Mythical Garkin, protector of newbie gardeners!Garden Candy
You just have to do it…every year you have to get just one thing that will really help you in the garden and last a long time. I’m talking quality. And until I get that patch of land, which I will, and start doing permaculture/food forests, I’m out at the community garden!
Last year my big purchase, was to get 4, or was it 5 yards of organic, vegan compost from Cedar Grove Compost here in Washington. I was lucky and had a buddy help me load countless wheelbarrows to my two plots. Funny, thinking back on it, I think I only saw him one other time out at the garden last year. Hmmm, hope I didn’t get him all worn out!
The good thing about Cedar Grove compost is that it is yard waste from around the Seattle area. The bad thing about it, it is lacking the boost that composted manure gives. Still fantastic stuff though! Slow and steady growth as compared to radioactive green super growth from cow manure. Seriously, I watched a neighbors garden literally grow inches a day and I could have sworn she was putting on Miracle Gro, but nope, she just had some really good dairy compost.
OK so back on track, what was my big ticket *snicker, yeah right!* item this year? I got a 4 foot, 4 bulb lighting assembly with T5 bulbs. You’re probably wondering, what is that? It’s fluorescent bulbs in a slim design with smaller radius bulbs than your regular overhead fluorescent bulbs and has more light. Why would I want that? To start my veggie seedlings!
Check it out:
As I mentioned in my last post, I had three cfl bulbs with aluminum foil forming a sort of tent last year. I used that for my veggie starts. Pro’s it was was super cheap. 3 lamps from target 25 bucks. 3 cfl bulbs from hardware store, 12 dollars. Con’s lots of wires, hard to control light leaks.
This unit is basically like 6 Aero Gardens, on steroids. It’s also a heckuva lot safer for little bambino as he gets older. There are better lights out there but they are like arc welders. Really great for indoor gardening, you can even grow all the way through Winter but whoowee those suckers are BRIGHT!!!
Here is my dream, 4 of these suckers on a nice lighting rack. Wow. Just think, I could have microgreens and salad all winter long! DREAM!
nelly on 
Michael on 
Awesome, Sweets! I love and appreciate your passion for gardening. I've learned so much from you.
I would love one of those for wheatgrass and sunflower sprouts. speaking of which i use cedar grove to grow it. it does quite well.
i wonder how earthworm castings compare to manure?
love the video. it's like those mr. rogers videos on how they make stuff like crayons.
Oh earthworm castings are AMAZING. They take it to a whole new level. Thanks for the post idea! Yea I used that last year for my seedlings and they were loving life, I made a tea for them. I found out that the stuff the worms ate was cow manure. Go figure. But something about what the worms did made it completely different because of their digestive bacterias etc. Like kefir! But made out of poops.
ha ha! You said, “poops.”
ohhh t5's that's a beautiful indoor lighting system..almost none..or.. very little heat eh? Fantastic post! Thanks! One question..how did you copy that bing maps image to your site…do you have an apple? Please advise. Thanks for all the great posts brutha..learning a lot!!
Hey Jake! PC guy here…but if you google bing maps then enter an address, and you will see on the page an option to embed it on your site. Look for the envelope icon on the lower left of the page. It gives you the code. Yea the T5s are cool as a cucumber! Thanks bro!
Thanks Mike! lol on the parakeets! Sounds like you go a green thumb! Thanks for the link!