The Greenest Thumb! Contest: Kristen's Tropical Laboratory

(Apologies to Kristen whose submission was lost until today!)

Name: Kristen
Location: Morningside Heights
Size: 2 indoor windowsills, plus some other places Favorite seed
Favorite Resource: grocery store fruit
Pitch:

"I don't have any outdoor space to grow plants, so I've used the living room and kitchen windows for my plant laboratory. In the living room, the windowsill has (left to right) strawberry guava, calamondin, lychee, calamondin, lychee, calamondin, and avocado....." [more below]

The strawberry guava was purchased from Gurney's online, and the lychees came from pits from fruit I ate. The calamondins come from the seed of a single ripe fruit that fell off of an expensive plant at a nursery (I asked if I could take it home with me). If you don't find a stray calamondin fruit, kumquat seeds grow just as fast. The avocado pit was donated by a friend.

This is a very dark corner, but the plants grow fine.

Comments (6)

Hmmm. I spy a fellow science geek.

Good job on the greenery!

The nice thing about buying a calamondin on dwarf rootstock is that it will flower and fruit much, much sooner. If I didn't love the unripe fruit for SE Asian cooking, I'd love it for the scent of those blossoms in winter.

regards,
trillium

posted by trillium on 2006-07-11 13:05:59

thanks, maxwell!

to kristen: beautiful plants; I am impressed by your ingenuity, as always!

posted by jesse on 2006-07-11 14:52:03

I've always been too impatient and distrustful of my ability to grow ANYTHING to plant seeds. Do you just keep them in damp potting soil?

I've got a nectarine pit on my desk. Think that'd work?

posted by AMLitt on 2006-07-11 17:19:17

AMLitt - If you're new to growing things from seeds, you're much less likely to suffer disappointment if you plant from a packet of seeds. The back of the packet usually has very good instructions on what the plant requires and how to plant the seeds.

posted by Allison on 2006-07-11 19:07:51

I am always amazed by our fellow urban dwellers who refuse to let our concrete lifestyle prevent us from becoming true gardeners.

I vacation in the summer in Maine where lush gardens fill up large ancient plots of dark soil, yet nothing beats walking down a dirty and run down street in Bed Stuy or WIlliamsburg and coming across someone's gardening fantasy coming to life right there; blooming out of recycled soup cans and milk containers and bringing new life to a struggling community.

All the garden entries on this site prove the statement to be true: Where there's a will there's a way.

I am moving this month to a house with no gardening options and I am bringing about 50 fire escape plants with me. I have no fire escape in this new place, but I keep telling myself, "where there's a will there's a way."

posted by Jessica on 2006-07-12 05:35:32

A+++++++ for effort, in spite of the challenge! :)

posted by louise on 2006-07-12 18:49:01