nichi
Newly Registered
Posts: 1
Joined: Mon Sep 18, 2006 9:12 pm
Location: Columbus Ohio

Indoor vegetable gardening questions

Hi,
This is my first post here. I'm not a gardener at all, but I do believe in the benefits of organics, and buy them when I can afford it. In lieu of that, I try and buy fresh as much as possible. With all this scare about ecoli, however, I'm getting extremely skepticle about purchasing anything fresh from the grocers, even a Whole Foods store (can't afford them right now since I'm out of work). I don't think this thing is isolated to packaged spinach. Remember the green onion thing awhile back at CheChe's? And I recall another brand of salad greens being recalled for ecoli several months ago. We love collard greens and kale, etc., but I think I'll stay away from them also. I know I can't grow those inside, but I'm wondering if it's possible to grow lettuces indoors during the winter. I've looked at some indoor hydroponic systems online, but they seem pretty expensive. Any help or advice would be appreciated.

opabinia51
Super Green Thumb
Posts: 4659
Joined: Thu Oct 21, 2004 5:58 pm
Location: Victoria, BC

Well, I'll first advise you not to jump the gun on a few isolated instances of E. coli infections. A lot of small, home grown produce is just fine. So, are the fruits and vegetables sold in supermarkets. I don't have any stats to give you and don't want to get into a debate over the safety of North Americas food but, a few instances of inoculation of E. Coli is not evidence that all food is unsafe.

Anyway,

I've never tried growing lettuce indoors but, this should work with good soil and compost. Hydroponics are not the best way to grow plants;

First of all they are very prone to infection and therefore the entire loss of a crop. Second they only provide the very base nutrients for the growth and health of a plant. The flavour of a plant grown hydroponically is non existant. A plant grown organically with composted manure, compost and good soil will be far healthier and much more nutritious (not to mention flavourful).

What vegetables have people grown indoors with success?

Newt
Greener Thumb
Posts: 1868
Joined: Tue May 25, 2004 10:44 pm
Location: Maryland zone 7

Hi Nichi,

I did a google with the term:
lettuce + indoors
and found many sites with info on how to grow leaf lettuce indoors. Sounds like a great idea. I just might try it with spinach in my south facing bay window!

Newt



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