Living Lettuce, meet Zombie Cress

I can still remember the first time I saw a "living lettuce" for sale at a grocery store. I thought it was the coolest thing there, and wanted my mother to buy it; she thought it was five times the price of any other head of lettuce, and declined. If I wanted to play with salad leaves, she said, I should go talk to my grandmother, who would help me grow some of my own.

Oddly, I don't remember whether I actually did; my mind's eye offers peas and mint and potatoes and a kiwi, but no kid-sized lettuce garden. Ah, well; I've grown a great deal of it over the years. But I'm still a little intrigued by the gimmicky-but-definsible living lettuce in its sturdy clear plastic casing. For many people, this is the only way they'll ever taste a freshly harvested lettuce leaf! One of these days, I really am going to buy one for myself, if only to compare the taste to my own aquaponically grown or more traditional lettuce.

More recently, I've been seeing living basil, another hydroponically grown item sold with its roots and a bit of nutrient fluid; these plants come in plastic bags that always remind me of buying pet fish, and like the living lettuce they have instructions for extending the viability of the crop. I found myself tempted by those, too; particularly if you're only using a leaf at a time, it might even make economic sense. (Assuming you can't grow your own.)

But the irrestistible item turned out to be some hydroponically grown upland cress from my local Sun Harvest. With some crops, you can't always tell if they were hydro or not just by looking, like tomatoes on the vine. But the cress was sold in the same square blocks it was grown in, dense root-pack yet intact. Sadly, the roots hadn't been kept wetted, but they hadn't been on display for long enough to dry, so I decided to buy a square.

Well, two, actually. Ate the first one, had to go back. What? I like cresses!

Cress-block in hand, I hurried home to get the poor roots into some water. My kitchen having suffered a recent outbreak of fruit flies, I wanted something a bit more substantial than a glass of water or a vase, so went with my one and only retail self-watering pot, a cute little two-part container with a glazed exterior pot and unglazed insert, reservoir space between. And for added security, I packed a bit of Spanish moss around the cress stems before setting the whole on a counter within view but out of the way. (Outdoors only long enough to take a picture.)

I've been nibbling the odd leaf now and then, but the bulk of the block's still viable. The leaves that were bruised during transport are long gone, of course, as are the ones injured by the rubber band. Some just never perked up again, too long away from their fluid, I guess. As well, a couple have yellowed as if from nitrogen deficiency--these are not still in their hydroponic set-up, after all, but only in water to keep them from wilting. No matter the appearance of new lobes on the stems, this is really not a living, growing, eating, increasing, plant, just not yet quite dead, and still crisp and yummy.

Folks keep standard post-harvest leaf lettuce alive this way, too. It's not the same as the living lettuce, but again, keeps the leaves usable for longer--a lot longer than just tossing the bag in the fridge. For folks who don't garden or like me can't grow enough leafy produce, don't care to hit the grocer every few days, and/or are more likely to use a leaf if it's right in front of them, this might well be worth the small change in habit it takes: less waste, better value for dollars spent, and all the rest.

For me, I'm thinking it's time to eat the rest of that cress. Or, maybe not quite all of it; I could divert a small section to one of my tiny vermiponics experiments, just to see. A couple of worms, some Spanish moss, a little bokashi juice...

Excuse me, I'm off to go play with my food. -G-

DSF

intervention cannot be far behind

My winter wormery*, about which I seem not to have written (bad blogger! no chocolate), proved to be a hospitable home for more than Verne. The immature insects may or may not live through the planned solarization**--I'm baiting away such of the wriggle as is willing to be moved, but the rest shall be sacrificed. Had considered, briefly, trying the usual soil-cover/weight/time salvage technique, but it turns out I need the container.

See, the insulated cooler's a good size and well suited for large-plant hydroponics, and I've just learned of a variation on the aquaponics model I simply have to try. Not quite as described, of course; fermenting food doesn't require rabbits around here. I have buckets for that!

