 So welcome everybody. Thanks for taking the time to join us for the third part in this Anyone can grow series that we started a couple of weeks ago The idea really has been you know to see if we cannot share some knowledge That would be useful for people who find suddenly perhaps for the first time in our lives that our food security is Realistically threatened You know things have been much better for the last couple of weeks. I'm sure but I think the first couple of weeks were a little worrisome We are also concerned that we may not be out of the woods yet either with respect to the coronavirus or with respect to you know Interruption to our food security and the reason for that is as you're aware You know a lot of farms start planting now for the next season So number one harvest from farms have been coming in in a patchy way simply because demand has dropped a lot and things like that and A lot of the markets are closed Also, simultaneously we are finding that you know You're going to have problems with the next crop being planted even as the current crops are sort of being Cleared out. So we may have issues with food security even like a month or two from now So our proposal is that you know, you can offset some of this by growing a little at home I know a lot of you may be actually doing this for the first time and It may not seem very productive, but we believe it can be a lot of fun to do It can Introduce really nutritious and delicious food to you in a way that you can really make out the difference And of course, you know, you can get over any shortcomings that you face Say a month or two from now, right? So we feel the next best time to get started is right now a Little bit about us Yogita and I and of course we have been joined I can see we have we have a interloper on the scene Our daughter Tara seems to have decided that she would like to be a part of this session She's highly impressed that you know one can be on YouTube and I think that's a kick out of this So basically yoga started growing in about 2006 at home And then we started, you know going more and more at home We started green essentials, which is an organic kitchen garden store in Goa in 2009 I believe and we've been doing workshops since 2010 trying to show people how simple it really is to Grow their own food organically We've always so done larger scale growing than our own kitchen gardens At one point we were handling three farms totaling to about one and a half hectares Fruits vegetables crops like coconuts things like that We didn't do a lot of grain but fruits and vegetables and herbs has real be really been the core of our growing We used to run farmers markets. We used to supply stuff to supermarkets and so on and so forth and What we really have been trying to do is to co-help coach new kitchen gardeners In the process of growing their own food. So that's really our goal with this session and our goal in general We believe gardens can be Very productive simply because that's what we've experienced now for over 12 years Almost 14 years and this is an example of a very recent harvest at our place You will see we've got a few strawberries less this season than we usually do We've got lettuce. We've got mustard greens we've got spring onions pineapple and so on so You know more or less what we found during this lockdown is that we've had more food Growing at our place than we can in you know as a family of three actually consume and that's been a good situation to be in Uh, I just like to take a quick minute to sort of recap what we've been doing in the past sessions also Especially for those people who were a part of them In the in the last session we talked about how to prepare our own containers So how do we select pots or containers of the right size? um, then We talked about the different types of materials that containers could be made of We explain how drainage especially is really important and you need to make sure that these containers have proper drainage because excess water is likely to kill your plants We showed you how to prepare excellent organic soil It Works for most herbs vegetables and fruits with very few problems You will remember that the proportions we talked about were 50 25 25 Where 50 percent is any garden soil that you can find even in your compound or in your complex Uh, 25 percent is vermicompost ideally Or kowdung for that matter And 25 percent is coco peat, which is this uh, you know soil texturing agent that we find very useful And uh, we also then talked about how sunlight plays a very important role And what grows in sunlight and needs sunlight and the few things that actually grow in the shade, right? so so you can go back to this of course and Have a look at this session if something seems to be forgotten But we'll move on from there today So the stage that we are focusing on today is the transplanting or sewing Remember these five or six steps are really The steps that you have to go through every season in growing Where you prepare your seeds and nurseries then you prepare your soil which was done in session two Then you transplant or sew your, uh, you know plants in then you go through the growing phase Which is the longest phase where you have to care for the plants And lastly you stay you reach the stage where you're able to begin harvesting, right? But after you're done harvesting almost immediately or actually even in parallel with that you have to actually plan your next cycle Of planting to make sure that your garden continues to stay productive through the season and through the year Yeah So for those of you who have been following us and been in sync with the sessions Hopefully you will have some seedlings underway Uh, you know most seedlings will be a little smaller than these basil plants, which you see Uh, these are probably just a week away from being ready to transplant But uh, if you've not had great results with these please You know write to us and and the best way to do that is through this telegram group that we've created Yeah So I'll give you the link to the group a little later But you can send in photos of where you are and we'll respond to them immediately as soon as we can rather So today's session Is going to cover this we're going to talk about transplanting your seedlings into their growing containers I realize this may be a bit early because your seedlings are not yet ready But you will know what to do when that comes around in a week or two from now. So that's what we like to talk about We like to discuss a little bit How much you should grow because we've found that frequently people end up planting too much of one thing So how much do you need to grow into in order to have meaningful amounts of food for your kitchen? That's another point of discussion today And then we'll talk also about so most of the time we end up planting single You know plants in single pots or containers Uh, depending on their size, especially the regular sized ones But what if you have a little bigger pot and can you plant multiple things in one pot? We'll talk about that a little bit and we'll check in on your vegetable seedlings also Now a lot of people seem to have an interest in growing microgreens too and especially for those of you who have You know somewhat shaded balconies and are finding it too difficult to grow other things Microgreens can be a really productive thing to grow Okay, so Just a reminder again that keep your questions handy Please enter them in the q&a section of your zoom interface Just type them in there and we will come to them at the end of the session Okay, so The first kind of Thing that we need to keep in mind is if we have planted a lot of seeds in a single large container as opposed to using You know a smaller one We will find that we have many seedlings that are blanched sort of bunched really close together And it's important that we take these out at the right time And that we do it in a way where we are able to separate each individual seedlings seedling without damaging the roots Yeah, because damaged roots can lead to a slowdown of the You know growth of the plant at the very least And in a worst-case scenario, you know, your plants may not really survive what we call transplant shock So just to give you an example of what I mean by transplant shock if you look closely in these particular sort of Images you will see that the saplings that have