I purchased a Gardyn 3.0 during the Black Friday sale of 2023. Why? Winters are hard up here in the PNW. I wanted to try to double up and benefit from gardening and the full spectrum light. I also wanted some healthier snacks on hand that I didn’t have to worry about. What was my garden experience before this? I had murdered all my house plants save one pothos I amanged to keep alive for a six months (it’s still around and thriving). This is a random smattering of things I learned/think are worth knowing/considering.
TLDR: Would I buy again? Yes.
Let’s talk about the subscription
Credits
You get 10 credits a month. Most plants are one credit. Fruits tend to be two or three. Are you going to go through 10 heads of lettuce in a month? You know, you might. This is probably the only full use of the credits. It you go 100% lettuce. Even, I’d find it wasteful only using the (compostible) y-cubes only once. I have been saving mine. After my initial one year of membership and a full year beyond, I have twenty unused y-cubes some of which are from the original starter kit. I also still have 35 reclaimed y-cubes. Seeing as I have transitioned my Gardyn to longer lived plants, I likely have two plus years of y-cubes on hand now. So, four years of y-cubes from one year of membership. I also used my credits to buy plant food heavily towards the end. I have roughly two full Gardyn bottles of veg + bloom.
Suggestion: If you buy a year subscription, use your credits to buy plant food every other month.
Kelby
If you forget to take the covers off your y-cubes, Kelby will let you know. Other than that… Don’t hold your breath. The app has seen some big changes kind of recently lending more to a gamification which–I’ll admit–I like better. The fact that it is essentially pay to win is obnoxious. Certain things that affect your score are only available with the membership. Not sure if it’s good or bad but my Gardyn currently has an 86 sans Kelby.
What was I hoping for? Well, as someone that had never grown food before I was bound to miss some things. Like the first time lettuce bolted. I didn’t realize that I should harvest it before it gets to far along. Not a word from Kelby. The time a column was disconnected and all the plants started to die? Yeah, Kelby also didn’t alert me that they weren’t looking healthy which was unfortunate because I was out of town… Temperature alerts as well would be nice. As in, hey guy your greens are gonna go limp if you don’t cool it down. Nothing. Once, while I was growing Fairy Tale Eggplant (which was listed as discontinued; I ordered some seeds) it did randomly give me advice on handling egg plant flowers. That was cool and in line with my expectations. But it only happened when using a product they no longer offered…
Y-Cubes, Rockwool, and Seeds
So you want to use your own seeds (maybe saved from your Gardyn or elsewhere), having to spend one full credit on one empty y-cube is dumb dumb dumb. Instead, save your y-cubes as you use them (give them a light wash) and buy 1.25” rockwool cubes. I wasn’t able to find a local vendor, sadly. Maybe you didn’t think about it but Gardyn loads up the y-cubes with more seeds than are necessary. You can usually pull out half from each cube and save them. The only real risk here is missing a starting deadline. Regarding sourcing seeds, I started off by exploring varieties Gardyn listed as discontinued (Fairy Tale Eggplant and Ground Cherry come to mind). I had good success. I have since expanded out, exploring dwarf and hydroponic varieties of lettuce and peppers. Peppers are trickier. A poblano, for example, if probably gonna be two feet tall-it’s a big space hog. I shoot for varieties that are less than two feet tall.
Accessories
I bought the accessory assortment with my Gardyn. I wouldn’t do it again. Why? Because you’re not really saving anything. While it is discounted it’s also priced such that if you want, for example, a full set of trellis you will have to buy one more than you need which offsets your savings. It’s pretty great business on paper, I suppose.
Trellis
One of the big draws for me with getting a Gardyn vs DIYing was that it is a pretty attractive little thing. The trellis accentuate it quite well. They are pretty easy to get on and off–less so if you’re trying to thread it over a plant. Each column can hold five trellis. For full coverage, you need ten-five on both of the outer columns. This makes it slightly wider as well. You could probably get away with eight, really, skipping the bottom. While it does seem sensible to just use the center column, if you have anything else fruiting it will probably be in the middle, dominating the area. Some plants will attach themselves, others will need to be seated or attached by hand. The many “hooks” on the trellis give you no-tie options.
