新车间 [Xinchejian]

We are getting seedlings from the first urban farming workshop. Thanks to Jia Qi for letting us borrowing her lights.

Mini Workshop is a short and hand on workshops offered by different projects in XinCheJian to provide new members an introduction to the projects and opportunities to get involved in the projects of interests.

The first workshop “starting seedlings for hydroponic” was run by David from Urban Farming Team success this afternoon. Everyone sowed a tray of seedlings in coconut peat with variety of vegetables, including parsley, carrot, tomato, coriander and many others.

On next Saturday afternoon, we will hold the 2nd mini workshop and teach you how to set up a small hydroponic system at home.

this is the 3rd week after oregano cutting been transplanted into small pots with 4 different mediums and was surprised to find out those in vermiculite/‎蛭石 grow generally better (light blue pot) than the rest; especially there are 2 out of 5 died in soil base – with 24/7 lights on, water in soil base probably be dried out faster than vermiculite, coconut peat and perlite. 三周后的牛至幼苗在各自培养介质中均有良好的成长趋势；另人意外的是，在蛭石中，牛至的生长高度和强壮度是整体最好的。其次分别是椰糠，珍珠岩，再者是传统的培养土 – 猜测可能是因为在24小时持续的外加光照条件下，培养土中的水分流失比较严重。

top: 4 best growing in vermiculite base
bottom (from left to right): the best in soil (H=65mm), in perlite (H=67mm), in coconut peat (H=58mm) and in vermiculite (H=95mm),

It has been 2 weeks since oregano been transplanted into bigger pots with 4 different mediums, including soil and hydroponics which are coconut peat, perlite and vermiculite. By far, all cuttings are survived in their own home base while those in perlite are slightly shorter and smaller.

Florescent lights are set up last weekend (216W in total with 4 bulbs) running 24/7, and a small fan (2.5W) is available for creating mini air circulation environment. Once timers are fixed, ideally they will be off for 6 hours every 18 hours.

If you have any questions or be interested in growing your own hydroponic plants, feel free to contact David Li, Roger Mu or Jackie Hu.

The farming team got two more systems online today: Bubble bucket:

The Urban Farming Lab is opened! We have setup an ebb and flow system and are planning to build other system in the near future.

Ebb and Flow system

PH, Temperature and Conductivity PPM meter

LED growing lights

Fish Tank for Aquaponic

Roger Mu who presented his home farm a few weeks ago just sent a few pictures to share. Some pretty nice tomatoes

The fogger box has been working well. The transplants have been growing root rapidly after just few days.

Just installed the first version of the ultrasonic fogger based aeroponic.

Materials：water bucket, strainer, ceramic balls, plastic tube, water pump, air pump, plants, water, nutrient.