been planted in these spots here Are looking pretty smashed in the sense they're lying down and they look wilted and they are along the soil and they're not standing upright So this typically happens when they are experiencing some amount of transplant shock And uh, we found that this is you know, this this is something that you need to plan for in order to minimize Right. Otherwise things take a lot longer So just to contrast this this is an example of a transplant which is not experiencing shock So you will note that uh, basically We are Seeing the seedling. It's nice and upright. It looks healthy And it's not something that you need to worry about in terms of its survival, right? So so our idea is to basically ensure that in most cases, this is the result we have And we'll talk about it a little bit so Imagining that you are actually Taking seedlings out separating them from a pot and then transplanting them, you know Here are some of the things that you need to do Uh, you need to Prepare the seedlings for their transition into the new growing container and the best way to do this is by Sort of putting them through a little bit of inconvenience or discomfort In advance of the actual transplanting. So usually what we will do is we will begin working on them about a week before We are going to transplant. So if today is thursday, then the previous friday I would have started reducing the amount of watering To the plants. I would cut down the water given to them. This sorry the saplings I would cut down the water given to them by about 50 percent And I would keep them, you know a little thirsty over this period of time. So Then what we would do is say a couple of days before on tuesday, you know We would give them their last watering and then not water over wednesday and the most of thursday Typically, we would transplant when the sun is low and the temperatures are on the lower side. So After say four o'clock in the evening is actually a good time to transplant The the the shock that the plants will experience would be much less And what we will do is that just 20 minutes before say at 3 30 we will give it a deep watering Now because these plants have been deprived of water. They have automatically kind of tried to Reduce their consumption patterns and when they get this deep watering just before They find water available and quickly react to take a lot of water up, right? So this means when they go to the new place, they do have a reservoir water in them And this will do them a lot of good when the transplantation actually happens So what you should then do is take it to the new pot You know nicely firmly Set the seedling into the new growing pot that you're going to be in and water very well, right? okay, so When you have one plant per cup as you can see in this case Transplanting becomes a lot easier for a few reasons the first which is the obvious is you don't have to separate the Kind of seedlings much, right? you are basically Taking one plant you don't damage the roots and You end up having a situation where you know things work very well okay so If you look at transplanting single seedlings, this reduces the chances of root disturbances This can be done at any point through the day and this can be Something that ensures very high survival rates um Here's the difference between I mean, I think this illustrates the big difference between something that has been grown in a cup as opposed to something which has been Grown in a pot So if you can see this root ball around the seedling You will notice that the roots are very well formed and they are wrapped around this sort of ball of soil So when you actually transplant this into the new pot, it's almost like the plant hasn't been disturbed at all The roots are entirely intact and it has most of its nutrients and its familiar soil available around right So we find that when this situation this type of method is used there is almost no kind of Need for for us to wait for the cooler parts of the day to transplant We could do it right in the middle of the day itself and everything would be just fine Survival rates are a lot better, of course, right? So what I'm going to do is that I'm going to hand it over to yoghita and to tara who are going to Basically demonstrate how this can be done All right. Hi everyone. This is tara my little helper for today um We are basically going to show you how you can transplant your seedlings Whether they are growing several in a container or whether you've grown them individually. So before we do that I'd like to show you something here is um a set of spinach seedling This is grown in a paper cup and this is about I would say almost three weeks old What you can see is that there are several plants. There's one two three four five plants in this Which means that each of these will have to be separated because if I have a plant this size Which is about an eight inch pot. I will need to put one plant per pot Having more of them would mean there will be competition And so I will not put five of them in one container Now if like karan mentioned I had sown them singly like for example, I have a basil That's just a single plant in here There is a certain way that I will do the transplanting as opposed to if I have a cluster of plants growing together It could have been a nursery that was in a pot in any kind of a damba that you may have had Um or in a cup like this So um the first thing to do as he mentioned is that over time you've got to reduce the watering In the week prior to transplant so that they are basically getting a little ready for the shocks that they're going to receive as they are transplanted Then 48 hours before you water it and then you don't water it for two days And then just just before we start in the lunch you would want to grow So uh lady finger beans chilies brinjals malabar spinach You know palak red amaranth water spinach or sweet potato and gourd's ridge gourd I mean the gourd family including ridge gourd little gourd and so on will be something that You can grow in this particular season going through to the monsoons So these plants will probably get productive by the time the monsoon just about starts in most of our uh, you know locations And it will be productive through the monsoon too If you say bindi, uh, it's a fairly tall plant. So it needs a larger 10 to 12 inch pot Uh, it's not a very, you know, stocky plant in the sense. It doesn't have a lot of volume in that sense So this kind of pot will sort of suffice And because each plant does not produce a huge amount of fruits if I can call the bindi a fruit Then you will see it is better to have a larger number of these pots So depending on how big your balcony is you want to have between 8 to 10 pots at least to so that you have a reasonable amount of lady finger to kind of cook, right? Full sun those are the requirements that you have for this particular uh plant Coming next to beans, which is the long beans like val is one variety that we grow This also requires a 12 inch pot You will notice that most of the plants require a 10 to 12 inch plant uh pot so that you know There's enough soil mass to hold them up especially in the case of taller heavier plants and also at the same time There are enough nutrients to last them for a while So for beans and while we would grow two or three plants in a 12 inch pot each of them in a 12 inch pot Then we would grow chilies Just a couple of plants are usually adequate for most families So I would have two pots of 12 inch for chilies. For example Brinjal is another very productive vegetable You know produces a lot of fruit and over a long period of time And therefore we would you have not not more than two or three pots of these Malabar spinach, which is a climbing wine is also a profuse producer of leaves We would use a 12 inch pot for these and a couple would be more than enough The leaf of this plant is a little bit like a palm leaf, you know, it's like It's got a glossy surface. It comes one of the varieties has a red stem. So it looks very nice to the The other name for it is basella A palak or spinach, which most of us are used to eating on a regular basis This I would have at least five plants And we if they were 10 to 12 inch pots a little bit on the bigger side You could put two plants in each pot, right? So but you would have to space them out Don't plant them too close together Plant them maybe, you