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The goal of becoming self-sufficient is growing into a very popular one. More and more people are working towards providing for themselves in all aspects of life, ranging from the fuel they use to the food they eat, and you’ve probably done some work in this area for yourself. Of course, though, when it comes to something like growing food, the time of year can have a big impact on your ability to grow. To help you out with this, this post will be exploring a route which can be followed to move an outdoor garden onto the inside of your home. With this in mind, you should be able to avoid any downtime in your food production, enabling you to be truly self-sufficient.
Finding A Space
You will find it hard to be able to start a process like this if you don’t have the space for it, making this first stage into a very important one. Depending on the amount of plants you have, different amounts of space will be needed for this, and this makes it critical that you think about the space you’re going to use. Garages can be perfect for this, along with attics, cellars, and spare rooms, giving you loads of options when you’re first approaching this idea. When it comes to growing your own food, it will always be worth making compromises in other parts of your life.
Along with providing you with the room you need, you also need to make sure that your chosen space is going to be suitable when it comes to areas like temperature, water, and power availability. Thankfully, though, you don’t need to worry about light, as this will be covered later on. If this is something you plan to do for a long time, it could be worth putting some time into modifying your place to make it more useful. Of course, though, this won’t be viable for some people, and you may have to simply work with what you have.
Getting Some Equipment
Once you have a space to put your plants into, it will be time to start gathering the equipment which you’re going to use to help you through this process. There are loads of tools around the web which can be helpful when taking this approach to growing, and loads of research has gone into this industry to make it work. Below, you can find some examples of the tools you will need to get started with this.
- Irrigation: Water is very important to plants, but you can’t exactly live with sprinklers going off inside your home. This leaves you with the task of finding a more subtle solution to this, with modern hydroponic irrigation systems being perfect for this task. There are loads of stores around the web selling these goods which urge you to shop their catalog before buying into this. Of course, though, it will also be worth doing some research before you buy.
- Lighting: Along with water, you also need to make sure that your plants are getting enough light. Normal light bulbs can work for this, but it can be much better to go for something more specialised. Lighting companies have managed to produce products which are designed to provide the very best light to plants. While it is synthetic, this can make your setup more effective than the sun itself.
- Ventilation: Unlike animals, plants need to have carbon dioxide in order to survive, effectively breathing the stuff in to help keep themselves healthy. To give your plants access to enough air, having a fan or two blowing onto them is a great idea. This has other benefits, too, as it will also simulate wind, forcing your plants to grow their roots deeper to protect themselves.
- Monitoring: Ensuring that your plants stay healthy will always take some monitoring. With factors like soil PH, moisture, and growth rates being crucial to your operation, it’s essential that you have the right set of tools to be able to manage it. Thankfully, there are products on the market which can help with all of this, making it possible to keep your plants on the right track from your smartphone.
Tailoring To Your Plants
With your plants growing and data being collected, it won’t take long for you to have an idea of how successful your setup is going to be. You don’t need to accept your results at this stage, though, and there will always be room for improvement, making it worth doing some optimisation. By making small changes here and there, you can adapt your environment to ensure that your plants have the best possible chance of growing large fruit. Simply tweaking something like the temperature in your room can be enough to make loads more grow.
Learning More
Once you’ve gotten started with a process like this, there really isn’t much reason to stop, and you will always have more to learn. To make sure that you’re always moving forwards, it will be worth setting yourself some challenges, like learning about a new plant every day. Blogs, forums, and social media are perfect for this, providing you with a wealth of free resources which can’t be found anywhere else. As time goes on, you will get better and better at managing your indoor garden, and your yields will grow year by year. At the start, though, it could be a little bit slower, and this will be worth keeping in mind avoid disappointment.
Being self-sufficient isn’t something which should be dependent on the time of year. Having cold weather will make it impossible to grow food, though, and this makes it important to be aware of the tools which are available to help you out with this. People have been using methods like this for many years. This makes it nice and easy to find support for your effort, while also giving you the chance to learn from others, providing you with more than just a garden, as you will also be a new member of a community.
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