Apr 14 2008
Organic Indoor Gardening
The idea behind organic indoor gardening is simple: pack up everything you know about organic gardening and move it indoors.
What Is Indoor Organic Gardening Anyway?
Simply put, indoor organic gardening is the indoor cultivation of plants without using synthetic fertilizers or pesticides. Organic gardeners focus on every phase of a plant’s life and every component that goes into a plant’s health, from the water and soil to the climate and insect life. Applied to indoor gardening, organic gardening means that artificial lights are permitted, but artificial fertilizers and pesticides are not.
Organic Gardening With Indoor Herbs
One of the easiest ways to get started with organic indoor gardening is to culinary herbs indoors. Growing herbs is fun and easy to do, and you can use herbs for recipes in your kitchen, for homeopathic healing remedies, and for room-freshening potpourris and sachets.
Herbs need well-drained soil, so use an organic soil mix made for cactus or other plants that thrive in dry weather. Put your herbs in a south-facing window where they can get four to five hours of bright sunlight every day. During the winter, you may need to supplement the light by using fluorescent lights for up to 12 hours a day.
Inspect the leaves of your herbs often for signs of pest damage. If you find aphids or other leaf-eating animals on your herbs, pick them off and drown the bugs in tap water. Spray the infested plants with a diluted insecticidal soap, being sure to coat both the top and the underside of the leaves.
Organic Indoor Gardening Fertilizers
Fortunately, many organic fertilizers are available for use in indoor gardens. The ingredients organic fertilizers are made from often don’t sound or smell very pretty, but they are chemical-free, and they will produce amazing results in your indoor organic garden.
Fish fertilizer is a liquid made of bits and pieces of seagoing fish. Mix it with water according to the instructions on the container, and water your indoor plants with it. Fish fertilizer has a strong fishy smell, but the odor disappears soon after the soil dries.
Bone meal and blood meal are byproducts of the meat business. These fertilizers come in powdered form and should be stirred in to the top surface of the soil.
Indoor Gardening With Organic Pesticides
Regular plant inspections are the mainstay of indoor organic gardening. It’s best to spot problems, including pest infestations, early, before they get out of hand. Keep insects away from plants by lighting citronella candles regularly. Flying insects don’t like the scent of citronella oil in the air. Kill crawling insects by adding one teaspoon of dishwashing detergent to a quart of water. Pour the solution into a spray bottle, and spray the plant thoroughly, including the underside of the leaves.
Indoor organic gardening is fun, easy to do, and good for your plants and the environment.
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