know, two-thirds of the way from either edge Red amaranth is also, you know, a good producer. I would have at least same five to seven plants For this or pots for this and each would have just one plant These would be 10 to 12 inch pots Water spinach is another one that we feel can be grown It does pretty well You can or you can be growing sweet potato for the leaves rather than for the root And we would grow four or five of each of these in a 12 inch pot We are going to choose a little bit bigger pot for the gourd's family things like bottle gourd snake gourd bitter gourd that's karela or, you know, pumpkin and ash gourd And basically we are going to just have a couple of these pots So if you want, uh, you know bitter gourd, for example, don't have like 10 different Pots of bitter gourd because each pot produces a fair number of fruits over a long period of time Okay You'll notice that we've added a column over here, which actually talks about companions So what we are trying to say is that in case in the case of say lady finger You can also grow red amaranth to a small size around your lady finger plant So if you have red amaranth seeds, you can sprinkle them there And you can harvest them young, right? You have to not let the plant get too crowded But they will kind of grow in in in parallel Usually what we look to do is to have a low plant growing within the pot and then a taller plant Since bindi is pretty tall it may go up at least four feet high You know, it'll grow above the red amaranth and it will get all the sunlight it needs Val is another climber It's a good idea to use like a bamboo stake and let it climb in your pot And that again leaves space below for red amaranth to grow Chillies you can plant some spinach with them again in each of these cases Uh, the spinach would have to be harvested at a little younger stage Simply because you don't want it to completely crowd out the chilies and start competing with it But it is possible to grow multiple things in a single pot Mint is another thing you can grow with brinjal planted just at the edge of the pot And it will kind of take up the space in the middle Only for maybe, you know, like a two or three finger span around the stem You can kind of keep that clear and make sure that it doesn't crowd the Brinjal too much and so on and so forth if you go through this You know table you will see many a few options of companions that can grow together in a single pot Okay Now when you're planting different types of plants together Then I would there are a few things that you should ideally consider Okay, the first thing is that the sunlight requirements of these two plants should be similar So that if you are placing them in a particular part of the you know of your Of your garden or your balcony or your terrace Then they will thrive there because both of them love those particular conditions Similarly, it is important that you grow things that have similar water requirements If you grow something that Doesn't like a lot of water with something else that likes to have a lot of water You will usually have one of the other of them dying. So just to take an example I think I've mentioned in the past session that Tomato doesn't do very well with too much water And if you were to grow something like mint which enjoys a lot of water along with the tomato Then you would have you know problems more on more more likely the tomatoes will get a fungal disease and will basically die away And all you'll fill with this mint, right? So a little care in Kind of choosing this is a good idea Okay We also need to consider the kind of space available So that there are sufficient nutrients for both plants So if you are picking 12 inch pots 10 inch pots and you know in the largest case 14 inch pots They have ample room to grow you cannot take a six inch pots and then stuff two things into them You will not have good results. Okay Now an example of multiple things planted in the same container is this bathtub Which I'm sure you can see This was something that we I would say we rescued from my mother's apartment Once she figured out that bathtubs don't really aren't really as much fun as we imagine they should be And basically we've every year we've grown multiple things in this. I think the previous year we grew carrot And we grew beetroot Yeah, I think so and this year we planted beetroot and a lot of spring onion in them So as you can see, you know, the spring onions are growing very well and you know very They're really thriving in these conditions and Yes, the spring onions we basically use them for the leaves. We don't usually let them Kind of grow to the full size for the onion root, right? Therefore that the spacing of these spring onions would have to be a little bit more than it is in this particular case You will also see that we have several pots around here. We have kale growing around here. I can see chilies I can see talanum. I can see I think some beans in the background Also Some peppermint and so on. So what we try to do is we try to ensure that we have a lot of diversity because this also helps us Experience less damage from pests, right? Yeah, there's some lettuce in there also. So so ideally in your garden space Try and make sure that you grow many things and yet get sufficient quantities of the things that you're really interested in consuming Okay after this we'll move on to microgreens and you know This is something that a lot of urban folks especially seem to have a great interest in eating There are certain benefits that we believe, you know, nitro green microgreens provide In terms of nutrition itself. It's like sprouts Are popular with a lot of people who have a greater interest in healthy food because they create they contain a lot more nutritious Materials in them at that stage of growth. Similarly, microgreens are seen as providing A lot of the benefits or a lot of the same benefits but with larger and different You know form of plant you're not you don't have just a sprout You actually have some amount of leaves and it can be used Either as an addition in your food or to eat or also, right? So it adds texture and flavor to your dishes It is nutritious addition to a salad that you may be making And the most interesting perspective Perhaps, you know, or rather the the thing about them from the perspective of a Urban gardener somebody who's growing in a city in a balcony is that it grows This does pretty well even in pretty shaded balconies. It does not require locked of light It does pretty well even in low light conditions Now, uh, I'll come to preparing your microgreen trays and I think I'll should I hand it over to you? Okay, I'll just go over it. So basically microgreens are grown in shallow trays and containers Yogitha will just demonstrate it to you in a minute And these shallow trays and containers, you know, could have as little as an inch layer of soil Typically when growing microgreens, we use vermicompost because it's already already been thoroughly digested You know in through by the earthworms and is and and it's much likely less likely to have other seeds or any pathogens in it We also use cocoa peat, which is again the dust that you get out of coconuts after they make ropes and other things out of them And this is kind of compacted and sold in blocks most of the time You need to take the blocks and dip them in a bucket of water They sort of open up and increase in volume and once you've sort of shade right them You use it to make your mix your medium or soil for this microgreen So about 70% of cocoa peat and 30% of vermicompost is sufficient We are not putting large amounts of nutrients like vermicompost We are not putting large amounts of nutrients like vermicompost only for the reason that it's You know just a 15 odd day growing period and you don't really need a lot of nutrition right now We basically also have This other rule which we don't reuse the medium again and again not for growing microgreens So what will typically happen is we will use a particular tray We will do microgreens in a tray and once that microgreen lot is harvested We will probably reuse that in pots in growing pots where we are growing other things and we don't use it in The trays itself yoghita will talk a little bit about why that is One very important thing to consider is because microgreens are basically small baby plants which are grown very densely We need