Took the cover off of the Sparkling White Tip radishes and they are doing very well.  Much better than the first try.  I planted more seeds and you can see that the crop is much denser than the first try.
It seems as if this is a quick and easy to grow micro greens indoors with very little effort.  The biggest problem may be to be able to get bulk seeds over the winter.  Single packs of seeds would not seem to make much economical sense unless you can get them at half price at the end of the season.  May just have to make another buying trip to Home Hardware and get all that they have.
Later in the week I may just get rid of the other crops that have not done well and try something else.

I let the sunflower seeds soak for about 24 hours and spread them over the shredded paper.  Then put a thin, single, layer of shredded paper over them and covered to keep them in the dark for three days.
Not associated with this experiment but also planted some old basil seeds for the hydroponic setup.

I gave up on the sunflowers and threw them out in the garden.  There were only 3 or 4 sprouts and the rest seemed to be quite water logged so that was the end of that.  I am going to try something new and I have not seen on the net.  I am going to try the next lot of sunflowers in shredded newspaper soaked with the hydroponic solution.  
I already had some shredded newspaper so put that in the cleaned out original container and soaked it with the solution.  I spread a little dry shredding over the top to try and get the surface more or less even.  If the paper is still dry tomorrow I will wet it again.
Put some sunfl0wer seeds in a measuring cup to soak for about 24 hours.  Will spread them on the newspaper tomorrow.
The Swiss Chard and Spinach are coming along but I may get rid of the spinach and retry it later.
I am pretty sure the reason the three others did not work out as well is because the seeds got water logged due to the screen sinking a little into the water.

The radishes that were planted were, Cherry Belle.  From the videos I saw days 10 to 12 should be harvest days for radish.  Therefore, I was going to harvest the radishes yesterday but time seemed to run out.  Went to Old Farts for lunch and then to the OLT to see a play in the evening.  I did take the photos for day 10 though and they are below.
It was a simple process of simply cutting the sprouts at just above the level of the screen with a pair of scissors.  I tasted one and it had a very distinctive radish taste but a little milder than the root.  Because these are grown on a screen over water I am sure that, unlike seeds grown in soil or coir, the roots can also be harvested.  In fact I did get some roots as well as the stems and leaves.
After cutting I strained the water put the screen back on but ensured that it was tighter than this experiment, spread two packages of Sparklers White Tip Radish, replaced the water and topped up with some more hydroponic solution.  The two packages of seeds covered much more of the area than the single package from the first attempt.  Covered over and will leave covered for three days and see how these work out.
I bought eight packages of seeds from Home Hardware at 49¢ a pack (1/2 price) because it is the end of the season.  Also these are a different type.

As you can see from the photo the other seeds do not seem to be doing well.  I am thinking of trying the sunflower in shredded paper with the hydroponic water solution.  I have lots of sunflower seeds so that is not a problem.  Still wondering just what to do about any other seeds.  Because it is the end of the growing season getting seeds is a little more difficult but I have seen where I can order bulk seeds on line so that is an option.  I will also go through the seeds I have on hand from previous years and give them a try.

Later Thursday afternoon - I set up another grow light for the greens.  I put two pieces of tinfoil with the shinny side down over the bulb to reflect and hopefully diffuse the rays more evenly over the containers.

Seeing as how I started the project, first day of planting, on Sunday the 15th of September today, 17th of September should actually be day two of the experiment.

In yesterdays blog I mentioned that I was going to try a Microgreen growing experiment.  Well, the seeds are sitting in water waiting to germinate so here is what I have done on the first two days.

I am going to combine days 1 and 2 of this experiment into just this one post. 

Day One!
​The main reason for not having Day 1 as a separate post is that I simply went to Dollarama and bought three 6 litre containers and then Home Hardware to see what few seeds they had left and to get a roll of window screen.
After doing some research on the net I found that the three most profitable crops were; sunflower, peas and radish.  These were followed by broccoli and cress.  With a little more searching more crops appear. 
Unfortunately I was limited to what was available at this time so I had a few radish seeds left over from this year and sunflowers from the bag of bird seed.  I am trying Spinach and Swiss Chard.  Well both of those are used as salad greens.  I then cut out the centres of the containers leaving just the rim which will help keep the window screen in place.
I put all four seed varieties into water for soaking.
That is it for day One…


Day Two!
A little more work done on day 2.

• Cut the window screen to more or less size.  Left overhang around all edges
• Used 3 containers from $ama and one tinfoil tray that had been used for something else.
• Fitted the screen to the containers and put on rim.  Found that the rim did not keep a tight seal.  May have to get better containers (more $).  Simply used scotch tape on all four sides to keep the rim tight and the screen more or less taut.
• Placed the four containers beside the existing hydroponic set-up and filled with water and the hydroponics fertilizer.  In the videos that I saw I didn’t see any mention of using a solution but only water.  If I had more seeds I would have used one set with just water and one with the solution.
• Spread the seeds on top of the screen and found that the water may have been to deep.  In the video it seemed as if the water just barely covered the seeds.  I removed some of the excess water and put it in the hydroponics tote.  In the videos, no matter what growing medium was used, the entire surface was covered with seeds.  Unfortunately, there were only enough sunflower seeds to do an entire cover so I just spread the other seeds.
• Covered to keep in the dark for three days.

All in all it was a very simple operation.  The hardest part was cutting out the tops of the containers but once that is done they will be done forever.  No doubt the window screen will not be reusable so it is a good thing I got a roll for the same price as it would have been to get just enough to cover the containers.
If this works out I will have to check Richie’s Feed and Seed to see if they have any seeds and in what quantity.  The little seed packages are not enough.  I will also do some checking from seed houses on line.  Mainly the ones I have used in the past.  It is not that I am going into business but the greens can be used in salads and on sandwiches and smoothies.
Time will tell: A - how this worked out and; B - will the greens be used!

In the photos the 'odd' colour with the hydroponic set-up is due to the LED grow lights.

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