Just as last week, the eggplant is the biggest feature in the garden.  It's sprouted tons of little flowers, probably 30-40 at this point.  If every one of them turns into an eggplant, I'll be my own farmers' market...

Although I make no claims of being a subject expert on the topic of eggplants, here's what I've been doing.  Much like the strawberries from previous batches, I do the pollenation manually.  I keep a paint brush near the plants.  When I see flowers, I brush the inside of them with the paint brush.  Truthfully, I don't know if an eggplant needs this treatment; but I'm doing it anyway.  It's always given good results with the strawberries, and I'm not enough of a botanist to question it.

Although the plants seem pretty happy, I do notice some unexpected downward curling in the leaves of the strawberries, tomatoes, and basil.  I'm not sure the cause, but I'm suspecting that I haven't been adding enough of the Mag Pro supplement.  I have recently changed the water, and I'm thinking that the plants were running low. 

Here's this week's overview photo:

Please Note:  I will *not* be writing a Hydroponics Tuesday next week.  I'm going to be on vacation, and I won't be here to tend the plants.  Our pet sitter Danielle will be taking care of the garden for me.  I'll resume the normal schedule when I return from our trip to Orlando.

For any of you who happen to be visiting the Maximum Yield Indoor Gardening Expo, we'll be there on Saturday the 10th.  If you'd like to meet up, send me an email through the site. 

From the title of this post, you can probably realize that the eggplant in the aeroponic system is getting absolutely huge.  To be honest, I'm thinking that I may have to cut back some leaves (or move the neighboring plants to different sites).  It's really starting to shade the adjacent strawberries.  The eggplant has lots of flowers, and seems quite happy.

In related, but unexplainable news... The pH seems to have stabilized more than usual.  Normally, we have rapid fluctuations.  For the first time in a long time, I haven't raised the pH is almost four days.  That's a big deal, as I usually have to raise it daily (in the aeroponic system).

The larger tomato (#10) is getting quite large.  In fact, since you can't see the whole thing in this week's "overview" photo, I decided to give it a photo of its own.  At it's tallest point, it's still about 30 inches from the light source.  No burning is visible, but to be safe, I probably won't let it get much closer.

Strangely, the smaller tomato (#18) is really struggling.  I'm not sure why.  It appears weak, spindly, and has few leaves.  Additionally, it's leaves show curling (but no burning).  I'm not sure if it's going to live.  This is particularly odd, as everything else in the same aeroponic system is looking great.

Here's this week's overview photo:

Additionally, here's a vertical shot of the larger tomato (#10):

This week's report really isn't as dramatic as some previous reports.  Things are growing at a good pace, but the situation is fairly stable.

However, I would like to mention something, in case you haven't heard it before...  An aeroponic system (like my TurboGarden) helps plants grow very quickly.  Since so many changes are taking place under an aeroponic setting, you have to be very mindful of the condition of your reservoir.  Normally, the water chemistry is fairly stable... However, in an aeroponic system, like the TurboGarden, this really isn't the case. Admittedly, the TurboGarden has a fairly large reservoir tank (about 25 gallons when full).  However, there's so much growth activity going on, that the chemistry changes rapidly.  The TurboGarden consumes a lot more nutrients than my other system, and the pH changes much more dramatically.

This may sound strange to someone new to aeroponics, but I add almost 1 pint of pH increaser to my TurboGarden each week.  That's a lot of pH increaser.  Although I don't understand all the plant biology involved, I can tell you from experience that the plants just suck the pH right out of the water.  I check the pH every morning, and most of the time I find it around 6.0.  I realize that 6.0 is still in a good range for the plants; but I also know that it will continue to drop unless I supplement it.

I really need to buy more twine.  I need to tie some of the plants, like the eggplant.  It's not being a good neighbor at the moment.  Additionally, the eggplant is flowering.  We have several flowers, but no baby fruits yet.

I'm not quite sure what's going on with our younger tomato plant.  It doesn't look as good as I would expect.  The chemistry is good.  I'm suspecting a heat issue (as it's tall, and closer to the light source).  As an experiment, I've laid it down, in the strawberries. 

Here's this week's photo:

Things have really started to take off in the TurboGarden.  This week's title comes from the big and leafy results that I'm starting to see.  The eggplant is of particular interest this week.  It looks like I've got a good balance going.

The leaf burning is gone.  Since I acted decidedly unscientifically during the trouble, I cannot cleanly attribute the success.  However, I've got it narrowed down to two solutions.  Firstly, I moved the 400W light further away.  This significantly lowered the heat on the leaves.  Leaves love light, but aren't so much in love with overheating.  Secondarily, I've started supplementing the plants with MagPro supplement on the advice of Beau, my local hydro-guy.  He's always given good advice.  This appears to be no exception.

The eggplant has gotten so large that I'm thinking about cutting back a few leaves... It's shadowing it's neighboring strawberry.  Things are going very well.

Take a look for yourself.  That's one big eggplant. 

Also, my lime basil has sprouted a little flower.  I didn't know that basil produced flowers.  Live and learn.

Keeping with my promise of solid record keeping, here's this week's chart:

I've spent some more time working with the plants this week, and I have a tenative solution for the burned leaves issue...

I think the root cause was the proximity of the 400W HPS (High Pressure Sodium) light bulb.  I had it previously positioned approximately 3 ft. from the top of the plants (only about 12 inches from the tallest plants, the tomatoes).  This lamp generates a lot of heat.  It's amazing, I never really noticed it until I removed the lamp for a while.  Here's a great example:  All the plants are sitting in hydroton (clay pellets).  Normally, the hydroton would be constantly damp, from the continual circulation of the water in the aeroponic system.  I only learned this after removing the 400W system for a few days.  The 400W system generates enough heat that the top layer of hydroton was always dry.

I removed the 400W system for a few days, and ran only on the underpowered 125W compact fluorescent.   I wanted to see if it would stop the leaf burning. I admit that this experiment is far from scientific, as I also added the Mag Pro supplement at the same time.  Regardless, the burning has stopped.

As a more permanent remedy, I've added the extensions back into the lighting frame.  Take a look at the picture below; you'll notice that the frame is much taller than last week.  This makes the light less harsh on the plants, and the heat less intense. 

I don't think that any of the plants suffered irreparable damage.  Regardless, I'm going to limit the cycle of the 400W light for a few weeks.  I'm going to start it around 9 hours a day, and see how we do with it.

Lettuce is tasty. I must report a casualty this week.  #16 is no more. 

Here's this week's overview photo.  The strawberries are finally getting moving.  Finally.

Keeping with my promise of solid record keeping, here's this week's chart: