I love how they have these little like smiley faces, like gotcha.
That's a good tip. It's not. If you're like me,
you've probably seen those crazy viral hacks that have gone around on Facebook
or everywhere else on the internet, pretty much,
about how to grow plants in these creative fun ways.
So what I thought I'd do today is take a look at one of these videos from the
perspective of someone who's been gardening. Now I'm not an expert,
I would never call myself an expert gardener.
But I've been growing plants for about 10 years now up to the point where I
actually lived off my own garden, fishing and foraging for an entire month.
And I live just like a mile away from downtown San Diego.
So I've done my fair share of growing.
We're going to take a look at the aptly named site Blossom and this video is
called "indoor gardening hacks that make you throw your hands up and sprout".
I have a feeling I'm not going to be throwing my hands up and sprouting.
I will probably be throwing them up in despair at the terrible advice that I'm
about to see. But this video has, how many views does it have?
36 million views. 26,000 comments. 603,000 shares.
So needless to say, it's been spread around. It's been propagated quite a bit.
Let's go ahead and take a look and see if any of this advice is valid from the
perspective of someone who's a gardener. So let's go ahead and do this.
I'll just be pausing throughout and offer my perspective.
So cultivate that Like button and let's get into the video. Okay,
we're going to put our finger in it. First of all, already out of the gate.
This is a terrible hack because that's just a good banana.
You should just eat that banana.
You shouldn't ruin the banana and do what they're about to do here.
It looks like they're putting aloe in.
So this an already rooted aloe plant and okay,
they're going to put it in a banana and then plant the banana. Oh my God.
So what they're doing here is they're taking an aloe,
which typically likes a dry sandy, rocky type of soil,
and they're putting it into a banana that's perfectly healthy that you should
probably eat. And then they're putting that into soil. How does that make sense?
Why wouldn't you just eat the banana and then put the aloe into the soil if you
already have the soil? So this hack, even if it was good, which it's not,
it doesn't really serve what the hack is even trying to do - which is planting a
banana. So let's see. Oh, it's just, oh, okay. That's why,
it says potassium speeds up growth. Not really. No.
I mean the soil is already gonna have potassium if it's got enough of nutrients
in general. So if you're putting your aloe in a decent plant pot with good soil,
it already has potassium in it. And giving a plant more potassium,
if it's lacking, will boost growth. But if there's already enough,
it's not going to boost it further. So it's just simply not true.
And really the banana would have to degrade to the point where you would even
mobilize that potassium.
You can't just take it straight from a banana into the plant roots.
It kind of has to go through this whole process in the soil to even become
bioavailable to your aloe. So none of this makes any sense.
And of course, we have incredible growth on this aloe plant here.
Next we have a teabag and they're going to rip it open and they're taking a seed
and they're going to use this potentially to just germinate that seed.
Let's see what they say. Yeah. Okay. Okay,
well this is actually not wrong. This actually would work,
although it's probably not the most sterile mix.
A lot of the times when you're starting seeds,
you start in a sterilized seed starting mix just to make sure that you have no
fungal pathogens or anything like that that might disturb your, your seedling.
Because when we're starting a little seedling, you know,
if I was starting this little guy from seed,
I want to give it the best chance that it has to grow and starting it in
something like that might not be the best idea. Also,
it's generally a little overly moist.
You'd probably want to squeeze that out a lot before you started a,
a whatever in it. And I, oh, okay. So now it's,
this is the same sort of fallacy. Nitrogen in tea promotes growth.
There may be nitrogen in the tea leaves. In fact there very likely is.
But again, it has to be decomposed to become available to the plants.
And so the whole reason for doing this, at least that they're saying,
it just doesn't make a lot of sense.
What I would do with my teabag is I actually would throw that into my worm bin
in the backyard. The worms would eat their way through the tea,
they'd poop it out and they've broken it down and then soil microbes and all
sorts of different things that live in the soil would actually make it available
to my plants. But for now,
just planting it in tea doesn't make a whole lot of sense. It looks cool though.
Okay. We have a plastic container here.
We've magically tapped a hole through it. We put some cardboard in,
we've put some herbs in it in an upside down herb planter. Okay. Yeah. This,
this actually works.
The problem you're probably going to have with this is that number one,
you're watering the plant from the top and water's going to spill out the bottom
onto the plant, so it doesn't make the most sense.
I don't know what the purpose specifically for growing herbs upside down would
be when you could just do this exact same thing right side up and you have the
exact same results and way less mess.
