Adios, y Buenes Suerte

This semester's project has all but come to a close, and there has been much learned in these last few months about plants, grants, meetings, paperwork, and community. As is often the case in the world of science and exploration, the goals that we set out to reach at the beginning found themselves pushed aside for a different unforeseen result. This entry will share those lost goals, valuable consequences, and some suggestions that will hopefully breed success for future similar undertakings.

Originally, we had hoped to produce enough food on these systems to provide an economical and healthful subsidy to the diets of the residents of urban food deserts such as east Saginaw, which is laden with fast-food restaurants but lacks a supply of food as nature intended it. For this to work, the food produced would have had to been more valuable than the systems and the energy required to run them. The systems cost about $250 a piece, and the halogen lights added between $30 and 50$ to the power bill at each location. The nutrient solution required a bigger initial investment--about $100 for each of the 3 solutions--but would last probably over a year, so would amount to $10-25$ a month. So to be profitable--or worthwhile financially at all--each system would need to produce at least $40 of food each month, just to pay for the months costs, and hopefully a little more to eventually pay off that initial investment put into the systems. But, after 6 months of growing food, the 4 systems downtown produced less than 10 pounds total of lettuce, collards, kale, and parsley combined. Basil, spinach, and cilantro yielded less than one serving so will not be considered in the total. So if the monetary value of food were the only thing gained in this project, it would be a sore failure indeed, and the verdict would be to just go to Meijer to purchase groceries instead of spending a whole lot of time to produce food at around 50 times the cost of the grocery store produce.

But this is not the case. Much more was gained in the form of community awareness of food systems and food production. Networking was established between the various people and organizations with the resources to further develop a healthful, economically viable food production subsidy in Saginaw. There are prospects of constructing greenhouses on the horizon. One abandoned lot has been turned into an oasis of plants in the middle of a landscape of concrete and electrical wires. These developments are important and essential steps that much be taken before the eventual goal of widespread healthful diets and local food production can be accomplished. The pioneer who takes the first steps rarely takes the last ones. Building the community that will carry the torch is essential.

If this project or anything with similar goals is to be carried out again, there are a few areas which would be greatly improved upon. Everything could be done for much cheaper and some initial preparation would help to foster more productive plants. The systems used in this project were designed for greenhouses, but function inefficiently in a regular indoor setting. To spend so much money on boards and PVC pipe is unnecessary; the principles of hydroponics can be put into many different shapes to fit the room, just like a regular garden would be customized to fit one's yard. I encourage anyone looking to build their own hydroponics system to first decide where it will be put and then begin seeking the cheapest materials possible to construct a system to hold in water and support a plant in that area. Amazing things have been done in Rubbermaid containers. There is also no need to pay for electricity to pump water. Systems can be made to have only one level, and the fish bubblers used to oxygenate the water are very inexpensive--$6 or so with negligible energy costs. The second area for cost cutting is the lighting. It is important to acknowledge that there is no real substitute for natural sunlight, but the closest things cost hundreds of dollars. Without either of those, growing anything that requires fruiting or flowering is a futile effort. BUT, if you are growing just leafy greens, I recommend florescent lights. They produce much less heat, consume much less energy, have have shown no less capability of fostering plant growth than the very hot and costly halogen lights on the systems downtown. Additionally, they distribute the light more evenly than do the halogen lights, preventing the sporadic growth of steps on plants that should not have stems, like this 3-foot long lettuce plant pictured here. The initial cost of the florescent lights is more than the cost of the halogens, but the difference in the energy bill will compensate for that investment in 4 to 6 months.

