Japan is testing grow-in-a-bag plant technology in space

Dive into a comprehensive guide on Orangeola Japanese Maple information, covering its rich history, care requirements, and everything you need to know.

After a week trapped inside by work, on Saturday morning I happily pottered around the garden for several hours. I started in the front garden, cutting back the comfrey and stuffing it into buckets to make liquid feed, since the flowers have faded to the point where the bees are no longer interested. I also harvested the wild strawberries that had been wafting a ripe aroma around the place for several days. In doing so I disturbed a frog that was hiding under their leaves. Two hops and it had disappeared again; I almost didn’t work out what had caused the movement. We know we have frogs in the garden because they hop out when we’re working on the unruly corners, but other than that we rarely see them. Which is fine, they’re doing a grand job of pest control.

We half-finished the back garden last year, in that we installed and planted half of the raised beds. In truth, we did a lot more than half, as we had all of the paving done and installed the two sheds. But the wet weather over the winter stalled progress, and it has remained unfinished. It has been frustrating, but has become even more so since the sowing season arrived and I faced the fact that the plants I wanted to grow this year had no home to go to. And so it is with great excitement that I can say that weather, time and energy coincided over the weekend, and we have broken new ground!

I love growing unusual edible plants – not only are they potentially useful and easy to grow (because the pests and diseases they suffer from are not widespread), but they can be beautiful too.

If there’s a plant that’s destined to explode onto the Grow Your Own scene this year, then it has to be agretti (Salsola soda). Agretti got good press last year as being a vegetable sought-after by chefs; it didn’t hurt that seed was in short supply! Suppliers have taken note, however, and there are plenty more sources this year.

At 11 pm on Friday (BST, 18:01 EDT), SpaceX launched an uncrewed Dragon cargo spacecraft on its way to the International Space Station (ISS). This Dragon capsule has been to the ISS twice before, making it the first to fly in space for a third time. This is the 18th SpaceX Commercial Resupply Services (CRS) contract mission for NASA: CRS-18.

When Virgin Galactic’s Unity 22 flew into space on Sunday, it carried one billionaire passenger and three tubes filled with plants.

A few days ago I received an email, asking me the following question:

In previous years, my garden plan has revolved around what I want to grow. There are a lot of unusual plants that grow, or might grow, in our climate, and I enjoy trying them out. With my experimental impulses mainly focused on the Hydroponicum, I have been thinking about what we would like to eat from the garden.

The political weather has been stormy of late, and as the sun has come out to play at last, the garden seems the safest place to be. There’s a lot to be done to get it ready for the growing season, so time spent outside is never wasted. A lot of what I’m doing at the moment could best be termed ungardening, clearing out the contents from last year’s containers, and reusing the potting compost in the bottom of new pots, or as a soil improving mulch.

It’s time to cut down on your carbon footprint and help lock carbon in the soil, and the good news is that this doesn’t have to be a self-sacrificing activity, it can be a win-win situation if you choose to grow your own food!

Last weekend, as the temperatures soared, I found a certain amount of solace in learning more about how plants are being grown in Antarctica – the coldest place on Earth.