Skip to main content

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.

_____________________________________

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


Labels:

Comments

Post a Comment

Also read

Learning from Gardening

While composing status messages, just for fun, I simply jot down anything random that comes to my mind at the moment. Here is the latest FB message i posted few seconds ago. Tushar Mangl learns a lot from his gardening routine. Even when his plants die, he simply feels bad and then goes about to plan for new plants. Mostly because an empty space does not look that good. That is life for you. People will always go away from your life, at one point or another. But you cannot always leave the places vacan t. New plants have to be placed. Optimism has to exist for new flowers to bloom, new leaves to grow. Now, FB only gives me 422 characters to say my point. But my dear blogger, a companion of several years gives me much better platform to elaborate my thoughts. You see, in a flower bed I maintain near stairs of my house I had planted bougainvillea plants on either sides of the bed. As fate would have it, and given my nature of getting too attached to livi...
4 comments
Read more

A suggestion to break the loop of guilt, isolation, and emotional burnout?

Caught in a guilt spiral, isolating quietly, and wondering why rest doesn’t heal you? You’re not lazy—you’re carrying layers of unprocessed emotion and spiritual exhaustion. This is your invitation to pause, reflect, and reset. Let’s explore why you still feel stuck despite good intentions, and discover rituals, reflections, and real reconnection to help you come home to yourself. First Published on 20/06/2008 14:30 Second edition Published on 04/07/2025 12:51 Why do you keep spiraling despite good intentions? Let me ask you this. Have you ever written out a self-care plan so perfectly, maybe in a brand-new notebook—drink more water, meditate, go to therapy—and yet by day three you’re numbly binge-scrolling, wondering what’s broken now ? Yeah. Same. We don’t spiral because we’re undisciplined or lazy. We spiral because the emotional weight we’re carrying goes deeper than we admit. It's not about a missed workout or failing to reply to that one text. It's the inner tug-of...
2 comments
Read more

Cutting people off isn’t strength—It is a trauma response

Your ability to cut people off and self-isolate is not a skill you should be proud of—It is a trauma response Cutting people off and self-isolating may feel like a protective shield, but it is often rooted in unresolved or unhealed trauma and an inability to depend on others. While these behaviors seem like self-preservation, they end up reinforcing isolation and blocking meaningful connections. Confronting these patterns, seeking therapy, and nurturing supportive relationships can help break this unhealthy cycle. Plus, a simple act like planting a jasmine plant can symbolise the start of your journey towards emotional healing. Why do we cut people off and isolate? If you’re someone who prides themselves on “cutting people off” or keeping a tight circle, you might believe it’s a skill—a way to protect yourself from betrayal, hurt, or unnecessary drama. I get it. I’ve been there, too. But here’s the thing: this ability to isolate yourself is not as empowering as it may seem. In fact, i...
Post a Comment
Read more