For a Green Thumb, Just Add Water

Summer starts this weekend, and already I'm munching on home-grown Swiss chard, three varieties of lettuce, arugula, mint, chives, oregano, sage and basil. The potatoes are planted; so are tomatoes, peppers and some broccoli.

And here's the clincher: It's all growing on my deck.
Consider me a lawn-chair gardener. After years of putting off starting a food garden because I could never find time to till the soil, erect a deer fence, weed, water, etc., I finally took the plunge thanks to an arsenal of easy-gardening products now flooding the marketplace. From container kits with premeasured fertilizer and watering gauges to compact potato and lettuce-growing bags that can be toted around, the gardening industry is angling to green the thumbs of reticent, and younger, first-time growers. The new items are intended to save time, water, fertilizer and space -- and make it hard to mess up.

Home Depot Inc. will begin selling "Farm in a Box" online within the next few weeks; the system by Atlanta-based Earth Solutions LLC uses aquaponic technology with recirculating water to grow vegetables on top of the box along with fish underneath (their waste acts as fertilizer for the plants); the smallest version, called "Little Tokyo," costs about $249 and at 30 inches tall by 20 inches wide, can fit on an apartment balcony.

In the past two years, sales of tomato-growing aids from Gardener's Supply Co. of Burlington, Vt., have risen 30%. Among them: a $19.95 hanging "Revolution Planter" that grows the fruit upside down to eliminate weeding and staking. Meantime, sales were up 10% this spring of EarthBox, a purportedly fool-proof $55 container gardening kit featuring a shower-cap-like plastic mulch cover, the optimal amount of fertilizer and a self-watering reservoir system.

"We are seeing a new generation of buyer coming in, one that is younger and trying to grow their own food and doesn't have the skill sets or confidence yet to go in with a full-blown garden," says Frank DiPaolo, general manager for 15-year-old EarthBox, which is owned by Archbald, Pa.-based Laminations Inc.

While seasoned gardeners have long grown select foods in pots or in contained raised beds off the ground, proper care and feeding of plants is still sometimes tricky. A key focus of today's new technology is to help time-pressed (or forgetful) consumers not kill their food with neglect. For instance, year-to-date sales of Miracle-Gro Moisture Control Potting Mix, fortified with moisture-absorbing coconut fibers to protect against over- and under-watering, are up 23% for Marysville, Ohio-based Scotts Miracle-Gro Co. Meantime, Gardener's Supply this year launched "Garden Grids," flexible polyethylene-coated panels to ease the hassle of crafting support trellises so tall-growing vegetables don't flop.

Toro Co. recently began selling the "Drip Starter Kit," a $9.99 three-step irrigation system that works in pots and is designed to cut time spent watering. "We were specifically looking for the novice," says Laura Lopez, senior marketing manager for Toro's retail water business. "We were getting so many calls and questions like, 'I don't know where to start.' "

Newcomers are expected to account for 21% of U.S. gardening households this year, according to the National Gardening Association, and will help drive the total number of food-growing homes to nearly 43 million, up 19% from last year. The increased appetite for food gardening is being fed by a desire for better-tasting produce, the prospect of saving money as well as safety after several high-profile food-tainting scares. What's more, First Lady Michelle Obama threw down the gardening gauntlet earlier this year when she devoted 1,100 square feet of the White House's South Lawn to plant an organic vegetable garden.

However, for those without a full-time kitchen staff and gaggle of volunteer schoolchildren to chip in digging and weeding, the easy-garden products can ease the transition into first-time farm work. "You've got to start somewhere, whether it's in a container or with a raised bed or simple irrigation kit," says Bruce Butterfield, market-research director with the National Gardening Association.
Moreover, such products can make gardening accessible to consumers in urban areas or places with poor soil quality. Two years ago, Steve Cerilli of Newport, R.I., gave two EarthBoxes a whirl on his own downtown building's rooftop and tended to the plants with water collected in rain barrels.