a lot of seeds for this So if during the lockdown you don't have access to a lot of seeds This may be something that you have to wait to get started Of course, there are some things in your kitchen which you may have adequate quantity of seeds up for and These will really be something you can get started at this time also So yoghita will you know talk about some of these things in a little greater detail as she demonstrates things And we will kind of you know go through this also I'm going to switch over to yoghita and She'll demonstrate exactly what you mean Okay So I have my tray here again And if you look I don't know visible clearly, but if you look you can see that There are 10 little katori's in here of which three of them that is 30 percent Contain coco peat these three and seven of them have ours Sorry these contain vermicompost and these over here contain coco peat So that's the proportion of the two that you need to mix it in Can I be heard Yeah, so So 70 percent Coco peat 30 percent vermicompost. That's an appropriate mix We mix these and we get we'll put them into the tray But before that, I just want to mention that you could use seeds that you buy from outside for your And we'll go through which are the ones that make good microgreens. For example, I have radish A whole packet full of radish seeds and you will need a lot of seeds to make microgreens But if you're unable to get this you can take, you know, whole urad dal whole moon dal that is Amply available in many homes these sprout really quickly and make for very nutritious and they grow quickly as well And and nutritious microgreens then you have pea shoots which are very popular So if you don't have peas, you know dried peas, there's this other vatana that can be soaked and can be planted. This also would make really nice microgreens Then you have mustard seeds again, they'll have a nice sharp flavor You can also try methi methi tastes really nice as a microgreen in our warm and tropical conditions The winters actually are best for Growing methi in the summer months. It's difficult. So they do work very well as microgreens at this point in time Um So these are some of the seeds that you can use. Let's do the mix tada. Can I have your help, please? to make this mix can you upturn all of these? and 70 30 Of this mix it up. Well, one of the things while tada is mixing I will talk about is that you know a lot of the seeds that are commercially available have a A coating of some kind of a fungal side or some kind of a Some treatment usually a theorem. I think that's used But you'll find that either the seeds don't look the natural color You'll find sometimes they have a nail polishy kind of coating Do not use those seeds because those are poisons that they put on the seed to prevent Fungal problems as seeds germinate So you need to necessarily get untreated seeds if you can access organic seeds all the better But even if they are just untreated, they are good enough You should not use and if you buy one of the commercial packets of seeds You will find that it says do not use as food or feed because it contains poison So do not use those you could fall sick just to sort of cut in yoghita One of the things that in this particular case is Yoghita is talking about not using these for microgreens because you will still have the seed residue when you actually harvest your greens It'll be very close to the plant itself So if you were growing this as a seedling in your pots or your nurseries It wouldn't be such so much of a problem One of the things you can also do to reduce this coating though I would still not use coated seeds for microgreens is the diluted milk So you can pretty much soak them for an hour or two yoghita or maybe overnight In diluted milk maybe overnight Yeah, at least three four hours and this would reduce that coating it would wash off some of those Fungicides and make it sort of easier to Use in your growing process. I am I just mean in the sense that it's a little closer to a healthier kind of seed Okay, so now what kind of a container to you basically we don't need a very deep container A shallow container of about an inch or an inch and a half depth is sufficient I have a typical container that we can use for microgreens What's important is the number of holes that you see over here. If you see there are several holes in this This is a hydroponic tray actually and it can be used just as well for microgreens If you don't have access to this any good old abba tip and abba from your kitchen will do Make sure you poke holes so that the water drains out excess water can be a problem It may cause fungal issues. So this is tara's Lunchbox that can be used You need to make holes in this or any other container. This is actually much deeper than we need If you use a container this deep make sure you bring the soil right up till the top because during harvesting If it is deep inside you will find it very difficult to cut and you will lose a lot of your microgreens So now we're going to use this container Tara can you help me fill this thing? Yeah, maybe I'll hold this up and Empty it in here and give me that other container over there We have prepared another container already with the same 70 30 mix And can you spread it out so that it Yeah, nice and and maybe we may need a little more It will it's always a good idea to use a light hand and level it out like this And if we need a little more because it'll settle once it water I'll You know use up a little more that I have prepared here smoothen it out smoothen it out Okay, and I'm going to plant um seeds of radish in this Radish has a nice spicy pungent kick. It tastes great in a salad It tastes great in a Sandwich it tastes great on anything actually Okay, that's it. That's it. That's it. It's smooth enough. That's it. All right now Level level, you know the the reason it should be level is otherwise water will be more in some spots and will be left in others So it needs to be What one other way of doing it Tara is like this Okay, yeah, thank you Now you have a little bit gathered here. So can I just level this out this way? Yeah, that's it Okay, and then you need to have some to sprinkle on top once it is done So let's do the radish seeds So this we have to make sure There are two ways to do this either you can make you know just furrows with your finger like this at say closer closer So you can use two fingers like this Yeah, two and a half in spacing now spread it Or you can even just directly do it and maybe make one last one over here Like this and we can sprinkle them in the furrows and then you gently cover it or the other way to do it is just um Have it plain sprinkle it, you know All over one minute one minute one minute don't be impatient Yeah, and spread it out not too thick and Not too not too So like this So I am choosing to do it the second way because I want it to be a little dense And that it will um So you can see how dense it is You should be able to see the some of the soil as well Spread it all out Tara now just can you sit here one minute one? Yeah, thank you Okay Where you find it's too dense. You can just use your fingers and sort of spread it a little evenly and this will Now work out to be fairly Okay, here we go So if you can see maybe I'll hold it closer to the camera More or less. That's the density we've got now what I will do sit down Now what I will do Is I will take the remaining Mix the same mix And just cover it very lightly so that these are not visible Okay And then again with a um with a very light Hand or you can use a roll scan watering can make sure that You water it well because there are so many holes the water will Come out and you will need to keep checking for moisture level It should not go dry That's the main thing because if it does then your germination process either slows down or stops completely so it should be continuously moist But not wet as you can see now the seeds should not be visible So let's cover them up and again. I won't water it here, but with a light shower can You just water it all the water will rain out and now this is ready and I'll just show you um This is something I planted In rows about a week ago. It's not yet ready for harvest. This is a little Um past I would have actually planted it a little closer. I had someone healthy and so we sort of didn't quite get it Right, but this is not too bad as these grow a little They will sort of cover up this space, but you can see there are clean lines here And that's another way to go about doing it also. This is red amaranth This was planted on the 70 So as this grows we will perhaps in the next couple of sessions even show how these are to be harvest Okay, so I'll continue with the Slides, please give me a moment Yeah, so just you know recapping what you with I said you have a 70 30 mix of Cocopeat and verbing compost and you create a really level kind of surface of soil or of mixture using the tray The the seeds can be sown in In Sort of rows or in the way that yoghita demonstrated This is how they look at the early stages just like the amaranth that Yoghita red amaranth that yoghita just showed you think in this case. It's either mustard or maybe radish itself Yeah, and This is how they look when they are almost ready to harvest So you can see these these are probably about 15 days or 16 days old, right? One thing to just note when we are seeing 15 odd days What tends to happen is things like mustard germinate very quickly in just a couple of days So it may take three or four extra days for some other things to get Uh, you know ready just because their germination time may be longer Maybe say five six days instead of just a couple of days, which mustard tends to do Right So, yeah, I mean in terms of setting up the microgreens tray itself I think you have a pretty good sense of How things need to go and I'll move on to Things that you need to keep in mind when you're growing microgreens just as a sort of summarizing thing to that demonstration uh, the first thing to remember is that Microgreens with violent theory you can grow almost anything that you have sufficient of You know quantity of seed for as a microgreen There are certain varieties that are more popular. So arugula or rocket which is from the mustard family is a popular thing It has a stronger taste a little nippier just like the Radish that yoghita just showed us Basil has you know its own unique flavor even when it's young and therefore that makes for an interesting set of microgreens also Amaranth which she showed you mustard Radish lettuce these are all you know popular things that people consume as microgreens But you can even look beyond these more popular varieties to try seeds from your kitchen, especially right now You may have a lot of methi seeds which you can use you may have rye or sarsow those Are typically available because we use them for tarkas and things like that Or we may have wheat moong or even whole masoor and each of these things can be used Where the seeds are still viable they can be used in order to grow microgreens Just repeating what yoghita explained was that we shouldn't use treated seeds as much as possible As they contain a little bit of fungicides, which is not the healthiest to have to deal with the residue of that so close to the sowing stage Do not sow the seeds too dense because otherwise what tends to happen is they crowd each other And create a very humid environment and if there is a lot of moisture you will have a fungal disease Which is called damping off and you'll just find a bunch of them falling over just almost like in a herd like a pack Or like a set of dominoes knocking each other down and that's not really what you want to be eating The seeds that you have which have thick seed course can be pre-soaked so that you know, they are ready before they actually Get sown in the In the trays itself, right? So that's something else that you want to keep in mind Now coming to how you harvest the microgreens So what you want to do is very gently use your hand to so you typically try to Cut from the corner of the tray So you start from one corner Perhaps if you're right-handed this would mean the right side corner And you want to expose the stems so that they are visible and you can use I think a scissor is great or a knife in that sense I think a scissor is really better unless you've got a very sharp knife And you can actually cut them maybe at an inch off the ground of the soil, right? So just trim them so you Actually consume not just the leaf but also the stem Right, but you cut a little ways off the ground Um Important important thing what yoghita mentioned about making sure that your soil is coming up close enough to the lip of the tray In order to allow that to happen Yeah, if you leave that too low the soil level too low You will have big problems getting it or you will not be able to harvest the same kind of quantity Or volume specifically that you can do otherwise okay Now just a quick summary since we are drawing pretty much to the end of the presentation part of this session The first thing is we talked about seedlings And that these can be sown either in a group Removed separated and then transplanted into your growing pot Or it can be a single seedling in a single cup And we've talked about some of the benefits of these Uh the individual seedlings as we said are much easier to transplant You will know that your seedlings are busy Already when you see four to six true leaves So by this what I mean is that the first two leaves are what we call the seed leaves They provide food to the growing baby plant and it's after these first two that the Uh actual real true leaves come out and you got to make sure that at least four to six of these Exists now typically a seedling will be about three and a half to four inches tall When it is ready to transplant so between three to four inches depending on which type of seedling it is Yeah, and typically this will take 21 to 25 days Sometimes depending on conditions may be a little longer or a little quicker But more or less it tends to be in that 21 to 25 day range Uh plant requirements will determine what you should plan together if you're putting multiple things in a pot As we said you need to make sure that you uh, you know Follow a certain system while putting two things together Uh a low plant or several low plants along with a taller plant so that there is no interference for sunlight And also to avoid overcrowding You know we harvest some of these things a little earlier than we normally might uh microgreens which Seem to be something that a lot of people are interested in growing These are really something that you can grow very well in most households and especially when you're uh, you know space space availability for you is limited And when direct sunlight is not easily available in your balconies Then this is something that certainly can be very productive for you Right Um, I like to explain a little bit about what will be coming in the session next week Uh, we will this this will be on the thursday the 30th of april And we shall talk about growing and caring for your plants. What are the things that you need to do? Watering sunlight nutrients pruning all the different things that contribute to this plant care and plant health And we shall also discuss something that we haven't talked about so far Which is how do we prevent pests and disease? Uh using organic methods or integrated pest management or you know, whatever the word you are familiar with it as being um I think that's going to be a very interesting session if you've had a good start I think this is going to be the place in which there is a lot of work to do and a lot to learn and master Uh to register for this section session. I mean if you've already registered for the sessions no problem I think you'll get a reminder email which will tell you when the session is coming up But in case you haven't please just go to has geek.com slash kilter Anyone can grow series the url right here and you shall be able to sign up over there Right Thank you for taking the time to be here for this session and for listening to us patiently These are our contact addresses Number one you can email us at green essentials info at at the rate green essentials dot in That's g-r-e-n-e-s-s-e-n-t-i-l-s dot i-n And we can also continue a more interactive conversation using telegram If you're not familiar with telegram, it's an app a messaging app that you can install on your phone Uh, it's available on both apple and android phones. You just have to go install the app and then use this link Use this link, which is t.me slash anyone can grow In order to join this group So we have a group called anyone can grow on telegram and this link will help you join this group Right, uh, in case