The AeroGarden

I’ve noticed some confusion around the web reguarding the labels on the AeroGarden “grow pods”, to be honest I had a few minor difficulties with them as well.

Usually within a few days of starting a new seed kit you will notice the plants are starting to grow, what sometimes happens is the plants get stuck on the top of the label and then either push the entire label off or get trapped inside the grow pod.

Some people have solved this problem by removing the labels however this can cause problems. You see the labels are their to keep light from shining into the water, when to much light enters the bottom of the AeroGarden you have a high chance of developing algae problems… Which are a pain to clean and can damage the plants.

The easiest and in my opinion the best solution is to watch for these growth problems and once the plant appears to be trapped inside the grow pod, it’s time to nudge them through yourself. That’s it, thats all. If you don’t catch it in time or the plant pushes the label off, simply nudge it back down. As long as the label is preventing light from entering the bottom of the AeroGarden you should be fine!

So far the strawberry plants seem to be thriving in the AeroGarden, whenever one flower dies or wilts away another quickly grows to replace it. The plant leaves seem healthy for the most part, a few are a tad brown on the edges however so I will have to keep an eye on that.

As you can see from the above image, the flowers are healthy and in the next few weeks we should start to make some real progress towards having actual strawberries growing here. Personally I am pleased with the progress, water consumption is still very high compared with what I’m used to with other seed kits at this point but I am excited to taste my own fresh strawberries soon!

It’s been awhile since I last posted a strawberry update, a lot has happened the last two weeks. Most notably the plants finally started to grow, the root structures are coming a long nicely in the AeroGarden watering tray and perhaps most important… The strawberry flowers are starting to form!

Very exciting..

Here’s a close up of the flower:

More to come in the next few weeks!

It’s been about a week now since I first planted the strawberry plants in the AeroGarden, I have been running on the suggested Herb/Basil setting and have yet to see any growth pushing it’s way up to the tray. However the root systems are developing nicely as you can see below.

I’ve refilled the water supply for the first time and so far everything appears healthy. I am just surprised at how much water these plants are soaking up, it’s nothing like any other AeroGarden seed kit or plant I’ve tried to grow before.