To highlight the difference the presence of natural light makes to plant growth, I present the success of the basil plants at Living Center South. First is pictured the stringy, sickly looking basil plant grown in the basement of the Houghton-Jones Community Center without any natural light at all. Notice the very long stems and tiny little leaves. This is the sort of shape that is looked for in runway supermodels, but does not do much for growing tasty basil. At LCS, on the other hand, with only a westward-facing window, the plants have become much more robust, with giant healthy leaves. This is more of a Mrs. Butteworths shape, and is exactly the kind of dimensions looked for in a tasty basil plant since we are eating the leaves, not the stems.The same is true with the lettuce. Where there is sun, there is big healthy leaves and not vines; where there is no sun, there are oblong leaves and stems stretching towards the light source. If you doubt the deliciousness of this basil, observe the face of this jubilant civilian as he enjoys a plate of spaghetti tops with freshly brewed pesto made from the leaves of our very own basil. What could be a better testament to the value of homegrown greens than an exression of emotion such as this?
In 7 days, I depart for Guadalajara, Mexico to improve my Spanish skills while escaping the rational madness of American life. While there, I intend to seek out community agricultural groups to further develop my understanding of food systems and hopefully stumble across something that will be of value to another place I go in my short time here on Earth. Until next time, keep on fighting the good fight and eating the good food.
Adios, y Buenes Suerte,
Stu

Well with the coming of Friday, Spring is in the air, and outside my dorm complex at SVSU, the wildlife frolics in the drainage ditch that my neighbors and I affectionately call the "Cardinal River." But the great outdoors are the only places enjoying the greenifying bloom of new life; the Saginaw Urban Food Initiative is realizing spring inside and out in an attempt to free food producation from the icy limitations of Midwestern seasonality. Almost five months into the project, we have conclusively identified some shortcomings of our design and methods. But in scientific research, failure is not defeat; learning what does not work is the all-important step that comes before discovering what works, unless you are lucky enough to spill some acid and invent the telephone.

To begin with the successes, the basil at living center south is growing fervently, which brings hope to the Southeast Community that the Pesto-making Party will indeed happen. The lobby of Living Center South, where Don Corleone (hp system) is located, is flooded with a healthy amount of natural light. What we have found, however, is that the indirect natural light is not enough even in addition to the artificial light to nurse a basil seed to a full grown healthy basil plant. Don Corleone sits next to a west-facing window. The plants on the rows nearest to the window grew quickly and healthily, while the plants just 3 feet away on the other side of the system grew about 25% as quickly as their brethren with sunnier real-estate. More importantly, unless I moved those disadvantaged plants into the sunlight, even after 2 weeks, they had not entered the second stage of growth in which they develop large leaves. The moral of the story: without some direct sunlight, basil will not grow to full size. However, once the plant has developed large leaves, it appears as though it will sustain itself with just the florescent lights and indirect sunlight. I relocated the larger healthy plants to the opposite (dark) side of the system and moved the runts to the sunny side, and the large plants have continued to grow larger at a fairly impressive (to a layman) under the florescent lights.

MEANWHILE, the basil at both the Houghton Jones Center and Good Neighbor's Mission has failed to grow past that initial stage of tiny little leaves. These plants lack any natural light. Instead of the larger, rich smelling leaves, they are growing very long stems in the direct direction of the halogen lights. Stems don't make for tasty meals, so that's no good.

This rampant stem-growing is a problem with all the plants. I was in the greenhouse last week and noticed that their lettuce grew in nice little bushels, while mine grows in long, viney, trellis-dweller sort of beings. The collards and spinache as well grow very long stems to reach closer to the scarce light. Though one collard plant has still managed to grow large leaves, the spinach doesn't look like the spinach formerly served at Subway. The lettuce of course grows very large leaves--tasty ones I might add--but in doing so blocks the light from reaching plants in the lower rows. Pictured here is the view of a collard seedling unfortunately placed underneath the row of lettuce giants. It's chances of survival are bleak, drab, dreary.

This image led me to a nice metaphor: a concentrated souce of light at the top of a hydroponics system works about as well as a concentrated source of wealth at the top of an economy. The light does not "trickle-down." Those plants lucky enough to grow big leaves are then more equipped to suck up more light, leaving the others to suffer in the periphery. It makes me wonder if republicans would succeed in hydroponics.

