Abhishek Agarwal asked:


Not everybody is blessed with a house and garden plot or lives in the country with access to farming land, so the option for a garden leave alone a kitchen garden, is a fairly remote one. But, if you put on your thinking cap, you can have a fresh and economical option of growing your own veggies in the privacy of your home – by using cost-effective gardening containers for growing vegetables from seeds and seedlings bought from the local nursery or even ordered from a mail-order or online catalogue.

For those that live in flats and hostels, the need to grow their own vegetables may be limited due to space constraints, but the readily available gardening containers in many different sizes and materials make having a kitchen garden less of a dream and more of a possibility for people with the smallest budget. There are also a variety of indoor gardening plants and vegetables you can bring for your home cooking needs, which only require a few hours of sunlight that they can have access to while hung in the balcony or even in your window-sill planter box. These include herbs, peppers, bush beans, salad greens, bush and cherry tomatoes and baby carrots.

Of course, depending on the vegetable variety you do purchase and the size they grow to, you will need to purchase a planter pot that is ready for holding the full-sized plant, so choose with care. For example, tomatoes are grown one per pot while a big size pot can hold 3-4 pepper plants besides basil herb around it in small quantity. This is typical of 5 gallon pots.
Other containers you can use for your gardening needs include tubs, buckets and barrels cut in half (distillery ones) ranging from 5 to 15 liters. However, you need to keep in mind that if you are also intending to plant herbs in addition to the vegetables in the pots, you need to ascertain that the ones you buy are at least 10 inches in diameter so spring onions, for example, planted in the pot, also hold space for rosemary or thyme.

You need to also invest in a drainage tray (even plastic ones will do) that will allow for proper leaching from time to time so the pots get enough water, sunlight and there is a measure for extra water to leak out too. Do remember to line the bottom of the pot with some pieces of rocks or broken crockery besides a few layers of newspaper before putting in potting soil to prevent the fine soil from seeping out from the drainage holes.

Use well-rotted compost, adequate potting soil till an inch or two below the rim, water plants regularly and also give plant food twice as often as outdoor plants would need as dehydration occurs more rapidly for indoor plants.

Cactuslover asked:


You hear a lot of talk these days about how good vegetables are for you. The daily allowance is of five portions of fruit and veg today. But it costs a lot to buy fruit and veg at the supermarket. Despite all the guff about supermarkets being low cost places they still charge a lot for vegetables. It is not uncommon for a couple of lettuces to set you back over $1. You can get veg much cheaper if you go down to the market, but it can be out very cost effective to grow your own.

The following is a top 10 list of easy-to-grow vegetables and their recommended varieties.

Carrot. Plant seeds several times throughout the growing season, early spring into fall for a continuous harvest. Soil should be loose and deep. Varieties: ‘Nantes,’ ‘Chantenay,’ ‘Touchon,’ ‘Short n’ Sweet’.

Cucumber. Wait until warm weather to plant seeds. Varieties: ‘Sweet Success,’ ‘Fanfare,’ ‘Lemon’.

Green Beans. Plant seeds after frost danger. Bush types are easier to manage, but pole types are more productive in an equal space (because they’re taller!). Varieties: ‘Blue Lake,’ ‘Contender,’, ‘Kentucky Wonder’.

Lettuce. Plant seeds as soon as soil can be worked — hot weather ruins the plants. Varieties: ‘Black Seeded Simpson,’ ‘Buttercrunch,’ ‘Deer Tongue,’ ‘Nevada’.

Onion. Timing the planting of seeds or the miniature onion bulbs called sets can be tricky. Also consider mail-order onion seedlings. Check locally for availability.

Peas. Sow seeds early in spring as soon as you can work the soil. Varieties: ‘Alderman,’ ‘Sugar Snap,’ ‘Oregon Trail,’ ‘Super Sugar Mel’.

Radish. Sow seeds during the short, cool days of spring and fall. During these times, radishes are perhaps the easiest and fastest vegetable to grow. Varieties: ‘Cherry Belle’, ‘White Icicle,’ ‘Scarlet Globe’.

Summer Squash. Sow seeds after weather warms up. Grow bush types to save space. Varieties: ‘Sunburst,’ ‘Yellow Crookneck,’ ‘Scallopini’.

Sweet Pepper. Plant seedlings in warm weather along with tomatoes. Varieties: ‘Bell Boy,’ ‘California Wonder,’ ‘Sweet Banana,’ ‘Gypsy’.

Tomato. Set out seedlings after the air and soil have warmed up. Tomatoes come in countless varieties; among the best: ‘Celebrity,’ ‘Big Rainbow,’ ‘Brandywine,’ and ‘Enchantment’.

Tomatoes are one of those rare plants that actually benefit if seedlings are planted deeper than they grew in the nursery pot. Plants will be more anchored and sturdier, and roots will develop along the buried portion of the stem. Pinch off lower leaves once you plant.