Growing in pots with soil, Edamame beans
Edamame beans are a soja type of bean that are very popular in Japan. They are lightly cooked with a sprinkle of salt. Very tasty with an soja dipping sauce…. And very healthy.
Seems like a nice plant to try grow in one of our grow cabinets. I have never seen Edamame beans grown indoors under a light. Searching the internet i also could not find any info. Maybe they not meant tob e grown in this way and my grow blog is going to be a complete failure. Bearing this in mind i am still going to do this blog “real time” on our website and maybe you guys can help me along the way. Get in touch with me via our contact page or via Facebook.
The Plan
I will be growing in pots with soil of 11 litre. In every pot there will be two Edamame plants. The pots will be in two rows in the grow cabinet. In the middle of the two pots i will place a 1,20 meter high frame with a plant net. The net will run from the top of the frame right down to the pots in a sort of pyramid style.
This will allow the bean plant to grow along the net towards the light but also allow the bottom half of the plant to get light.
The cabinet that we will be working is the Bonanza 600. We will use a dimmable Lucilux ballast instead of the standard Eurogear ballast because we dont want to give too much light to the plants in the early stages of growth. In the this way we can start them on 250 Watt and then 400 watt and finish them on 600 watt. It will also save on the power bill.
The Bonanza 1m2 grow box with dimmable ballast.
The dimmable ballast can be set on thfour differentsettings 250,400,600 and 660 watt
The seeds are sown in turf pots and allowed to pre grow under the Starlight 2 x 55 watt light. The pots are placed in a propergator to maintain humidity. The newly sprouter plants have hardly any roots so they rely on there leaves to absorb water. Once the roots have developed they will be placed in 16 litre pots. Two in a pot.
Envy, the Edamame bean that i have choosen
The beans in the turf pots are placed around 2 cm in the soil
The propergator with pots under the Starlight 2 x 55 watt lamp.
16-9-2017
After two days the first beans have sprouted. The soil cracks open with a small sprouter with little leaves. This happens within 24 hours. You can watch them grow it happens so fast. The roots also grow very fast and after a day you can see them growing out the bottom of the turf pots. The roots dry up and die outside the turf pots so its time to over pot them. The soil that will be used is Guanokalong soil. This soil is enriched with Guano and provides all the food the plants will need.
Within three days the beans have sprouted
The roots have grown threw the turf pots
The edamame beans in 11 litre pots
The Lucilu dimmable ballast is set at 250 watt fort he time being.
3-10-2017
The beans grow super fast. They are very thin and fragile. They need support and look for something to support them. Time to add the the frame with netting. I have placed a frame 40 cm below the lamp and added the netting. The beans now have asupport system that allows them to grow towards the light but still allows light to reach the bottom.
I have placed a frame 40 cm below the lamp and added the netting
I place a aluminium u profile to create the top part of frame
Now i have an attachment point.
The plant net goes over the profile and is connected to the pots.
The plant net goes over the profile and is connected to the pots.
10-10-2017
The speed that the beans are growing is super fast.the grow around 10 cm everyday. All the staff members had running bets on which plant would reach the top part of the frame first.
The edamame on 10-10-2017
The beans racing up the net
Blumat irrigation system
I decide to use a irrigation system to make it easy to give the beans water. The blumat automatic watering system is my best option. The system consists of a water tank that is placed up higher than the plants with 8 blumat sensors connected tot he pots with soil. The blumat sensors are connected with a hose to the water tank. When the soil drys out the valve opens on the sensor giving droplets of water. When the soil becomes wet the valves close. The system works perfevtly and without pumps or timers. Once the plants start needing food it can be added into the watertank. This system is delivered with a circulation pump and make sure the nutrient mix does not sink tot he bottom of the watertank and that O2 is added to the nutrient solution.
In every pot a blumat sensor is placed
The sensors are connected tot he watertank
25-10-2017
The first plants have now reached the top. The question is how they will grow further.i hope they will stop streching and broaden out and start making pods. The first pods are now visible and can bes een on every plant.
The plants on 25-10-2017
25-10-2017 the first pods are visible
25-10-2017 The lamp is now turned up to 400 watt
