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Areca Palm (Chrysalidocarpus lutescens): Best Air Cleaning Plant #2
The Areca Palm goes by a number of names: yellow palm, the butterfly palm. bamboo palm, or golden cane palm. It's native to Madagascar, where it grows in tropical rain forests or near moist river beds....
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Corn Plant (Dracaena fragrans "Massangeana"): Best Air Cleaning Plant #12
The corn plant is a bit of a misnomer, as it has nothing to do with corn. But if you've ever shucked corn, you'll understand where the name comes from. The thick, green leaves that grow from the plant...
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Dumb Cane (Dieffenbachia camilla): Best Air Cleaning Plant #25
There are actually two plants by go by the name of "Dumb Cane", the Dieffenbachia "Exotica Compacta" and the Dieffenbachia camilla. The differences have to do with the variegation. Both have broad,...
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AeroGrow comes through with a replacement base for the ULTRA
Autumn is nigh, and while that usually means harvest time, with indoor gardens it can mean planting time as well. So I'll be putting my obsession with air cleaning plants aside for a while and turn my...
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Aerogarden Strawberry Kit - Can you Really Grow Strawberries indoors?
If you've been following this blog you know I've grown just about everything there is to grow in an Aerogarden (at least legally). I've gone through herbs, tomatoes, lettuce, cabbage, peppers, and...
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Replacement Aerogarden Strawberries Arrive
Well, as I prognosticated, only one of the clumps of twigs and dirt that Aerogrow sent over managed to grow. "Dormant State" indeed! Although I must say, the one plant that DID grow is growing very...
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Gerbera Daisy (Gerbera jamesonii) - Best Air Cleaning Plant #5
One thing you may have noticed is that our list of air cleaning houseplants is that none of them so far have been flowering plants. Sure, plants like the Mass Cane are capable to producing flowers, but...
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Alternative to Aerogarden's Rinse and Refill Siphon
It's now been over a week since I planted the "new" plants from Aerogarden, and I don't see one speck of green. I fear that yet again, what Aerogrow calls "dormant" plants is really just a bunch of...
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Aerogarden Strawberry Crowns - Try Try Again
So, here's the latest on my saga with Aerogarden strawberries.If you recall, I planted my strawberries into my Aerogarden ULTRA as soon as I got them on 9/9. One plant grew nicely but the others were...
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Aerogarden Strawberries Finally Growing
Just two days after planting the latest batch of Aerogarden Strawberry Crowns, here's what I'm seeing:You might recall from past posts that the original set of crowns was 90% dead and the replacement...
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...and growing, and growing
I usually don't update the blog this quickly, but Aerogarden plants also usually don't grow this quickly. Check out the progress in just one day.What a difference not cooking in a UPS warehouse makes!...
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Strawberry Plants Growing Well, but I Lose the First Strawberry
It's only been a week, and look how nicely the Aerogarden strawberry plants are doing!Now this is more like it. Every single crown has sprouted leaves, and I can see even see flower buds on a couple of...
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Turning to Gnatrol (Bti) to get rid of Fungus Gnats once and for all
If you recall, a few months ago I wrote of how Kmart sold me a bag of potting soil with fungus gnats, and soon every plant in my house and office seemed to be infested.I detailed every single tactic I...
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Lots of dried, undeveloped strawberries--Update on the strawberries
It's been a while since I gave an update of the strawberry plants. Here's what they look like today.Pretty impressive looking, huh? Out of all the plants I planted, only one didn't grow. Again, nice...
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A great garden center in Flushing and Bayside - Garden World
Now most of you who read the blog know that aside from a few links on the side, I don't do a lot of advertising. Part of it is because I do it for the love of indoor gardening, but another part is that...
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Boston Fern (Nephrolepis exaltata "Bostoniensis") - Best Air Cleaning Plant #1
With chemical removal rated at 9 out of 10 and transpiration rate at 9 out of 10, the Boston Fern (Nephrolepis exaltata) is the top air cleaning plant on the list. Here's the one I got from Garden...
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Peace Lily (Spathiphyllum sp.) - Best Air Purifying Plant #7
Granted, I can't say the name of this plant without sounding like Sylvester the cat, but it is one of the most popular houseplants around. Its Latin name is Spathiphyllum, where "spatha" refers to the...
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The first strawberry
My first "real" strawberry, after a string of stunted and shriveled ones, came in December.Here's what it looked like on December 4.Notice that on the same vine, its sibling never grew more than a few...
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Happy belated 2015! Here's where we are with the strawberries!
Sorry, it's been a while since I've posted an update about my Aerogarden Strawberries. Lots going on in my life (don't worry, all good stuff), so keeping this blog up has been put a tad on the back...
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Alternative Aerogarden Nutrients - Liquid and Dry Plant Food
With the exception of a class of plants called Epiphytes which are able to extract nutrients from the air, rain, and debris around it (like cacti, orchids, and bromelaids), most plants derive their...
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Alternative Aerogarden Sponges and Pods to Grow Your Own Veggies and Herbs
For the last few years I've been growing everything in my Aerogarden--herbs, strawberries, tomatoes, peppers, flowers, It's been a great experience, but one frustrating thing to me is that all too...
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Rubber Plant (Ficus robusta) - Best Air Purifying Plant #9
Once there was a silly old ant.Thought he could move a rubber tree plant.Everyone knows an ant. Can't.Move a rubber tree plant.For some reason, every time I look at my Ficus robusta, #9 on our air...
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Indoor Herb Gardening Tips: Growing 101 for Basil, Rosemary, Parsley, Thyme,...
I used to maintain a site called IndoorHerbGarden.org, but I decided to retire it and focus all my effort on this blog. This is a page that I was especially proud of, as it represented the culmination...
View ArticleSo long...for a while
Sorry that my posts in 2015 have been so sporadic, but it's for pretty good reason. In August, I have another "little sprout" coming. It's our first baby and she'll be a little girl. And so the time...
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Basil as a houseplant: growing basil indoors all year round
And...we're back!It's been about a year since I hung up this blog, but my green thumb is back.For the time being, I figured I'd take a break from the hydroponics and go back to container gardening....
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