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Gardening in the time of coronavirus

 If you are sitting alone at home and looking for a constructive timepass gardening specifically, kitchen gardening can be e an excellent idea for you.

 But with Limited supplies and without stepping out of home, how do we manage to set up a kitchen garden?

Let me give you a brief idea about how to go about it. You don't need fancy stuff to start, and this is specifically for beginners who don't have much experience in setting up a kitchen garden but would like to go for it.

The first point is to clean your house and look for pots.  Now how do we do that? In your home, if you have old buckets, empty cans, unused plastic jars, etc. We can also use 2-litre pet bottles of soft drinks. Cans of for use for ghee or refined all those can also be used. We can also use takeaway containers which we get with home deliveries. Some outlets also send food in earthen handis. I once used for a pot, an old stainless steel jar of a mixer grinder way past its prime and which didn't work. The steel jar served an excelled container for a Sadabahar Flower Plant. 

For soil, you will need to dig our backyard or look outside your home to find a growing medium to start with the process. 


Now comes a significant point. From where do we get the plants? We will look for seeds that are there at home.  I will give you some examples like chickpeas, coriander seeds, cuttings of herbs like mint.  Rummage through your kitchen, and you will get some great ideas. Capsicum and Tomatoes both grow from seeds, which might be on the menu for dinner.

In fact, if you find old buckets in storage, you can propagate and grow tomatoes in buckets. 

Add a dash of creativity to the process. If you find some paint lying around the house, use it to paint these plastic jars and containers. Use your creative streak to paint it and give it a nice and clean look.

Next, let us discuss fertilizers and plant food. Once you start your kitchen garden, chances are you want to take it big, post lockdown as well. This lockdown is an excellent time to establish a system to recycle your kitchen waste into compost.

Again will not complicate the whole process with all that deep science, but the basic is that we will recycle the Kitchen waste make it into compost. Later on, we will use it as plant food.

Kitchen Gardening is a fantastic hobby. It gives you a break from the digital screens, is a nurturing hobby, and promises you a steady supply of fresh homegrown food.

The curfew outside is the right time to plan and start small. By the time you get the hang of it and the situation improves, you will be ready to take it up on a larger scale. You will also have a better idea about the location, watering, sun directions, etc.

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The writer is co-founder of Nature's Kart, an effort to promote green gifting and bringing nature closer to urban spaces.
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