before the system is complete. 11/4/10- The bell syphon is built, just needs installed. I am using Affnan's bell siphon design with modifications; mine is much smaller. Well, this is just a quick update and as I have said earlier, there will be more pictures to come (tomorrow) of the valve, and possibly a video of the system if I can get it all working correctly :) -- kmgx3x

Aquaponics

It's nothing much yet, but my aquaponics setup in the side yard is starting to form. I will most likely use my old half wine barrel as the fish tank and I have recently made the grow bed. It's an old wood door sitting on cinder blocks with a 1/2 inch piece of plywood over the door for added support and to spread out the pressure, then 2x12's for sides. An old pond liner I got on sale and never did anything with will finally be put to use as a liner for the bed. So far, all of this has been completed.

The next step will be trying to find some kind of medium. I would prefer Hydroton, but as it is ~$1/L, and I need ~300L, that doesn't look like a possibility. Pea gravel is another choice which may be cheaper, but it will be difficult to find. I also need the tubes and piping (I already have a pump) to go from the tank to the bed and back again.

Once these final, crucial steps are finished, aside from getting the fish, my system will be ready. I want to grow winter vegetables (kale, cabbage, greens, etc...) to test out and fine tune the system and have something edible growing through the incredibly harsh ;) winters we get here in Southern California. hahaha. In early spring (here, February) I will be starting the summer garden for both the aquaponic system and the community garden- more on that in another post.

I also wish to build an aquaponic running greenhouse. Just finished my first design, so we'll see where that leads. It will mainly be for starting seeds to go into the grow bed and growing tomatoes, as they seem to like it much better in the greenhouse than out. If the design comes true, there will also be a living wall in the back, several NFT tables, floating lettuce, and strawberry trees. There will be much more on the greenhouse in future posts, but as it is going to be aquaponic, I decided it should be mentioned in this one as well.

Here's my inspiration: Signzit on youtube-


Pictures will be coming soon, and possibly some designs for the system and greenhouse.

-- kmgx3x

2010 Harvest

Please ignore the extra spacing between pictures, I haven't quite figured out how this site reformats the html, so this is the best I can do...

Fresh Beans Dried Beans Watermelon growing Giant Sunflower Dried Corn Habanero Hawaiian Chili Artichoke Mutant Carrots Red Savina? Peanuts Watermelon Barrier Blue Passionfruit

As this is officially Autumn, my first year growing vegetables is winding down and most have already been harvested.
My spontaneous garden this year consisted of ~
8 Corn plants (Early Golden Bantam)
3 Watermelon (Georgia Rattlesnake)
4 Sunflower (Mammoth Gray)
2 Artichoke (Globe)
18 Pole Bean
          (9 Blue Lake White Seeded)
          (9 Burpee's Tenderpod)
8 Gac
14 Tomato
          (9 Beefsteak)
          (5 Red Cherry Large)
3 Pumpkin (Jack O'Lantern)
9 Peas (Alaska)
9 Soybean (Envy)
9 Kale (Dwarf Blue Curled)
9 Arugula (Roquette)
9 Radish (Cherry Belle)
9 Cilantro - Livingston Seed Co.
9 Broccoli (Calabrese)
9 Stevia (Honeyleaf)
9 Spinach (Double Choice Hybrid/Bloomsdale Long-Standing)
9 Lettuce (Black Seeded Simpson)

