Microgreens Experiment -- Seed Sprouting/Microgreens Growing Tray Part 1

You may have seen me use a pastry tray to use to germinate seeds back in fall, but this time I'm going to try microgreens with them. For those who are unfamiliar with microgreens, they are essentially mini-plants grown for their sprouts. Many different varieties of seed can be used to grow microgreens. There are the popular sprouts like wheat grass and bean sprouts, and more vegetable cropped based ones like radish, cabbage, spinach, and others. They are ideal to grow indoors or in small space areas because they don't require a lot of light and are ready to eat in 4-7 days. Since they are small, microgreens also contain a lot more flavor than their full sized vegetable forms since it is concentrated all in the little stem of the plant. The disadvantage of growing sprouts is that it requires a fair amount of seed and unless you are growing plants for seed elsewhere, you'll have to keep buying more and more seed.

Germination tray from fall

Bicycle Bell Ringer

One day the ringer for my bell mysteriously disappeared.  I had temporarily strung a baseball bat key chain around the handlebars to use as a striker, but it came time to build a new one.

The design was inspired by the plunger from a pinball machine.  The ringer is a spring loaded brass #10-32 screw with an angle iron bracket.  The bracket itself attaches onto a convenient #10-32 (M5-.8) screw on the bell's handlebar mount.

The bracket.

Aloe vera Propagation and Transplanting

New plants

My mother has a large Aloe vera plant in a container on the patio. She wanted me to help her separate some of the new plants that had grown off the main plant. Apparently this is something you do yearly since she had a bunch of pups from last year all along the side of the wall. In helping her out, I learned more about the aloe plant and how it grows.

Baseball Bat Key Chain

I was commissioned to make a baseball bat key chain similar to one I made in school.  I used a piece of recycled aluminum from a bicycle kickstand found in a dumpster about .440"⌀ to build it from.

DWC setup maintenance

I returned home to find the hydroponic system I built at home in a sad state. Several preventative measures had not been taken to ensure the survival of the crops in the system. With many of the old plants coming out, I had to make sure the new ones being placed it would stay alive. Here are the main things I had to take care of.

How the system looks now. There are a few vacancies needing to be filled.