From house to table

Germinate seeds and grow your own food with a few helpful tips and tricks

There comes a time in every plant enthusiast’s life where they feel the need to expand their horizons and change things up a bit.

Maybe you’ve been able to grow new succulents from leaves, gotten a pothos cutting to grow roots, or got your Hoya plant to flower (lucky!), but you still want more.

Have you ever considered growing your own herbs, fruits, and veggies? Even if you don’t have access to a backyard or community garden you need not fear — there are a few really fun ways to grow your own food indoors or on your balcony. Many are very cheap and easy, and some may just involve the produce that’s starting to wilt in your fridge.

Take a green onion for example. Simply put the white root end into a cup of water and be sure to keep it topped up. In no time at all, you’ll be growing fresh green onion for your food.

When your potatoes start to grow eyes and look alien, stick them in a 2.5-litre storage container and grow your own. Start by putting a few inches of soil in your container and putting the potatoes on top of it, adding more soil to cover them. Keep the soil moist and add more as your plants grow. Once the plants outgrow their nursery, pot them and set them beside a window that’ll give them several hours of light. Once the potatoes are ready to be harvested, your plant will begin to turn yellow and die off.

Save your avocado pit! The pointier end is the top while the rounded end is the bottom, which is where the roots will grow from. Take a few toothpicks and insert them at a downward angle. This is to hold the pit so the bottom can rest in a cup of water and root and the top can stay dry. A little tree will start to develop. When this tree reaches around six inches tall, you can pot it in soil. A word of warning though — it could be three to four years until you get an avocado off your tree, and what you get might not taste like the avocado it came from. The tasty avocados you enjoy are from trees that have been grafted together (read: a twig or segment from one tree is put into the trunk or stem of another) by commercial farmers for taste. In fact, this is true of most fruit trees!

Try germinating the seeds that come out of your produce (do some research to see what will work and what won’t) to save you a trip to the garden centre. Scrape the seeds out of what you’re eating and wash them. Once the seeds are clean, mist a paper towel, lay the seeds in it, and fold it up. Place this folded piece of paper towel inside a Ziploc bag and place it in a warm area.

After you start to see green or sprouts, it’s time to take the seed out of the bag and plant it in soil. Get a container — anything will do as long as it’s two to three inches and has drainage holes — and plant it in pre-moistened soil.

Take care of your new sprouts and give them lots of light. Water them when they’ve had a chance to dry. If you have a fan, set it up near your sprouts for good circulation.

If you’re moving your baby plants outside, make sure to do this slowly. Going from the predictable climate of your house to the uncertain outdoors can shock your plants. I learned this the hard way one year when my pepper plants started to develop strange spots. They were sunburned!

Acclimatize your plants by putting them in the shade to start and bringing them inside after a little while. Slowly move them out towards the sun and increase the time they spend outdoors until you can finally leave them out there for the season.

Make sure you give the plants the water they need. It’s a different ball game outside than inside your house. While your house plants may be OK with your weekly watering, your outdoor fruit and veggie plants will be thirstier.

Also, beware of squirrels and other animals that will happily feast on your plants when given the opportunity. You can humanely keep them away with smells they dislike, deer repellent, or even by tucking tufts of dog hair under or around your plants. You can even plant more plants that will give off offensive scents; for instance, squirrels hate mint and marigold. However, if you like having the little fellas around, you can always cover your plants or distract them with food and drink of their own.

If you’re limited on space and have some extra money in your plant budget, there are many different mini hydroponic gardens that come with a small water tank and an overhead light that will let you easily grow herbs, veggies, fruit, or flowers from a convenient and pre-portioned seed pod. These are fuss-free, easy to use, and versatile. If you have an electrical outlet, you can plug in one of these little gardens.

If you have a pit, seed or a root vegetable and you’re wondering if you can plant it or not, do a search online! You’d be surprised what you can do with your leftover produce and a cup of water or dirt. You can also do a search for the type of climate your plant will grow best in.

I hope you have a fantastic ‘crop’ this year! While you may not be able to feed yourself entirely on the things you’ve grown, it’s very satisfying to have even small amounts of homegrown food on your plate. This will also renew your gratitude for the farmers everywhere who have the dedication, time, and space to keep us all fed.

A version of this article appeared in print in The Ontarion issue 190.4 on March 25, 2021.