Most are in groups of 9 because I started each vegetable by seed using cells. The list may be impressive, but the harvest was not. As for the corn, it produced heavily, but was overly starchy - probably due to insufficient watering.  The watermelon was planted with the corn (along with beans that never came up) in the back yard in attempt to copy the indians "3 sisters" method. If not for my dog's free roam of that section of the back yard, the watermelons would have been fine, but they grew through the bird net and were left exposed. In sections where the net was doubled over, she would hop the net and carefully break the immature melons (~6") from the vine. Lucky did not actually eat them, but picked them off one by one as soon as they were becoming visible among the foliage. The sunflowers have done exceptionally, as they were planted directly in the ground in the side yard without mulch or any form of soil prep prior to planting. Out of the 6 planted, 4 grew to maturity. One had to be replanted and never made it, while the other was broken before it was ready to harvest. The artichokes have grown well, and are expected to flower next year, as this year I started them from seed. It is possible to flower in the first year, but in my situation, apparently not. The Blue Lake pole beans were planted in a long, narrow planter against the dividing wall in the side yard with a nylon trellis. These, as well as the Gac and Peas were planted in the same style planter along the wall, with coco mulch at the base. The beans produced heavily, but were attacked by powdery mildew before the end of the harvest. The peas were attacked by the same disease before they were even 2' tall. There were several pods forming but the plant was killed before they reached maturity. The gac (a form of bittermelon normally found only in asia- thailand I believe) is incredibly healthy, but not produced yet. It has similar characteristics as the artichoke, and is expected to flower and fruit next season. The beefsteak tomato were started early, so produced the main harvest during July, while I was away in Utah, but are still throwing out a few fruits. I believe there are several left on one of the plants still... 3 of these were on cages on the slab of concrete in the side yard, while 2 were inside the greenhouse several feet from the others. The greenhouse tomatoes did much better than those outside, and were planted in identical soil and pots, so the slight temperature increase and humidity is beneficial. The rest of the beefsteak were tested in the "topsy turvy" which did live, but spat out some ripe fruit that were smaller than even my cherries. The cherries were started late, so are only now reaching maturity. I have harvested ~4 fruits so far and enjoyed them in a salad for lunch. They are exceptionally large for cherry tomatoes, and for plants that were not contained and are sprawling on the ground, matured very well. The fate of most of the rest of my list was not very good. The pumpkins croaked from powdery mildew, they were planted in the front yard on the unused patch of dirt alongside the driveway. The arugula, broccoli, and spinach never left their cells, as I was rushing to pack for Utah and could not properly contain them, so they met their demise first of all. The soy and bush beans (oh yeah, I had bush beans too) were planted opposite the gac and peas in the ground of the side yard, but without mulch. They were showing signs of fruiting before I left, but were shriveled and brown when I returned. The soy beans had gone to seed, so I have more seed to replant from, but I am going into an all heirloom vegetable garden next year (more on that in another post, as this one is long enough already). The radishes never formed after 3 months, and the cilantro bolted on me, so those two were out. Incredibly, the kale survived the cells of death that the arugula, broccoli, and spinach suffered from, and will probably be planted out for winter either in the community garden or as a test crop in the aquaponic grow bed. Stevia has probably come to be my favorite plant, as it is a woody perennial and will last for several years. They need replanted, as they are still in gallon pots and are reaching 3 feet tall and require water every couple of days to revive them from severe wilt. The woody nature though keeps the plant alive even with inadequate water. Today was actually my first taste of the fresh leaves, and it nearly knocked me over with its sweetness. The initial bite is as though you just ate a leaf, both in texture and flavor, but then the 300x sugar content kicks in and explodes in your mouth. It becomes very pleasant and satisfying. I cannot wait to harvest some leaves to dry and try in tea.

Well, this post is incredibly long and I apologize for not breaking it up, but I'm too lazy, haha. I promise future posts will not be of this size, and I will try to get more pictures up of this years harvest, as well as some video of the gardens soon.
-- kmgx3x

Fate

My plot area and number in the Huntington Beach Community Garden is F8. Fate will be the main topic of my blogs this year, but this is the first year of the HBCG, so the entire community garden has not even been created yet. Only recently has the committee finished nearly two years of preparation for last night's meeting to assign plots to members. I will try to get my community service group (Beyond The Limit) at my school (Liberty Christian High School) to volunteer to help with the groundwork to get the plots laid and everything that needs done in order to open the garden to everyone around Halloween. I will try to keep this site updated with information and pictures of my plot throughout the growing season, which in Southern California is pretty much the entire year.

My other main focus on the blog will be to post my progress, as with the community garden, but with my soon-to-come aquaponic system. I will be setting up a small (~150 gallon) system in my garden at home. The garden at home is along the side yard of the house, and will also be included in the posts, but is not a main focus, as my fruit and vegetable production will mainly be in the previously stated topics. The side yard is going to focus on rare/tropical plants as ornamentals, although some are edible.

I know there is no audience for this blog yet, but I hope to gain at least a small following to help others better understand unusual or even radical gardening methods.

-- kmgx3x

Hello World

First blog post- This blog will be used to record my activities/ adventures as well as the things I find interesting.