Measure out a length of toilet paper. If the planting row will be narrow and straight, cut the toilet paper in half lengthwise. Consult the packet of seeds to find out how far apart the seeds should be planted, then use marker or pen to mark each spot where a seed will go. Next, add a dot of glue to each mark. Pour the seeds out onto a plate, then spread them around a little to make them easy to pick up. Using tweezers (or tiny fingers), pick up a seed and place it on one of the drops of glue. Continue until you've placed seeds on all the glue drops. Store Your Seed Tape Once your seed tape is dry, you can roll it back onto the cardboard toilet paper tube and store it in a cool, dry place until you're ready to plant. To plant, lay the seed tape on the soil surface, weighting it with a rock or stone to keep the wind from moving it. Cover with soil to the depth recommended on the seed packet. Firm the soil to make sure there's good soil-seed contact. Water with a fine nozzle to avoid washing the soil away.

Keep the soil moist until seedlings appear. If starting seeds indoors, you may wish to cover the container with plastic wrap to encourage germination.Growing cress is not limited to the garden. You can cultivate garden cress, also known as pepper grass, indoors on a windowsill throughout the year. All you need is a small pot or tray, high-quality cress seeds and some paper towels or soil. Growing cress sprouts on moist paper towels instead of soil reduces the amount of nitrates the crop absorbs, which in turn makes the sprouts taste less bitter. Before we get into the details of how to grow garden cress sprouts indoors in the convenience of your own home, let's take a look at the nutritional benefits of these culinary sprouts. Garden cress (Lat: Lepidium sativum) is a close relative of watercress (Nasturtium officinale) and shares many of the health benefits of watercress. Like watercress, garden cress is packed with vitamin C, with one cup (50 grams) of garden cress providing a whopping 35 milligrams of vitamin C.

This represents nearly 60% of the recommended daily intake of vitamin C! Fresh garden cress sprouts are also loaded with carotenoids, mustard oil, vitamin K and antioxidants. Bike Tire Patch Kit AutozoneWith its peppery flavor and health boosting properties, garden cress makes an excellent addition to salads and sandwiches, steamed/boiled potatoes and soups. Asics Tennis Shoes Washington DcYou can also use it as a garnish in place of parsley.Cooper Zeon Tires 22For more information about the nutritional properties of cress, see Nutritional and Health Benefits of Garden Cress. Garden cress is a fast growing cool-weather plant and the sprouts will be ready for harvest 15 to 20 days after sowing. If you want to have a constant supply of garden cress, sow seeds every 10 days and you will always have fresh garden cress available!

To successfully grow garden cress indoors on soil or on paper towels, follow the step-by-step instructions below: Book You May Like The Hemsley sisters' debut cookbook, The Art of Eating Well, has already taken the UK by storm, and the US edition of the book is rapidly gaining fans in North America, too. Clocking in at over 300 pages, this inspiring cookbook created by two of London's coolest young advocates of healthy eating proves that you don't have to give up the flavor to give up grains, gluten and refined sugar. Complete with stunning photographs, The Art of Eating Well is a must-have for anyone who needs a little inspiration to get started on his or her journey to better health! To learn more or order a copy of this terrific book, click here ( UK residents) or here ( if you live in the US).I have a day off from writing today! The lovely Sarah from Ethics Trading (who is offering free delivery on all order over £30 and has REDUCED the price of her soapnuts) mentioned growing carrots in toilet roll inners on one of our posts.

Well it caused quite a stir amongst our readers who were eager to hear more. As your wish is our command, it’s over to Sarah to tell you all about it……….. This article was first published by Sarah on Quassia; “I’ve always struggled to grow carrots. My soil is quite clay and cold so they often don’t germinate or survive to be big enough to eat. Last year I tried something new. Someone said to me that they save the inner card tubes from toilet rolls and use those to start off seeds, especially carrot and parsnip. The tubes are rigid enough to hold compost, biodegradable and open at the bottom so anything with a tap root isn’t restricted, as well as being tall enough to give those root veg a good head start. Now carrots hate being moved, if you try to transplant them they split, fork or die, don’t form that delicious tap root and are generally inedible. So you can’t usually give them a head start indoors or in a greenhouse, which plants need in my garden – because the soil is cold and sticky.

So, I saved some toilet roll inners, stood them in a deep tray, filled them with compost and sowed my carrots. They germinated and grew fine on the window sill. I went to plant them out and the cardboard was still solid enough to handle reasonably well. I left one or two seedlings in each tube and set them in rows in the veg bed. I did help them along with a liberal sprinkle of organic slug pellets, but this year I have chickens to help with the slugs so I’ll have to be more careful with the pellets or use something else. This all started happening last March and continued through the year until planting season finally came to an end and I now had several rows of carrots grown this way. I ate the first carrots grown in this garden – and they tasted lovely, the roots were long and straight, but could have done with another week or so to bulk up a bit. Still, a successful carrot crop, but I’ll leave them in the ground a bit longer this year and I want to try some different varieties.