As a final word to this slightly negative entry, I would like to say that I see a great value in the project. Scientifically, we have established that a centrally located source of artificial light causes strange, obstructive growth and does not provide adequatley for naturally small-leaved plants such as basil or parsely. Also, more evenly distributed artificial light--florescent beams--while inspiring less stem-growth, still do not provide adequately for plants to grow to adulthood or deliciousness. Is there a solution? Yes. Windows. Find yourself a nice, south-facing window, and set up a hydroponics system there. Am I sure that will work? No. But it did well for teh basil plants in LCS and deserves a project more focused on how to set up such an operation. Socially, this project has more value. We have effectively begun a discourse among community groups concerning food supply in Saginaw. I am confident that this will lead to more progress in establishing what will not work, and then what will work, and people will have a chance to eat healthier for cheaper. In one of my classes, a local Saginaw resident said something to the tune of "women do not need to know how to cook; we have plenty of fast food." This person happens to be quite overweight. While I sympathize with her stance on gender equality, her solution is appalling. Women and men alike ought to take more interest in how to feed themselves. It is this interest that is the most critical factor in creating a more productive food culture in urban areas.

February 29th, 2008

Hola todos,

During the last week, I did alot of replanting and remixing...and a little bit of harvesting. A very significant dilemma that the project faces is my lack of gardening skills. I was hired for this internship mostly for my writing abilitily and familiarity with Microsoft Excel; being able to grow and maintain the plants was not a high priority skill, due to the expectation that the community members themselves would be more engaged in the gardening, and my role as a researcher was to be more of an observer of community groups than an implementer and maintainer of hydroponic systems. Lack of community involvment is due to lack of communication between the community groups and the researchers. We have yet to set up a formal educational or explanatory program, which is essential for people to take part in the project. So, until we organize such an event (which actually may already be planned), I am learning all the necessary skills that I need via Youtube tutorials, or calling known gardeners (mom).

One of the things I have learned is the necessity of picking off flowering buds before herbs "bolt." Maybe common knowledge to gardeners, I failed to do this, so my plants often look very different from the ones on the package. Here (above, right) is a a spinach plant that I expected to be bushy and compact, but as you can see, is more jungle-ish. To the left is an equally neglected parseley plant, which one brave soul at the Houghton-Jones Community Center performed a taste-test on, and said that it was much more bitter than parsely that is harvested at the right size. Even though this plant is beyond the stage in which it can be eaten, I can't bring myself to just kill it, as it is still very healthy, even if it doesn't taste so good to us. So I am leaving it in its hole on Puck to thrive on.

So dilemmas aside, things are going well (ha). I thought I might, in this blog entry, give a small explanation of how we start our plants. The materials for each unit are a piece of rockwool, a 1'' net-pot, about 6 inches of braided nylon rope, and of course, a seed. First, we must soak the rockwool in water for 24 hours. The rockwool is the medium in which we plant our seed. While hydroponics are wonderfully soil-free, dropping a seed in water won't get you very far--you need something to hold it in place and support the plant when it sprouts. Seeds are still genetically wired to grow in soil, so it's necessary to make it feel like it's in soil so it grows right. Hence, rockwool the medium, picutured hear. Rockwool is purchased in sheets of about 100 for a total of $8 or so. It looks like several Carmello-bars placed side by side, except green and scratchy.

