Just don’t forget to shake well, before opening the sachet.

View the PDF of the Aerogarden Seed Kit and Liquid Nutrients User Manual

An Aerogarden Box Being Packed up in the Warehouse

This is a question that we sometimes get asked, and so we thought we would just pop a quick post up to let everyone know the dimensions of  the box that we send out aerogardens in. We use a double-walled card board box that is nice and sturdy, and it is….
Length: 54cm
Width: 38cm
Height: 33 cm

The weight of the parcel for an aerogarden starter kit is roughly 7kg, and an aerogarden annual kit is roughly 8kg

Hope you find it useful!

Excitement in the Industry

We are very, very excited to announce that development is under way of a new ‘super’ Aerogarden. Rumour had been circulating around the Aeroponic industry of ground breaking work developing what has been dubbed the ‘TurboGarden’, due to it’s increased rate of growth. What was previously hearsay and rumour has now been confirmed, and in a press release today, April 1st 2010, the announcement was made that the new model was going to be released to the public in early 2011.

Much speculation had surrounded this announcement, with some saying that it would include the ability to grow meats and eggs, meaning that a meal could be grown in an Aerogarden, supplying a whole weeks supply to a family. This was (sadly) not true, but some may say the truth is even more exciting than the rumours. The new features of this ‘TurboGarden’ are as follows;

Dramatically increased speed of growth

Yes that’s right, this new Aerogarden model will grow your tomatoes and chillis from seed to full fruit within 24 hours.  You plant them in the morning, and by evening you will have a full crop of fresh tomatoes, chillis or herbs.  This is due to the new light bulbs that have been developed that release 72 times more energy than the Sun.

More Seed Pods

The new Aerogarden will include a majestic 50 seed pods, meaning your indoor Aerogarden will look more like a field in a farm than a small indoor Aeroponic system.  This has got many bigwigs in the agricultural industry very excited, and the Government is considering introducing legislation that will see the gradual phasing out of traditional farming techniques in favour of giant Aerogardens.  It is thought that enough fruit and veg could be cultivated in just 300 of these ‘TurboGardens’ to feed the nation.

Completely Portable

Expect to see many people in public with their ‘TurboGardens’, as the new model is being designed so it can fold and be carried – without damaging any of the plants!  This means people will be able to tend to their plants whilst on the go, you will be able to eat your lunchtime salad completely fresh off the plant.

The first press photo’s of this ‘TurboGarden’ can be seen here

The magazine is one of America’s most read gardening magazines and currently has a following of over 600,000 readers.  This is obviously something that has delighted us at Aerogarden, even though it may not benefit us in the UK, it’s nice to see the Aerogarden getting the credit it deserves.   The magazine get’s the ratings for the products by taking a random sample of it’s readers, making sure there is no chance of bias towards certain products.

It’s particularly encouraging that Aerogarden is getting respected in the gardening world, as it lets a lot of people who may not have the time or space to grow their own fruit and veg in gardens still enjoy the process of cultivating their own plants!  It really is good to see the Aerogarden being rated by many who would consider themselves gardening purists.  The Aerogarden scored a fantastic 9.2 average rating, and scored over 9 in the Design, Quality, and ease of use categories, really showing how great it is for people to make a start in the gardening world with.

Gardening How To magazine is part of the National Home Gardening Club.

If you have your own review of the Aerogarden to share we’d love to hear from you, especially if you’re someone who is fairly new to growing your own plants.  It’s always nice to hear how someone first got on with our product.

This subject has been due a blog post for a while so we apologise for the tardiness of posting it, but just to clarify, the seed pod in the Gourmet herb kit which used to be cilantro has now been replaced by thyme. The cilantro had a slightly lower rate of germination than the other seeds in the kit, and has been changed to Thyme in order to make it possible for us to continue to honour our germination guarantee on all Aerogarden seed kits.

So our apologies to those whom this change has disappointed. If you do still have your heart set on growing coriander in the Aerogarden, then we recommend that you purchase some coriander seeds from your local garden centre, and plant them in the Aerogarden using the master gardener seed kit, which allows you to grow your own seeds of any practically any variety.

