Lansdowne Urban Farms
Good roots mean that your plant has access to the nutrients it needs. No roots, no growth. Zach was checking nutrients in the NFT Hobby system today and found this Parris Island Cos Romaine Lettuce with roots about 42″ long. They came all the way down into the water reservoir. We were quite excited.
Lettuce Leaf Basil (Baker Seed) has a huge leaf, it’s less dense than your average basil leaf, and it is not as sharp tasting. Some suggest this basil is perfect for using in place of lettuce for fresh wraps, stuffing, layering in lasagna and for making an abundance of pesto.
I am a third generation entrepreneur. My grandfather, my father and I each started our own businesses. If you would have told me that I would start a business with any one of my children, I would have told you that you were crazy. Well almost 26 years later, I may be crazy but Zachary knows a lot about growing things and, at this time in my life, growing food seems absolutely the right thing to do. What a blessing to start this journey with our oldest child.
Today we moved the first seedlings into the Monster. We are about half full and hope to fill the rest by Monday / Tuesday.
These are the seeds – soon to be seedlings – that will be the inaugural batch for The Monster. This is where the entire process begins.
Four trays of 72 Rockwool Grodan Cubes fill the Ebb now. Each has been carefully seeded with Parris Island Cos Romaine Lettuce (Baker Creek Heirloom Seeds), Black Magic Kale (Eden Brothers) and Lettuce Leaf Basil (Baker Creek Heirloom Seeds).
Wait until you taste them!
Oh boy! Assembling The Monster was quite a project. It took two-and-a-half people (I’m the half – LOL) over three days!
It’s all together now, though – super bright and massive. It has 24 NFT channels on four levels with 360 holes to hold our crops of lettuce, kale, and basil. We have lots to learn now that the real growing process and adventure begins.
A huge shout out and debt of gratitude is owed to Bill Horton — who is a pretty brilliant tradesperson. Without him, The Monster assembly would not have been possible.
Now the real work begins — the part that Zachary and I have been training for. This is what we hope our first NFT and Ebb & Flow setup prepared us for. The Monster is 10 feet long, four feet wide and eight feet high. It’s huge, and weighs in at a hefty 700+ pounds.
This is just its frame. Next we add the channels, plumbing and banks of lights. Stay tuned. We are so excited!
This sink brings us so much joy. We needed Bill for this, not going to lie. Up until this moment, this side of the building had never had water.
Why the upside down Home Depot bucket?
So the Grandkid can wash her hands, of course!
The water we use for our plants is critical. Like I said earlier, for the first four months, we relied on jugs of distilled water from Giant. That was not sustainable; we knew that. We also care deeply about not generating more trash than we need to.
The first step in eliminating distilled water was testing our water. Boy, I’m glad we did. It contained way too much chlorine and chloramine. WAY TOO MUCH! Cue the conversations with water purification system people, who I swear are deliberately confusing.
That’s okay. We figured it out. Now we are filtering the entire building’s water. Our lettuce (and apartment dwellers in the building) are thrilled!
PS. Not a great picture – but its probably the most important piece of support equipment we have. Yes, its an old basement. This side of the building probably dates back to the 1870s.
This is Parris Island Cos Romaine Lettuce (Baker Creek Heirloom Seeds) at about 5 weeks. It tastes great too.