After the rockwool is soaked, we run the nylon rope through the bottom of the net-pot to act as a wick, pulling the water that runs along the bottom of the PVC pipes up to the rockwool and to the seed. The nylon rope works very well, and is far superior to strips of cotton towel, because the cotton towel rots after so long, and then you end up with 100 or so dead plants and a bunch of towel-carcass floating in your nutrient resevoir. When we put the wick in the net pot, we wrap about 2 inches around the bottom to get as much surface area as possible toucing the rockwool, and let the rest dangle into the PVC pipe. Then I plop the the rockwool right inside the net-pot on top of the wick. Then, put 2 or 3 seeds in the little hole (pre-drilled hole, very nice) and stick that into the holes on top of the PVC. Eventually, it sprouts, and you get little guys that look like this small basil-squirt. This plant resides at Living Center South SVSU dormitory on the system which I have named "The Godfather." This system is set up slightly differently than the other systems, with florescent lights above each row instead of with halogen, flood-lights mounted on the top row in the center of the system. Don Corleone is pictured here, in the lobby of LCS. We turn the lights on during the night and shut them off at night. Even eight florescent lights uses only about 60% of the energy as having two halogen lights uses, and the florescents put off much less heat. We have yet to see if the florescent lights support growth as well as the halogen lights. Also notice that we have mounted lights above the top row of plants. With the halogen lights, the top rows are neglected, receiving much less light than with this system, but again, the florescent lights may prove to be less supportive of growth than the halogens. Don Corleone receives more sunlight than any of the systems downtown, as it sits right next to a west-facing window, the plants next to the window receive a few hours of direct sunlight each day. I will document carefully any difference in progress between the plants right next to the window and away from the window, and may even remove the lights aboe one row of plants to see if the less frequent sunlight is able to support the plants as well as those subsidized with florescent lighting. After 2 weeks of growth, the basil plants on Don Corleone are doing consistently well. I only had to replant 2 plants that did not sprout successfully from a cohort of 76 plants. I also planted 3 lettuce plants to see how they did with the florescent lights just today, so we will see how that turns out.

Hasta el proximo vez,

Stu

Hola todos,

There is much news to report: many exciting projects, developments, accomplishments, and of course, catastrophes. We have installed some florescent lights on the system in Living Center South (Don Corleone.) On the Don, we are growing only basil plants, which looks very healthy. We are using nylon ropes instead of shreds of bath towel for the wicks, which is hydrating the rockwool much more successfully. (If you recall, the towel-wicks were responsible for the death of 90+ plants back in December.) We are hoping that the florescent lights will provide a more evenly-distributed light to the plants than do the centrally placed halogen lights. After 6 days of florescent lights, there hasn't been any conclusive evidence to suggest that either lighting system is superior. The lighting is certainly an issue; these systems were designed for greenhouses with ubiquitous natural light, which does not exist in any of the locations where we have installed these systems. With any luck, we will be able to refine the lighting on the systems to the point of effectiveness before the end of the research grant so that the communities won't have to struggle with such issues in the future. This has become somewhat of a theme of the research project. We had planned on being able to observe more the relationship between functioning hydroponics systems and community groups, but most of our efforts have been geared towards making the systems functional so that a relationship might exist between the systems and the community--a profitable one, inshallah.

I will begin with the catastrophes to avoid ending on a sour note. Added to the history books near the Great Ph Catastrophe of November is now the Colossal Computer Crash of February. My laptop fell victim to an underqualified computer technician named Shyam who was remotely operating on my computer from India. He managed to delete all the software off my computer in the blink of an eye, effectively erasing all my files. Some data was lost, but the majority was safely backed up.

Projects: Brooke Gomez and family are rapidly beautifying the room at Good-Neighbor's Mission. I don't have any pictures of the room itself now, but I will on Monday and will hastily post those for your viewing pleasure. I will also be assisting Brooke in constructing some smaller, personal-sized floating-bed hydroponics sytems to put at the GNM. I believe her plan is to have kids plant some lettuce and foster their plants to adulthood...and then devour them in a salad or a sandwich. The Gomez's beautification efforts have also engulfed Captain Planet and Norman Borlaug, who were given some cosmet enhancement to save them from the mediocrity of their dull, woody appearace. Who knows, maybe this little touch of class will encourage the plants to grow faster.

