What can I grow...

[garudamon11]

What can I grow in a medium-small container in a subtropical weather (very hot and high humidity levels but no rain)? I don't have much choices btw because there are no seeds available (I've only found onion, cucumber and zucchini seeds in markets here) so I will have to take the seeds out from vegetables I eat, I'm a begginer and I don't have tools or space so please give me simple tips I'm thinking of growing sweet pepper but I'm not sure about how to treat the seeds or if they will grow in this horrible weather, I tried growing a couple of plants before but they die after germinating and the only thing that succeeded was beans (and I grew that inside the apartment), I need your help!

[slyguy]

I say okra, and eggplant

[garudamon11]

Are they self pollinating?

[!potatoes!]

you have SOME water you can give plants, right? you're not just trying to grow veggies in smallish containers with what they can get from the air?

since beans have done okay for you, id suggest a couple things with similar needs (but less water): cowpeas or tepary beans. generally inbreeding self-pollinators.

seed for many things may be tricky to get - in some fruits/vegetables, the seeds aren't yet mature when they're picked for eating...I'm wondering if we should try to work out some kind of seed-for-something-else swap, since you don't have seed to trade...have you looked at the seed-swap section?

[Gary350]

Cactus grows very well in those conditions about 6" per week and new growth has not thorns. Slice and dice new growth with onions, cilantro, tomatoes it is good.

[img]https://i43.photobucket.com/albums/e358/gary350/100_1627.jpg[/img]

[garudamon11]

you have SOME water you can give plants, right? you're not just trying to grow veggies in smallish containers with what they can get from the air?

Of course I have water to give to my plants, but I just don't have compost or soil (other than salty sand outside) and the container isnt "small" its medium sized but from reading in the internet it seems that tomatoes and vegetables need a massive area to grow in (or at least thats what blogs about it make it sound like)

since beans have done okay for you, id suggest a couple things with similar needs (but less water): cowpeas or tepary beans. generally inbreeding self-pollinators.

I don't think I've ever seen those...

seed for many things may be tricky to get - in some fruits/vegetables, the seeds aren't yet mature when they're picked for eating...I'm wondering if we should try to work out some kind of seed-for-something-else swap, since you don't have seed to trade...have you looked at the seed-swap section?

How exactly do we trade? (I've never done it before)
Well .... do you want salty sand? Jk, I've got aster seeds that I havent used yet, but like I said I don't know how we're supposed to trade...

Cactus grows very well in those conditions about 6" per week and new growth has not thorns. Slice and dice new growth with onions, cilantro, tomatoes it is good.

I've red that onion likes sandy soil, so I guess I could raise that easily here, but do I have to wash the sand incase its really salty or will that remove the already few useful things in it?

[TheWaterbug]

Of course I have water to give to my plants, but I just don't have compost or soil (other than salty sand outside)

Is there nowhere to buy soil? Even if there are no consumer retail outlets for gardening supplies, are there any commercial landscaping companies who could sell you a bag of soil?

[garudamon11]

Of course I have water to give to my plants, but I just don't have compost or soil (other than salty sand outside)

Is there nowhere to buy soil? Even if there are no consumer retail outlets for gardening supplies, are there any commercial landscaping companies who could sell you a bag of soil?

I can buy soil from the very few nurseries (they look like a duplicate of each other) but its low quality and expensive because its imported

[flowersun]

You can grow tomatoes in medium sized pots. Try cherry tomatoes. Potatoes also grow well in containers. Put some shade netting up to protect your plants from the sun and use some wet newspapers to keep the moisture in the pots for longer.

I am not an expert but if I were in your situation, I would think of my vegetable growing project as a long-term one and start by improving the sandy salty soil. It sounds like you have access to sand outside. You can either get a big container like half a drum or make some sort of raised bed on the sand outside. Put a thick layer of newspaper or cardboard at the bottom. You do not want to lose the nutrients and moisture by leaking from the bottom. Now add some of the sand you have. Try to find some manure from somewhere (cows, camels, chicken, and sheep) and add. Keep all the raw vegetable peelings scraps, eggshells used tealeaves/ bag coffee grinds etc. and add that too. Tear newspaper and mix in. Water it and keep it moist by covering it with more damp newspaper/ cardboard or even old carpet. Keep adding to you pile. After a few weeks or months, you will be able to use the compost from the bottom.

[flowersun]

Wow! Just noticed you live in an apartment on the 34 th floor with a small balcony so you would probably not be able to go with the raised bed option I mentioned above but you can still make your own compost in a container.

Here are some smaller ideas.
1 . Pineapples grow well in pots and makes a nice ornamental plant. You can grow a pineapple plant from one you buy.
2. If you can buy seeds on the internet, you can grow fancy lettuce. They do not take much space and look good indoors. Lettuce can also grow in a small hydroponic setup not needing any soil.
3. You can grow sprouts in a jar or a tray.

[garudamon11]

Hi, I'm sorry that I didnt update this because now I have a bag of peat moss and a bag of potting soil, there was one nursery selling that and it was at a decent price, maybe I should've looked more carefully before moaning about it

I also have a small bag of sweet onion seeds I plan to grow 12 in my big container in which I mixed the peat moss with sand, do I need to add compost to it? my mom thinks peat moss is enough.

And how exactly do I make a compost container? I mean... how big should it be? where should I put it? is it going to smell? how long does it take until the stuff become compost?

[garudamon11]

Two pictures of the container:


[img]https://img716.imageshack.us/img716/1766/picture004qs.jpg[/img]


[img]https://img856.imageshack.us/img856/1521/picture005sh.jpg[/img]

[rainbowgardener]

A good composting option for apartment dwellers is worm composting.

Type vermicompost, worm composting, or worm bins or some variation of that into the Search the Forum Keyword Box and find lots written here about it.

Here's one to start you off that has links to instructions and other stuff:

https://www.helpfulgardener.com/forum/viewtopic.php?p=178711#178711

It's very self contained, works on a small scale, no smell, and you don't have to worry so much about greens and browns, just feed your kitchen scraps to your worms and get lovely worm castings back.

[garudamon11]

Thanks, but I have a strong worm-phobia... and I don't know where I can get redworms from (I know they live in soil but I don't own garden), even if I managed to find redworms then I have to convince my mom about keeping hundreds of worms in a bin in our apartment, and I'm not really keen about that

[soil]

not hundreds, thousands of worms.

[!potatoes!]

even tens of thousands.

I think you're going to need more material than just sand and peat. even if you can get a mix that works well for you drainage- and water-retention-wise, there's hardly any nutrient (or nutrient holding ability) there. maybe some of that potting soil, plus compost...would be a start, anyway.

[!potatoes!]

hmmm, no edit.

I'm going to send a message to you - I can probably send some cowpeas to try out, at least.