you're having trouble with any of this, please do get in touch with us and we'll send the link over to you Also, right, uh, so that's a place in which you can share your photographs We can maybe diagnose problems or challenges that you're facing and You know help you achieve better success in your garden. So Coming to the end of this particular session in terms of the presentation itself It's time now for the qna session or the am a Please ask away ask us anything that you want to know it may be related to what we've done in this session Or it may be related to uh, you know, what what what we've done in previous sessions We'll do our best to answer them A reminder if you haven't put these in the questions need to go into the qna tab in your zoom interface Uh, so please share those with us and I'll ask has geek to please help us Through the question so that we can answer them Thanks Karan and Yoveta. It was a very informative session. Um, we have a lot of questions This time most of them are on pest control something that we're going to be dealing with next week But there are also a few on microgreens. So I'll just start off with that The first question is um from joy He asked, uh, if coriander can be grown the microgreen way Uh, yes, it can Coriander can be grown as a microgreen of course like I said, so two challenges there joy First is that coriander is a you know, sort of a hardy seed So in order to make sure that it germinates you will have to Sort of break the husk of the seed which you can do by putting it in a piece of cloth And pressing down and rolling your hand over it so that the husk opens up Then the seed is actually exposed. Otherwise your germination times may be very long Of course, you need to have sufficient seeds also So just make sure you have a sufficient quantity of seed for whatever you're growing containers Um, the next question is from Shreya. She asks if You have a big tray for growing microgreens. Is it possible to grow different varieties of seeds in one? Absolutely, you can divide up your tray into two into four whatever works for you We often do that because I personally find that that much of one thing is boring and it's just too much So I usually divide up the train to half and in half of it I would so say amaranth and in the other half I would so Radish or arugula or basil in basil taste of me and it works perfectly well for sure That's a nice way to bring some variety into what you're eating also. Yeah I would just like to add to that by saying that you know because microgreens don't have a lot of volume You just make want to make sure that you get your calculation, right? Otherwise What you end up with is You know a situation where the volume of what you've chosen isn't enough to be You know shared between say two or three people, right? So just adding to what yoghita said Yes, you can divide the trays, but that's only if you have a really big tray If it's a smaller tray then that may not work as well Okay, um the next question is from jessica She asks if there are any special tips for growing microgreens directly on the ground Rather than on ports Jessica I would not really grow microgreens In the ground and the reason that I say for that is Is that since it is at such a low level close to the soil If there is something wrong in the soil nearby It's it's likely to affect your microgreens. So by that I mean like you know If you if you just take an example of a typical garden if you've got a dog He's going to visit and if he's going to visit he's probably going to shower it So that's not a lot of fun when you're eating microgreens with taller plants over time A lot of that washes off because the top top the microgreens itself grow just over two weeks She also asks if Um Once you cut the microgreens, uh, do they grow back again or No, they don't and that's one of the reasons why microgreens in my view are not a very efficient use of seed Because once you harvest them they are done they will not grow back Also, uh, somebody asked if monsoon is a bad time to grow microgreens No monsoon is not a in fact microgreens. I think is something that can be grown all year round If you have a sheltered balcony as long as you know, you're not keeping it In fact, you should not keep this out completely in sunlight. It should get a little bit of light That's fine But it does not need a whole lot of light and if it gets a lot of water from the rain the heavy monsoons that we have They will just get flattened or they will you know fall to one side and they will be unhealthy So, um, because you don't need it to be out in the open You can grow this 12 months of the year and you can grow it in any small corner of your apartment or in By a window or by a balcony that doesn't even get a lot of sunlight. So 12 months is good Yeah, just want to check whether There are any other questions Anish is he may have lost I'm having some disturbance Okay in the background Can you just take over and I'm just trying to fix this Sure Uh, Karan, can you hear me? Yes? Yes, absolutely. Okay. So, uh, we have a bunch of questions Let me see if I can try to bunch some of these questions. Um There are a bunch of questions on bugs. So let's try to get these first One is uh, my basil plants have got black bugs which are eating away the plant How can I get rid of them and another question is I tried spraying neem oil, but they still persist Okay, so most likely black bugs, especially if they are on the under side of the basil leaf is black aphids And uh, the problem the the the the the problem of black aphids usually happens in the transition of seasons And when there is not great circulation air circulation possible So essentially aphids they love humidity and warmth And especially when you're going I I If if you're in Bangalore for instance, you may be going from cooler weather to warmer weather right now And the humidity may be higher than it has been over the last few months And you know, you will have aphids appear But they tend the problem tends to be more severe when you have not spaced out your plants either your pots properly And therefore breeze is not flowing in so you could be trapped in those spaces That's when the problem tends to be more severe Right, so the best thing to do with aphids is uh, this this depends a little bit on the age of The plants but in older plants the way that we could we teach it treated is we can actually just use a toothbrush and soap solution And brush them off. They don't have wings. They're not going to come back So you can just toss them away somewhere far away, you know in the garden or whatever it is And you will have solved the problem for your garden for now Uh, thanks Karan. Uh, Kora, I hope this answers your question. Okay, back to uh, last couple of questions on Pests and then we'll go to the next self questions. One is from Viraj Where he said he's been using a mix of soap and tobacco and water For the small pests on his greens, but it hasn't worked. I have been spraying twice a day Should I also add some chili powder or garlic or neem? And uh, another question is Uh, will you be taking a special session on integrated pest management? I suppose that takes care of the pests Okay, so the last question first. Yes, we will be looking at an integrated approach to managing pests in the next session So, um, make sure you're there for that. We will there are a bunch of Things that we do to make sure that we manage pests preventive and curative both and we will talk about those Viraj about your pest problem. It depends what the pest is and what is the cause I mean, you know knowing what the pest is and why it is there helps you tackle the situation better like One can generally spray neem on everything and it might and it might not work But if you know the particular pest if you can identify it And you can sort of just observe and see what are the the conditions that are creating Uh, that that are favorable for its presence Then you can work towards making those unfavorable That's really the the kind of mentality that you would have that. Okay. Why is this pest here? Why does it like this and can I do something that makes the environment inhospitable that basically repels them? So maybe if you let us know what that is I can give you a more specific answer for that Um in general a neem spray does work for many things But like I said, it's always good to know the proper context to