My adventures in low-tech hydro don't get a lot of space on the 'slope, mostly because they're neither wholly failures nor great successes, and therefore don't make great reading. -G- Also, they don't use a great deal of bokashi, though I have been known to add a few drops of very diluted bokashi juice to a feed-mix. But hydroponics has a lot of benefits for the soil-poor gardener. Beginning with the fact that it doesn't take any soil.

I'm far too lazy to be forever brewing up and aerating seaweed and vermicompost teas for optimum nutrition; hence the appeal of aquaponics, where my goldfish fertilizes the water for me. But my aquarium bucket's only good for a few heads of lettuce or other "wet-footed" plants at a time. Can't drain off much of the water for additional plants, either, lest the fish succumb to terminal stress.

Vermicompost tea is one of the more common non-commercial feed-mixes, but I found only one authority willing to substitute fermentation for aeration in the process. (Which doesn't necessarily mean it isn't possible. Someone has to be first!) For the most part, homebrew recipes for hydroponic nutrient solutions are relatively labor-intensive, though it's generally assumed that labor will be mechanical.

But this model lets the worms do all the work. No tea-aeration necessary. For that matter, no brewing. I absolutely have to try it. Or maybe I just couldn't resist the name. Vermiponics, isn't it great?

Now if only I could figure out where I'm going to put this newest experiment. To grow plants, I need sunlight...

Feeling rootbound and overly shaded,

DSF

Note that this image is of a blackworm, Lumbriculus variegatus, not Verne. But, hey, how many swimming worm animations have you seen lately? It comes from the Charles Drewes' collection of educational materials.

*The Igloo was an insulated cooler donated by a neighbor. ("It has a spigot. I thought of you.") No airholes added, but container not filled, to allow an airpocket of sorts. Mesh frame to allow for drainage; standard worm bedding of moistened cardboard and newspaper, soil for grit, etc. Started with leaves and bokashi, pre-composted in the container before the worms were added. Fed infrequent large batches of compostables. Happy worms, finished vermicompost with some patches of pure 'cast, babies, and more insects than I've seen in a wormery since I gave up on the indoor model. Not something I'm doing again!


**Simple plan: carboard over pavement, far away from my plants. Very thin layer of insect-ridden bedding more or less free of worms. Clear plastic cover. Weights. More time than you'd think.

Tales from the bucket: the aquarium bucket

Actually, it's neither an aquarium nor a bucket, but half a globe terrarium I co-opted for a frugal experiment in low-tech aquaponics. My winter hydroponics experiments didn't go far enough--next time, I'm setting up a timer for the lights!-- but the lettuce grown on miniature rafts amused me. Easier than sprouts, even: mix the nutrient solution, add the sprouted seeds in their nests, wait, harvest. Repeat.

As for the lights...well, outside, there's no need to remember about switches and bulbs or anything. Of course, in Austin, still water is an invitation to disease-carrying and otherwise pestiferous mosquitos. Enter the goldfish, which will eat their eggs and/or larvae, and any gravid female flyer foolish enough to linger. And, hey! No need for nutrient solution, as the fish will take care of that.

Haven't found the precisely perfect balance of EM (for water conditioning) and vegetation for the unaerated four-gallon miniature pond, but the fish is alive despite my casual feeding and water-replenishing, and the only outdoor Texas summer lettuce I've ever grown was yummy, both heads of it. -G- I'm really surprised the fish is still alive, unboiled and undevoured after more than a month; had it lived long enough for me to harvest a single leaf of lettuce, I'd have called the test a nominal success, so my cautious two-head harvest certainly counts, and I'm now working on a more ambitious mixed-vegetation crop. Total cost: $0.60 for the fish, really. Everything else I either had or would have bought anyway. Not bad for two heads of chemical-free fresh locally grown lettuce! Still less if I can harvest a bit of Vietnamese coriander and maybe some other leafy greens...

The reduction in mosquito trouble may be my imagination, but even imaginary itch-relief is better than nothing. So the fish remains. Not a pet, just an earth-friendly pest control technique and fertilizer factory. There's no chance it'll be joined by any finny friends, as I simply haven't the space, and it probably won't last the winter if it gets to that point, but until then, or until the household feline or a neighborhood raider finds it, the microherd has yet another macro member.

And I have yet another bucket.

Help?