Now 39-year-old Mr. Cerilli has 14 EarthBoxes and grows a variety of things including broccoli rabe, eggplant and enough tomatoes and peppers to can for pasta sauce during winter. "Most people have yards -- I don't have a yard," says Mr. Cerilli, an audio engineer who co-founded the not-for-profit WXHQ Radio Newport.

To be sure, it can be tough to get the crop yields or the economies of scale that a larger properly designed and maintained in-ground garden can provide. And depending on what is planted, it could take a couple of seasons to achieve payback with some of the pricier kits, many of which encourage the purchase of "replenishment" or "replant" packs the following year.

Plus, with good potting mix, research and nurturing, consumers also can achieve good growing results in less expensive run-of-the-mill pots.

"But this isn't just about saving [money]," says Kathy LaLiberte, director of gardening for Gardener's Supply. "People have a lot of trepidation when they go out to garden, maybe because they didn't grow up with someone who gardened or they are living on their own."

She and other manufacturers hope early success with the kits and tools will inspire customers to expand their gardening ambitions. Take the collapsible "Smart Pot" aeration container sold by Gardener's Supply as a potato bin. No digging required; just plop in some fertilized soil and potato pieces and keep adding soil and water as the potatoes grow stems and leaves. Come harvest time, there should be 10 to 12 pounds of potatoes inside the bin. Not exactly a bountiful harvest, but enough to give a taste of the process.

What's more, growing in smaller, manageable areas heightens the prospect that a first foray won't end in failure. "The temptation is you go to the store with all sorts of enthusiasm and come home with 30 seed packets and begin to plant an Iowa farm garden, and you are just doomed," says Ms. LaLiberte of Gardener's Supply. One of the company's best sellers is its $69.95 "Organic Tomato Success Kit," which advertises to out-produce in-ground grown plants by 30%.

Sales are also flourishing of raised-bed gardening products. This is the process of building up fertilized soil in a centralized location, often with a contained border, to reduce weeding and avoid poor ground soil. Home Depot says its sales of Scenery Solutions Inc.'s $219 "Frame It All" raised-bed vegetable gardening system -- crafted from composite plastic timbers -- have risen in the high-double-digits year-over-year. And Earth Solutions recently launched a $595 "South Lawn Organic Garden Kit" with Spruce raised-bed garden boxes it says can be assembled with just a screwdriver and seeds. It's meant to mimic what the Obamas are raising.

Meantime, in March, Gardener's Supply introduced an online "Kitchen Garden Planner" program. So far, more than a million unique site visitors have looked at the planner at www.gardeners.com, the company says. It includes a cheat sheet of six preplanned gardens, including a "Salsa & Tomato Sauce" plot and the most popular -- a "Plant It & Forget It" garden.

That's the spirit inspiring my nascent deck venture in New York's Hudson Valley. After a late start last month, I'm testing the lettuce and herb bags, which resemble squared gray duffle totes, the "Organic Tomato Success Kit," and three EarthBoxes, and I will hoist the tomato "Revolution Planter" this weekend.

My deck is high off the ground, so critters (other than my dog) aren't an issue. Because everything is in containers, neither, really, are weeds.

While yields so far are modest with lingering mild temperatures, I've eaten homegrown lettuce two or three times a week, sautéed a couple of portions of Swiss chard and have more herbs than I know recipes for. Harvesting the tomatoes (which are growing strong), peppers, potatoes and broccoli will come later in the season.

The lettuce bag is cumbersome to move once filled with soil, and frustration assembling the tomato success kit's cage had me hollering some choice words to the neighborhood. Otherwise, there has been little hassle other than watering.

Makers of the products I'm testing say their wares typically work in any climate, but recommend checking with a local nursery or a state's agricultural cooperative extension program to determine the best varieties and planting times for your region.

However, because everything will stay on the deck until harvest time, I'm running out of lounging and entertaining space. (My guests' bare legs got tickled by chives recently.) This has me once again ambitiously eyeing a large, empty sunny plot of land in my front yard. Now if only I can get around to that deer fence.