be able to be more specific with your response to a pest problem So if you can do this, I I don't know if you're already on the telegram group But if you can join us over there Then what we'll do is that we'll and if you can post some photographs Then that'll allow us to sort of identify the pest and to make sure that we can give you a very specific solution Okay, uh, thanks. Yogi talk current. Uh, kora has more questions on The proportion of soap to water can we take this on telegram so that we can answer more questions that are there otherwise Uh, kora will paste the link here for the telegram group Would request kora and viraj and some of the others to join so that we can take the next set of questions Okay, so in the q&a tab just before you start that zainab if I can quickly Interrupt just for a second. Yeah general. I would Say this I I know that when we started growing we were equally anxious about pests and disease And this is a very natural reaction when one is new to growing because one sort of feels that you know disasters just around the corner and But let me reassure you Don't think too much about pests if you can help it Those solutions will come and typically pest problems will happen as the plants get older Usually I don't see a lot of problems happening in the first month for example, right? So usually those happen later, which is why we'll cover it in the next session. Uh, don't stress too much about it Uh, eventually when we are taking an organic approach We basically say that you know prevention is our goal and if we do lose one thing It's not too bad as long as we don't lose, you know, huge amounts of the crop Thanks for this prescription current. So back to the q&a tab. We move from unlucky number 13 to now 11 questions Let's try to take them in a bunch of groups. Um We have one question from devaki who asks Whether it's okay to use the potting mix sold by green essentials to grow the micro greens Because she already has some of that in stock We have one more question for green essentials From avani who says that she bought brazilian spinach from green essentials today And she was told she can grow it directly in soil How big is a bed that she should make for it and she has a single bag to grow? Uh, we'll take more questions after Okay, so the last question always stays in my mind first. I'll start with that Um, of me actually brazilian spinach will take over whatever area you give it So if you have a lot of air plant it in there brazilian spinach prefers a semi shaded kind of environment So if you have a place where I would say save up the sunlight for things that cannot do without it And push things that are okay in semi shade into semi shade. So Make as big a bed as you want if you creep and crawl it's a beautiful ground cover It looks gorgeous nice dark leaves and it's a perennial. So that means it will be there all the while And you just keep harvesting and it will keep spreading and you keep harvesting and it will keep spreading So give it as much space as you have or you can afford to give it and that should be fine um, the question before that was about whether you can use potting soil for Growing microgreens. I would not use potting soil because potting soil comes with 50 soil and often that soil contains Um, you know seeds of different kinds of weeds. It may have pathogens That may not be digested as in the case with vermicompost and cocopeat So, um, I would stick to a soil less mix for microgreens and the soil The potting soil or the soil mix can be used either in your pot Or in in like a small garden space that you demarcate. So, yeah, I would go with a soil less Soil less mix for microgreens Thanks. So we can take the next set of questions Let's see. Uh, we have a couple of questions about Poor little plants. There is tomatoes are blackened at the bottom. What should I do? And another one saying that, uh, it's been four to five weeks, but I have only one or two chilies. Uh, why? okay, so The blackening at the bottom of tomato is not a good sign Basically, it's a flung fungal disease that seems to be occurring over there Right. So what you want to do is that you want to very quickly Cut down your watering, uh, and you want to move these to a very sunny spot So if this is possible, please do this immediately The idea being the reduced availability of moisture and you know the the the kind of exclusion of moisture Due to the sunlight will lead to conditions which should allow them to recover Of course, you know a photograph would help to show the extent of the damage, but uh, I would say in general that is the approach that you take to deal with this right now Was there a second part of that? No, there wasn't but arthi had another question Which is that she also has other plants like mango and rum ful, but they don't fruit Uh, there is a related question on what is the best time to grow lettuce? Okay, so arthi, um You know fruiting plants is another whole session You know the way they function, but um, you know, is it that the flowers are coming and they are falling prematurely? Is it that your plant is not flowering at all? So the reason why it's not producing would be many how old is your tree? Um, you know what kind of soil Is it growing in what kind of nutrition are you providing it? So there are many reasons that about six or seven things that you need to sort of look at before you understand Why a tree is not fruiting? um, if you can get back with a more specific thing or maybe on um on telegram we could have a little discussion about it There's a lot to be spoken about for uh, why fruit trees don't I'm sorry. I'm not able to give you a specific answer But bottom line is you need to fix your soil, but more specific once we get more input from you Um, what was the second question? Yeah, uh, so we had uh, we had what is the best time to grow lettuce and uh, yeah Okay, so lettuce is basically a temperate crop. It's not typically from our tropical areas It prefers cooler climb like a cooler climate and usually in our conditions in our tropical conditions Our winter is the best time which means that when the nighttime temperatures go down and are closer towards 20 degrees Celsius at night That is when germination Peaks if you will get best germination rates 90 plus and the plants grow really healthy So I would say you can start your um, I don't know where you're located But if you were in the coconut area or anywhere that gets more or less a warm tropical kind of climate I would say you start after october And november december january february up to february is good And if you have you know some freak of weather like we have now I have been the plants that I planted have continued to grow Right now that it's still april usually that doesn't happen But it's that stretch of winter and it does well then So just to add to what yoghita said a couple of parameters. So You know if you're living in banglore, then that's like cheating. So, you know, I mean even now you're going to have great weather for growing lettuce So that's one part of the equation If you're in warmer places like everywhere more humid places. Yes, lettuce does go grow challenging at this point in time Just in order to give you a reference range Lettuce loves it between so if you're growing heading lettuces, which are the types that form into balls, right? Iceberg or something like that, right? So they will tend to prefer temperatures of say 15 to 25 degrees or so They will be fine in that range minimum to maximums But if you're growing loosely lettuce varieties something we grow more of when the The climates are generally a little warmer like in india Then they are happiest between somewhere between 18 to 30 Now what happens at this time of the year is you start pushing past 30 on the maximums And your minimums get closer to like 23 24 degrees or so. That's what Makes it challenging to grow lettuce. So I hope that you know gives you enough of a sense to Grow successfully Best time like yoghita said is starting october november. That's when you should best grow lettuce Okay, we have four more questions There are two from joy. So I'll go with those first He says he's been using a mixed bag from his local plant cellar On the bag it says contents are manure sand soil Fertile soil cocoa peat and husk But no proportions have been given and he's been using it as it is. Does he need anything to change? He has another