We harvested all the lettuce at GNM last week--a total of 1.07 pounds of the freshest smelling greenery I have ever taken a wiff of. The first lucky recipients were Blanche, and a southern family whose name's were unfortunatley recorded in illegible handwriting (mine.) While I don't have any testiments to the taste of the produce yet, everybody agreed that there had never been a more potently delicious smelling lettuce grown in Saginaw or anywhere else.

In preparation for planting the second crop, I also cleared the systems of all the plants who didn't make it. The mass grave of the departed is pictured hear. Crop II will be planted this coming Monday. The reason I onl harvested the lettuce was because I am not really sure how to harvest anything else, so I will be watching a series of you-tube "how-to" videos before harvest the kale, which is also quite large, along with the spinache.

So, until Monday, quedate verde.

Stu

Buenas tardes, amigos.

I visited the systems both last Friday and today, and all looks well...or at least o.k. The healthy plants are very healthy, and the unhealthy plants are equally unhealthy. The position and quality of the lighting is an issue. I offer this breakdown of what is affecting the plants at the moment:

At the Good Neighbor's Mission, the plants on the highest tier do not receive enough light, and so are not growing at all or are dead by now. This is not an issue at Houghton-Jones because the ceiling is relatively low, and the florescent lights produce enough to help the top plants. In fact, those plants seem to be the healthiest at this point. Pictured here are a row or ruby lettuce thriving on the mid-levels and a row of the same seeds of ruby lettuce perishing at the highest level. Hopefully, Ed Meisel will be able to make his way downtown to elevate the mount of the lights to include the top row of plants in the sun-bathing activities sometime this week.

Plants with less leaf surface-area do not handle the intensity of the lights well. Cilantro and kale, especially, are prone to shriveling and drying under the intense rays of the shop-lights. One kale plant on the top row has done very well, while the rest never sprouted--our prodige kale sprout is pictured here. Again, raising the lights, I suspect, will diminish both of the lighting issues. In the second planting season, probably beginning in mid february, I will make a point to plant Kale and Cilantro on the bottom rows, away from the intensity of the lights.



Another issue is plants with slowly growing roots. Basil, for instance, does not develop deep roots at all as fast as lettuce. What has happened is the lights have dried out the rockwool, and the wicks have deteriorated before the roots of the plants reached the water. Since our whole operation has upgraded to nylon-rope wicks, I am hoping that this issue will not be a factor in Harvest II.

Brooke Pieschke, formerly known as Brooke Gomez, has started her internship with the Good Neighbor's Mission, and is in the process of making plans to beautify the classroom in which Captain Planet and Puck reside.

Be sure to eat your veggies,

Stu

Rebuilding After the New Year

Happy Inauguration Day-Eve!

In my last blog entry, I was yet unaware of the full magnitude of the Ph catastrophe of late November. The plants receive water through a wick system, in which strips of towel were used to pull the water from the bottom of the PVC tubing to the rockwool crib that houses the seeds. The higher level of dissolved solids in the water that resulted from adding chemicals to balance the violent Ph levels caused the wicks to deteriorate, and eventuall, the plants to dehydrate and die. So while I was frolicking in the Upper Peninsula eating apple sauce after getting my wisdom teeth removed, the plants were slowly withering away. I feel aweful about that...but not so aweful that it kept me from replanting the hydroponics system!

My residents and I mixed some new nutrient solution and replanted all but collards, because we were out of collard seeds. Since the community members are very fond of collards, I am going to buy some more seeds today to plant them. And when that is done, there will be much rejoicing.