So let's go ahead and see if there's any special reason. Oh, okay.
Come on guys. Upside down plants absorb more nutrients.
I have no,
no idea what evidence they have for that and it just on its face makes no sense.
And so even, okay, how about this?
Even if upside down plants absorb nutrients, maybe like 20% better,
whatever.
There's still not the best reason to do that because it's more annoying than
it's worth. Okay, let's see. Our next hack. Uh,
hangers and, okay. They're going to make, okay. Yeah,
they're going to make like a hanger trellis here.
So they've actually chosen a plant that you can do this with.
This type of trellising method, it's pretty popular.
I actually went on a walk a couple of days ago through my neighborhood and this
exact pattern, this diamondesque pattern with an ivy plant, was being used.
So there's really nothing wrong with this.
It certainly can work and it actually looks kind of cool,
so I have to give them some props for that. Okay. So we have root rot.
First of all, for those of you who are unfamiliar,
root rot is basically when you're over watering your plants and the soil goes
anaerobic. Roots need oxygen to live and if they go anaerobic,
aka without oxygen,
it's really a breeding ground for these fungal pathogens that can just sort of
rot out the roots. And then you have situations like this.
So let's see how the almighty Blossom decides to, uh, combat this.
Pantyhose. I've got plenty of that at my house. What is happening here?
So they've taken pantyhose, they've put it around the roots,
and then they've put, okay, okay.
So they're using a,
basically they're using pantyhose to create a sub irrigated little water chamber
at the bottom. You can still over water your plants this way, especially if you,
you water enough to fill up that gap there.
But really the simpler way to solve this problem is to know how much water your
plants need and just don't give them more than that.
And so instead of creating this little reservoir, number one,
you could drill drainage holes in the bottom of your pot,
which I have a video on on my channel. And number two,
you could actually just water your plant appropriately.
So you don't need to craft a pantyhose, a sub irrigated little plant pot.
We've got a mason jar, they've sprayed some water on a plant,
and they've created, okay, so they've created a terrarium.
This works to a degree.
I mean at some point you're probably going to deal with like some mold or too
high humidity issues, which would lead to mold or rot,
especially if it's a plant that really doesn't like this.
This is basically a terrarium style,
but even terrariums need a little oxygen exchange.
And so I would recommend at the very least maybe drilling some holes in,
in the top. Plants in jars recycle water, self-watering ecosystem.
That's actually not false. There's a guy who did,
I'm sure we'll put the picture up here,
but he did this like big bottle jar ecosystem that's been alive and kind of at
interplay with itself for like 30 something years or so.
So it can certainly work. The way they've done it that's not going to happen.
So I wouldn't recommend that. Okay. Let's see. We've got some sponges.
We've put a sponge on the side and we've watered the sponge and we've evenly
distributed the water. Um, to a degree that actually works,
although I don't know that I would put it on the side.
If I was going to do that,
I would put it on the bottom and I would put it in a pot that has a drainage
hole. So if this pot had a drainage hole right here,
and I wanted to make sure that I didn't lose too much water out of the bottom,
what a lot of people will do is they'll put gravel at the bottom of their pots.
But gravel doesn't really improve the drainage at the bottom of pot.
And I have a whole video on why that is. But if I was gonna use that sponge tip,
what I would do, rather than putting it on the side,
is I would cut up chunks of sponge, almost like maybe like that,
and I would put them at the bottom.
And so basically what happens there is that's a water buffer and whenever the
soil gets dry, water's wicked upwards.
And then it just kind of manages it a little bit better. But again,
the solution there is probably just to manage your watering instead of relying
on a hack to keep your plants alive.
We've drilled a hole in the cork with a magnet. I mean, okay,
that's kind of cute. That's not going to last for that long.
It's not going to live for that long cause there's no,
there's no nutrition and there's no growing media in there.
But it looks cute and succulents actually can live for surprisingly long in
conditions like this. So, hey, if you want to do that,
maybe you have a big succulent,
chop some little cuttings off and do it that way. That can work totally fine.
Aluminum foil, we fold it in half.
We fold it in quarters and eighths and we've used a Popsicle stick.
What are we doing here? Oh my God. Okay, hold on, hold on, hold on, hold on.
If they're going to say that this reflects enough light to grow a plant,
then, so bad. Okay, here we go. Oh my God. Okay.
And I swear I did not watch this video. I swear I did not watch it.
But this is just so obviously dumb. So first of all,
a lot of people misunderstand how plants even use light in the first place.