question, but we could take that after you respond to this one So Not really. I'm most of the ingredients seem right Of course, like he said you one can't be certain of the proportions But by and large I find nurseries do a pretty decent job with their potting mixes, right? So so unless you have experienced Specific like lack of nutrient issues, which you could supplement by adding more vermicompost or cow dung I would say most of those things are good a lot of those ingredients like sand Coco peat and all are to improve number one the drainage of the soil And also to improve the water holding capacity of the soil, which the coco peat does So it doesn't sound like it's unduly Different from what we would use Okay, and his second question is how do I choose the seedlings to transplant if I do not want to transplant all the seedlings He also mentions he went a little over enthusiastic and germinated a lot of seeds Yeah, so joy first time I planted seedlings I planted Noll coal or coal rabbi. I don't know if you know it And I emptied the entire packet. So I had somewhere over a hundred seedlings I thought I was a genius Unfortunately, I planted them at absolutely the worst time of the year which was in october Which means we had those kind of post monsoon shower and all hundred died At which point I thought I was a dud You know the answer is somewhere between the two now In terms of the seedlings very simple survival of the fittest is guaranteed So just pick the healthiest of those seedlings and transplant those You know in the quantities that you actually need them By and large and this is this is one of the other reasons where I feel that one seed to one cup Method works a lot better It's because you are able to sort of Ensure that you don't waste a lot of seeds So you end up using only maybe 10 or 12 seeds and you know, you're happy because that's as many plants as you wanted Yeah, you can decide that. Okay. I want to have twice as many But as you see if you end up planting 10 times as many then it leads to a lot of wastage Of course, you can also use the surplus seedlings give it to a neighbor That's the best way to make productive use of them Pick the best ones out transplant them Then give the let the others grow out a little more and give them to somebody else who's interested in growing Should we take the last two questions? Yeah, okay, great. Uh, so there is uh, devaki shingray who asks That she's been using a plastic potting tray similar to the one you showed in one of your slides To grow red amaranth. She has almost eight to ten red amaranth plants growing at sufficient distance But in a single potting tray Is that okay because she has been having a pretty good harvest with lots of large leaves Okay, so I mean if you're having a good harvest, that's good. I'm just curious what is Of your tray. Is it as deep as this one or this is about an inch and a half perhaps Or is it if it was deeper? I think your plants would live longer and you get a better productivity out of them so, um Again, if you share a photo, we'll be able to give you a more specific answer. But um, if there are five or seven If I okay, let's look at it another way if I was to transplant um Amaranth plants into a pot. I would put one plant per Ten inch pot not even an eight inch pot And you know the the the interesting thing about plants is that the more room they get to grow the bigger they grow If you keep them in a small confined space, they will grow in that much But if you want more productivity and more yield give them the room and they will produce more So, um, if you're happy with what you have there's nothing wrong with it You just want to check on the depth to make sure that there is enough nutrition going around for all of them And a photo of your container would help us answer that better. But I hope this helps you for the moment So the reason yoghita is just saying that is that if you don't have enough depths and the plants get taller They are likely to topple over because they don't have a stable kind of anchor, which is what the roots also provide All right, uh, we have one last question. I think devaki has already joined the telegram group So she could be posting some photographs over there We have a last question from jessica who says that she has a two-year-old malaba spinach plant Which is quite huge and going on a trellis It has given her great leaves and It has gone Totally dry and mostly it is very long thick wine with a couple of live green shoots One farmer neighbor says that I should cut it at the bottom and let it regrow Another says leave the long stalk and it will start again in monsoon. What do you recommend? She's also posted a question in the chat which she asked saying that do you sell at green essentials the big planting tray That you were using for the micro greens and do you have it available? Yeah Okay, so again last question first. Yes, this is sold at green essentials and yes, it is currently available Um with regards to your malaba spinach, there are two three things you can do I would go with a haircut like I would cut off the long dry this Because I feel that the plant is carrying dead weight and there's no need for that to be there You give it a cut it sort of perks up and it will go give it a little more compost and it will grow back from there Um, I would go with that approach Um, you know, if you don't have a water shortage and you can water right now Then you don't have to really wait for the monsoon for things to spring back Sometimes people say that you should wait until the rains to plant something is because the water is freely available You don't need to keep going out and watering your plants So if you have access to sufficient water and you can water your plants Give it a haircut. Give it a little more compost and it'll come back to life another thing about Malaba spinach is they produce these little tiny flowers and If you have the variety that we have at green essentials, it has a red stem and it produces these Red they look like black pepper cons the seeds and if you squish them It stains your hand with a beautiful burgundy ink Those actually are seeds that can be planted again So if you collect those and they usually come around the time of holy which is around march You will have ample seeds on one plant and literally you need like two seeds from that You plant it again, you'll get a whole fresh round of plants So one way is to continue with the plant you have the other way is collect some of the seeds and plant them And you will get new plants right away Yogi, what would you do? Would you make cuttings from this plant or it depends on what the How would you be able to or how would you do it? Yes You can you can take cuttings from the existing plant take healthy cuttings Don't take the tips that are too thin take the slightly thicker more mature stem snip those out and You know, you can snip off the extra long bits from it and put in Like two nodes into the soil and that also There's root and it goes into a new plant. So that's yet another way of propagating malabar It really is a very productive plant Produces nice big thick leaves and can be eaten raw. It can be cooked And it's really high in vitamin C. So it's a good one to have in your garden So that brings us to the end of the questions and answers We see that a few more people have joined the telegram group. So that's a good thing And if there are any instructions for next week, I think Yogi the current this might be a good time to give that term and over to you Okay Yeah, just give me a minute. So Okay, so now that we are done with the questions a couple of bits of information You know, if you've been having trouble finding vegetable seeds, then What we do is we run something called the seed store You can order the seeds online and we ship them to you but not yet After May 3rd, we are not clear right now when courier services will start delivering So go have a look see what's available. Maybe decide what you want to grow in subsequent seasons And if you'd like to try our seed that would be One way to go Also, if you need help with your kitchen garden, you're looking for advice online You know, we can do this one on one with you also if you have a lot more questions to do These sessions will continue of course for a couple of more weeks They shall it should be next week on the 30th And then I guess the 7th after that 7th or 8th