Project by: Diego Bey (10th Grade)
Project Advisor: Kara Luce
Student(s)’s Advisor(s): Susan Now
Description of the Project: I will be buying Cucumber, tomato, lettuce, and zucchini seeds and will be attempting to grow them at my house in Bed-Stuy, Brooklyn. I will be growing 8 of each plant 4 inside and 4 outside to see which method ends up being more effective.
Final Product (e.g., documents, images, video, audio, poster, display, etc.):
Final Reflection on Learning:
Update on Progress from Weeks 1-3 (include any photos or video if relevant):
In the first week, I researched which plants were able to grow in New York and which ones would have the most success growing in late spring, I also researched how to most effectively grow them. By the end of my research, I found the tomatoes, cucumbers, zucchini, and lettuce would grow well. In the second week, I purchased: 2 planter boxes, 1 bag of soil, 1 bag of Compost, a pack of each tomato, cucumber, zucchini, and lettuce seeds. I then began planting filling each of the planter boxes with a mixture that is 1 part compost 2 parts soil and planted 4 of each type of seed in sections 6mm deep and 3 inches apart then left them outside in the sun to grow watering them once a day. In the third week, I purchased a set of 12 seedboxes and filled each with the same soil mixture and again planted 6 more tomatoes and cucumber (as my research showed they’d do the best indoors) 6mm deep, one per box, and left them inside to grow to see which set, indoor or outdoor, would have more success.
Links to the Websites I used to do my Research: https://www.burpee.com/gardenadvicecenter/vegetables/cucumbers/all-about-cucumbers/article10230.html#:~:text=The%20preferred%20method%20of%20cucumber,18%20to%2036%20inches%20apart.
https://www.gardeners.com/how-to/video-slideshow-growing-tomatoes/7902.html
https://www.almanac.com/gardening/planting-calendar/NY/New%20York
https://www.gardeningknowhow.com/edible/vegetables/zucchini/growing-zucchini.htm
Update on Progress from Weeks 4-6 (include any photos or video if relevant):
In these following three weeks I continued to care for the plants watering them every day and keeping them in the sun not really making significant changes to their environment. after the first week on may 13 I got my first sprout which was one of the indoor cucumbers followed by an outdoor zucchini the following week. by the end of the three-week period, 3 indoor tomatoes and 3 indoor cucumbers had sprouted as well as the outdoor zucchini. because the tomato and cucumber sprouts were getting too big for the seed pods and were starting to fall I repotted them in slightly bigger pots using the same soil mixture as before.
Update on Progress from Weeks 7-9 (include any photos or video if relevant):
In the final weeks, I made no significant changes to the plants and just took stock of what had grown. Indoor 3 tomatoes and 3 cucumbers giving me a 50% success rate with the indoor plants as for why the other 3 tomatoes and cucumbers didn’t grow my only guess as to why they didn’t is that I may have planted them too deep because that was the only thing that wasn’t the exact same because I watered all the seeds an equal amount and kept them in the sun. Outside the zucchini did the best although only two sprouted they grew huge very quickly, the tomatoes and cucumbers did sprout for the most part but it took significantly longer than the indoor ones (6 weeks instead of 2) and none of the lettuce sprouted at all meaning either I didn’t plant them right or that are just supposed to take much longer to sprout.