Your may have noticed some small brown speckles appearing on the leaves of the lettuce in your aerogarden at the early stages of growth. Do not worry – some of the varieties of lettuce in seed kits like the Salad Greens are of a red-speckled variety. When the speckling first appears, it can look like brown freckles. These leaves will become much more sightly as they develop.

When more than one pod in a seed kit fails to germinate, or seedlings show yellowed leaves or are stunted growth, chances are they are experiencing a nutrient deficiency. This is generally caused by one of two things:

Using water that is high in dissolved minerals (“hard water”, well water, or water that has been through a water softener), or

Nutrient tablets that were damaged by high heat or humidity, which occasionally occurs in transport or storage.
If your plants are experiencing these symptoms, it will be important for future success to determine which of these may be causing the problem.

Water

Water that is high in dissolved minerals can cause problems with growth in the Aerogarden and many areas in England do have “hard” tap water. If you are using “hard” water, well water, spring water, or “softened” water, you will experience germination and growth problems in your AeroGarden. The dissolved minerals in the water will block the proper uptake of the nutrients by the plants. Hard water is the number one cause of growth problems in the AeroGarden. Most water filters do not remove minerals.
If you think you may have high mineral-content water, we recommend switching to bottled distilled water (not “spring”, “drinking” or “purified” water) instead, which is available at most supermarkets.

Nutrients

If your Seed Kit experienced very high heat or humidity is shipping or storage, the nutrients may become damaged, causing the same nutrient deficiency symptoms. If your nutrients appeared to have dissolved and leaked out of their container in storage/transport please contact us for replacement nutrient tablets (if the item was originally purchased directly from us).
*Please note – nutrients which appear wet or partially dissolved in their bag are not necessarily damaged – if they are in twin packs of just two nutrients you can cut the bag in half and rinse out the contents in a cup of tepid water (including the nutrient tablets themselves) – then empty the contents of this cup into the Aerogarden water bowl. Be sure to store your nutrients in a cool dry place (a fridge is ideal) to prevent any further absorption of liquid.

The Aerogarden was compared alongside other propagators available on the market and was given the accolade of being the “Roll’s Royce of propogators” by gardening presenter Pete Jackson. The Show was aired at 5pm on the 7th January.

The Aerogarden Garden Starter tray allows you to use your aerogarden as a super fast propogator – starting off up to 70 seedlings in the Aerogarden before transporting them out to a regular soil garden to continue growing.

Watch the clip from the show here

Aerogarden.org.uk

Last weekend we were very pleased to be included in The Times newspaper “Top Presents of 2009″ list. The Aerogarden product has gradually grown a loyal following in the UK since its launch in August 2007 and Aerogarden.org.uk remains the leading Internet site for researching and purchasing Aerogardens.  For the full article featured in The Times - please click here.

Recently one of your customers shared his little pearl of wisdom, to pollinate his tomatoes he’d modified an electric toothbrush and attached a cotton bud. I was intrigued so I decided to do some research into the science behind this crafty little contraption.

In nature pollination is carried out by bees and the wind. With the Aerogarden being sheltered indoors we need to give the tomato’s a helping hand to ensure a good fruit yield. Using a toothbrush, it appears that this method of self pollination imitates the ultrasonic waves of a buzzing bee and is known as Buzz Pollination.

Here are our recommended steps if you’d like to make your own Buzz Pollinator and give this way a go.

1. Take a standard electric toothbrush
2. Remove brush fitting and fit a cotton bud onto the end. (some people just use the brush head but we’ve found the cotton bud works best)
3. Put the Buzz Pollinators cotton bud on the back side of any open flowers you see (refer to video below)
4. Hold the Buzz Pollinator to the flower until you don’t see any more pollen falling from the flower.
5. Repeat daily

The Flower will not look immediately different after pollination but after several days the yellow blossom will wilt, dry up and fall off. If the entire flower drops off unfortunately that flower wasn’t pollinated.

This is all that is needed to produce a high yielding Aerogarden Tomato crop.
Feel free to leave a comment sharing your experiences!

If you don’t have a toothbrush handy the I’d recommend you use the Shake technique

The most common self pollination technique is to simply grab a branch or stalk and shake gently to help the pollen drop down to the stigma of the flower. You can gently shake the plant 2 to 3 times a day around the time you start to see flowering.

If  you require any other assistance with your tomato plants we’d recommend you check out our Tomato Plant Troubleshooting blog