I have a video called how to evaluate an LED grow light that says exactly how
plants use light. They don't have eyes. And so like if you put a plant,
like if I put this plant next to my, my window over there, and I said, oh,
it looks light enough. Well plants don't have eyes.
It needs to be intense enough light basically to have enough photons of light
hitting this plant that supports its growth. So it can photosynthesize,
turn that, that light energy into plant energy and then actually live its life.
Now if you do something like this,
it's simply not reflecting enough to make a material difference.
The simpler way to solve this problem if you're growing,
and let's say my light source is coming in like this,
problem solved, right?
All you have to do is just rotate your plants every now and then and they will
grow evenly. You can even see this one.
Where do you think the light was coming on this one? More of the leaves have,
have sort of made their way this way. So if I was to grow this,
I would probably place it like this next and I would start to see some shifting
and new growth coming out this way.
That's the simpler way to do this instead of creating this weird Popsicle stick
contraption. I love how they have these little like smiley faces like, gotcha.
That's a good tip. It's not. How to check your soil pH levels. Vinegar.
No, no, no, no, no, no, no, no. Don't do that.
Baking soda. First of all, if you do this, you just ruined that soil,
so that's not a good idea.
The best way to check your soil pH is to use a soil pH test kit.
That's just the easiest way. You can get these little strips.
Although they're a little less reliable. You can even send away,
like if you're out in your real garden,
you can send away and have a lab test your soil. And they're right, to a degree.
Most plants like somewhat neutral to slightly acidic soil,
which means like maybe a 6.2 to a 7 although there's definitely plants on both
sides of those spectrums. You've got, you know,
your blueberries that really want it super acidic and then there's a bunch of
plants that like a little more alkaline soil. Okay.
We have what looks like a tomato hornworm here, not on a tomato,
so that's already unusual. Bugs.
Take peppers,
blend them and what are we going to do? What are we going to do?
Honestly, this can work. It doesn't work foolproof against all pests.
But hot pepper sprays, first of all, look at the little way that they've like,
I 100% guarantee that the way that they made these holes in this plant is they
just took like something and burned through it.
Because if you look at the way it is,
no bug eats that way and I guarantee they just like burned something through it.
But the hot pepper spray can work.
You usually want to mix in stuff like a little garlic or perhaps also some soap,
like a true soap,
like a Dr. Bronner's Castile Soap that can all work in conjunction and can deter
pests. But for the one that we saw, that tomato hornworm,
you would much rather just pick it off. It's so big.
You don't need to do something like this. Okay. We have a rope. We've got I,
they're probably gonna make like a macrame hanger here. Yeah.
Hmm. I mean I've never done this. That's actually pretty cool.
Like if this video was just that kind of hack, it would be a good video.
Why don't they just do stuff like this?
It actually is helpful instead of propagating this terrible information for the
first two minutes of the video to like millions of people.
Just do these cute hacks and live your life. Okay. Tylenol.
What are they going to do with this? Tylenol? What does it supposed to do?
Fights harmful bacteria. There's no point in doing this. Um,
at least to my knowledge, I, and I could be wrong in the science here,
but as far as I know, acetaminophen does not have any,
any material benefit to spraying on your plants. If,
if you know you have a bacterial problem on a plant,
it's better to just use better solutions.
Like a specifically formulated spray that can help combat that or you can cut
the leaf off. There's a lot of different ways to do it. Okay.
I think we have one more hack here.
Succulents in an ice cube tray with a Popsicle stick on each side.
What are they gonna do here?
What's the Popsicle stick for? Or the picture frame. Oh,
it's to keep it in place. Hey, I mean that works.
There's nothing wrong with that. I can't hate on that.
It'll eventually die because they're quite small, but that's fine.
It's like a cute little project. Okay guys.
So obviously there were a lot of things wrong with this video and that's a video
that was shown to 36 million people. Those views aren't real real views,
but like a lot of people. And so this is what I like to do.
I like to analyze why things do and don't work in the garden and really
understand things from that root level, pun intended.
So I hope you enjoyed this style of video.
If there's any other kind of viral gardening or plant videos you want me to take
a look at and do a reaction to, I would love to do that.
And if you do want a practical guide to gardening, no matter where you live,
apartments, townhouses, or condos, of course you can check out my book.
It's called Field Guide to Urban Gardening. I've got signed copies on my store,
but I also sell it on Amazon and really anywhere books are sold.
So until next time guys, good luck in the garden.
Keep growing and I'll catch you on the next video.