Caps/Covers
I am a bit annoyed that it doesn’t come with a full set of cover inserts. Algae is a problem. Nevermind possible contamination. I really like the caps that work without requiring a y-pod. Models that can be printed of both can be found online. Use PETG as it is UV resistant. You can also just use alumnium foil. It doesn’t look classy haha.
Plant Belts
I really like these. Again, they look nice and they’re easy to use. One side is designed to grip the column–it has a slot and tab design–the other is a ball and slot design with variable positioning. Can you use bread ties/twine/whatever? Of course. I had these because I bought the accessory kit. But I think I would still buy them again.
Chlorine is an Asshole!
I have tried a lot to keep my strawberries happy–they’re so needy! But still some level of rot seems to creep into their roots eventually. I added an aeration pump. No change. I had been using Hydroponic Research Life+ priobiotics which seemed to help a bit. Sometimes. And then I stepped it up to Hydroguard which definitely helped but not as much as I expected. And then I realized I was being an idiot: my tap water is treated with chlorine. I was murdering my probiotics. Mid-week additions were the extent of the real contribution to the plant’s biome. I run an aeration pump and stir my tank occassionally for two hours prior adding nutrients or balancing ph. This is mostly to protect the existing organisms colonizing the roots. I then wait until the following morning to add fresh Hydroguard. This seems to be helping.
Algae! Algae! Algae!
I have some strawberry plants that have been alive for more than a year. Hell, my rosemary is almost two. I used algae covers until I ran out. The strawberries got foil covers. I didn’t think much about algae. Until I started two pepper plants at the same time. They grew in lockstep for a while but one had and algae cover and the other didn’t. As the uncovered plant’s rockwool darkened, the other pepper seemed to rapidly outpace the other in growth despite fruiting first. Now I cover exposed rockwool obsessively. It takes a week or two for the plants to rebound but their leaves seem healthier and fruit production is better.
Let’s talk about tank refreshes
Mixed Gardens
Combing fruiting plants and greens seems like an easy win. But you’ll quickly see lackluster results. Basically, as instructed, a Gardyn will have an EC of around 1200. Great for lettuce, herbs, and the like. Not so great for more than a few fruiting plants. To get decent yields on a heavy fruiting Gardyn, you’ll need an EC so high lettuce won’t survive.
Fruiting Optimizations
If you’re like me and want to really want to get the most snacks, you’re gonna want to buy an EC and PH meter. I scoffed at this for the better part of two years due to the inaccuracy of the affordable models. But, in the end, it boils down to a tool that is 80% accurate is still vastly superior to shooting in the dark. My current strategy is to add 4 tsp of veg + bloom dirty and 10 lm of Fox Farm’s Tigerbloom. I usually end up adding ~1/8 tsp potassium bicarbonate as a PH up + stabilizer as well to ensure we’re within the acceptable range. EC tends to end up around 1840. I top off when EC >2100 to bring it back down around 1850. I try to do weekly refreshes but sometimes they stretch to ten days.
High EC Greens
My two favorite greens that work with my current strategy are kale and kohlrabi. Gardyn was my first exposure to kohlrabi and it was the purple variety. I loved it. Gardyn was sold out–and so was Johnny’s–so I bought some azur star seeds. No complaints. I’ve grown a lot of kohlrabi now but never so fast. And then there’s the leaves-they get huge! Kale, for most Gardyn-ers, is a big disappointment. It grows really, really slowly. Turns out, that’s a nutrient issue. It grows much faster with longer leaves (~12 inches). And then there’s the opportunity of pepper leaves. They must be cooked to be safe but if you’ve got peppers, you may as well use them.