I love to garden but I move around a lot and currently live in an apartment. Several times I've put tons of work into an outdoor garden, only to be called away for a work trip to find my veggies dried up, trampled, or choked out by weeds. The one time I successfully grew some strawberries and tomatoes, I had more than I could eat for a few weeks, and then nothing. I don't want to wait 9 months to have fresh organic food again! I decided to build this setup that you see pictured and I am proud to say that it is now growing it's first seven seedlings. :)
The whole design is my own but I did learn a lot from similar setups on Youtube and other blogs. I wanted it to look good enough to have in my living room and also have it run automatically. All I have to do is plant 7-8 seeds once a week and top off the tank with nutrient solution. The lights and pump timers are controlled with an app on my phone. I put red/blue LED grow lights on the top tier and a fluorescent shop light on the bottom to see which one grows lettuce the best. It also looks pretty cool. A few other innovations were using rain gutters for the tiers and the tank fitting contraption to adjust the water level. I'm sure someone out there has done similar things but it felt good to come up with these solutions on my own and have it actually work. :)
I filmed almost every step of the construction and am working on editing it all together. Right now, here is a summery video I made (before adding the lights and plants)about how it all works. STAY TUNED FOR THE FULL STEP BY STEP VIDEO!!!