At the Good Neighbor's Mission, there was no Ph catastrophe, so the plants are flourishing. The lettuce, especially, is quite large now. There are a few hiccups there, as well, however. The first being that the intensity of the lights is causing the plants in the middle of each row, directly in front of the light, to dry out a little and not be as healthy as the lucky sprouts at each end of the row. Another problem is that the plants on the top row of the system do not receive enough light due to where the lights are mounted.
I think a solution to this would be to add a vertical 2x4 board to mount the lights a foot or so higher. The last dilemma came from an error in mixing the nutrient solution, which resulted in cups of nutrient solution being added instead of teaspoons. This error was caught almost immediately, and very little of that solution reached the plant roots before new solution, with the correct amount of nutrients, was added. I will be going downtown today, and will be checking on the status of those plants to make sure I haven't poisoned them all and therefore subscribed them to the same fate as their counterparts at the Houghton-Jones Center. I very much hope that I have committed every error that could be committed, and that the runnings will be smooth from here on out.

Additionally, the hydroponics system that was installed in my dormitory complex at SVSU is now planted and operational. This system will be growing only basil plants as a part of a plot to make lots of pesto and sell it to raise money for Relay for Life. It seemed natural to name the system Basil. I also realized today that I have been somewhat sexist in my naming of the systems, so to counteract that I am going to construct a floating-system in my dorm room and name it Angie (with regards to the Rolling Stones ditty.) Basil will be maintained by college freshman and me. Half of the funding for Basil was provided by the Southest Community Council. I am a little concerned that there will not be enough light to successfully grow basil, as we have not installed grow lights. We will deal with that like most people deal with environmental crisis...as we are directly faced with consequences.

Happy New Year, Saginaw Urban Food Initiative

Thus begins the new year and my consistent journal documentation of the joint effort of the Saginaw Valley State University Department of Sociology, the Houghton-Jones Community Center, and the Good Neighbors Mission to explore new ways to provide affordable, healthful food to urban residents. It has been roughly two months since the four hydroponic systems were first installed at the two community centers, I have just returned from Christmas break, and the new year brings the real beginning of the project.
The last time I saw the plants, on December 11th, most of them were sprouting nicely while a few remained hidden in their rock-wool incubators. The sprouts only had to suffer a few stumbling points in their infancy. The ph levels in all four systems was noticably high, up to 7.8, and in correcting this I underestimated the potency of the ph-down solution, dropping the acidity levels in the Houghton-Jones systems to just above 3. In correcting this catastrophe, the parts-per-million was elevated from around 250 to over 600. Thus far, that does not appear to have had any adverse effects on our future fruits and vegitables. Additionally, while I was adding solution to all four systems, I unplugged the base chord from the outlet, which reset our kilowat-hours meter. This is minor, as we had recorded the total kw-hours before unplugging the meter, but it is something to be cautious of during future solution remixing. The final impediment to the program is the tragic death of our ph meter, which produced its last accurate readings in early December before displaying symptoms of old age and deterioration. Until we obtain a successor, we will use ph tape to record the acidity levels. This is equally as accurate, though less precise. For our purposes, it will suffice to know that the ph level is between 6 and 7.
We are submitting a proposal to present the findings of this research at a conference at Penn State in May of this year. I will be at La Universidad de Guadalajara Autonomo during the conferece, so should our proposal be accepted, Dr. Thomas will be presenting solo.

I have christened each hydroponic system with a more personable name than "system 1" or "system 4." At the Houghton Jones center reside Puck (Robin Goodfellow) and the Growinator. Stationed in the Good Neighbors Mission are Norman Bourlaug and Captain Planet. I am making laminated name-plates for each system, though we will not be smashing any bubbly over them to avoid intoxicating the plants. It is my hope that naming the systems in this manner will encourage community embracement of, perhaps even affection for, the systems. When I was in elementary school, my freinds and I all named our bikes, and I found that endowing one's property with a supposed personality inspires a person to care for it more earnestly.

We will be holding at least two workshops in Saginaw to provide the community members with training to use and maintain their hydroponic gardens. These workshops will address the large systems installed in the community buildings as well as potential smaller gardens that individuals may create for their homes. It is our hope that these workshops will initiate a higher level of community involvement.

I will be traveling into Saginaw to see how the plants are progressing this week. Until then, eat healthily and stay green.