While mints grow well in AeroGardens, they may fail to germinate or exhibit stunted growth in some instances.
Thus, you should understand various growth factors affecting mint growth before planting them in AeroGardens.
Proper mint growth ensures maximum output and quality products.
If your mints fail to grow properly after germination or appear unhealthy, it could be due to several factors. However, that does not imply the plants are defective. Instead, they could be lacking essential nutrients, or the environment has plenty of things they do not require.
Fresh mints grow well in an Aero Garden throughout the year.
It ranks among the most common herbs you can grow in your indoor AeroGarden. Mints belong to the family of peppermints and spearmints, and it is highly nutritious.
How to Cultivate Mints in an AeroGarden?
If you have an electrical, indoor garden, you can grow mint easily.
All you need to do is:
- Purchase mint seeds or make yours using seed pod kits.
- Alternatively, you can use old seed pods and get new growing sponges and nutrient elements.
- Next, after preparing the seed pods, fix them in the AeroGarden and add water to the ball. The AeroGarden system will notify you when the pods exhaust nutrients and water.
- As they grow, ensure you learn how to prune, trim and harvest the mints properly.
Growth Factors That Affect Mint Growth in Aerogardens
Some of the most essential factors that you should always check include
- water level
- lighting
- aeration
- nutrients
- compact fluorescents
Luckily, plants do not die immediately something wrong happens, giving you enough signs to act right and reverse the condition.
For instance, if you keep monitoring the aerator regularly, you can identify any problem before it causes serious damage.
From Experience: Timely intervention can reverse several potential adverse conditions besides limiting possible damages.
The Water Used
The most common issues mainly arise due to using water with high mineral amounts or hard water.
When using an Aerogarden avoid using hard, soft, spring, or well water. Instead, always go for distilled water.
This is because, it does not contain dissolved minerals that could interfere with the nutrient content of your plants.
You can always identify water problems either through yellowish or brownish leaves or stunted growth.
In some instances, water problems could stop germination completely.
Lighting
When it comes to lighting, always set the grow light element at the lowest position when establishing a new seed pod kit.
Many seed pod kits comprise several seed types differing in germination rates and flourish to varying heights.
It would be best to trim those growing fastest and tallest to maintain Light Hood at the lowest post position for slow-growing mints.
Trimming ensures every mint receives adequate light required for maximum growth.
However, avoid trimming more than a third of any mint at a go to avoid interfering with their growth pattern.
Instead, you can snip the mints’ top and maintain every plant an inch below the light works best.
It would help if you always replaced the compact fluorescent lights twice a year after use.
Although these lights may remain bright, their full-spectrum light diminishes with time.
Did You Know? Energy levels determine a plant’s maturity rates, mainly the blue and red-light spectrum not visible to the human eye.
Oxygen Level
Mints grown in AeroGardens receive oxygen through their roots provided by the bubbler in the system.
Consequently, if the mints lack aeration, they lack oxygen for proper growth and become suffocated and eventually collapse.
You should always monitor the aerator to ensure it remains in proper working conditions to promote the mint’s growth.
Nutrient Levels
Always add sufficient nutrients into the water before planting your mints and replenish after every two weeks.
You can get a nutrient input chart from nutrient bottles to identify appropriate nutrient amounts to add to the AeroGarden system.
Placing little or excess nutrient amounts is risky and could interfere with your mint’s growth and maturity.
Always use liquid nutrients because they dissolve in water readily, plus it is easier for plants to absorb them faster.
Remember This: Tablet nutrients usually have expired active components, and the mints will lack adequate food required for germination and growth.
Other Causes of Retarded Mint Growth
If you ensure that your mint plants have sufficient nutrient content, proper lighting, aeration, and water types and levels, but they still exhibit stunted growth, then it is time to consider other factors.
You can assess various elements that interfere with plant growth or the browning of their leaves.
You can watch out for excess or overly strong nutrients, insect infestation, plant diseases, or water temperatures.
Overly Strong Nutrients
You may have used overly strong nutrient solutions.
That could arise when your source water has several dissolved minerals or you have taken a long time to clean and refill your seed pot kit.
Leaves turning brown or yellow indicate nutrient imbalance; you can rectify this by regularly rinsing and refilling the seed kit.
Insect Infestation
Insect infestation is common for houseplants which affects their growth patterns.
Indoor plants are susceptible to several pests, which could affect mints planted in AeroGardens.
You should ensure your home windows stay closed, check your clothes for any bug or plant product from outside gardens, and keep other indoor plants pest-free.
Also, always check out for hitchhikers on your mints all the time.
If you note some white elements on the leaves, green or black spots on the stem or leaves, or sticky components on the stem or leaves, the mint is infested.
Works Best: In case you suspect or see such elements, use a magnifying lens to assess the mint carefully.
Water Temperatures
Always maintain adequate water temperatures below 80.00C all the time.
If you have stationed your AeroGarden close to a transparent window, sunlight can heat water depleting oxygen levels in the pot.
Thus, it would help if you relocated it to a shady and cool location.
Diseases
Root and plant diseases could be the reason your mints have stunted growth or brown and yellow leaves.
AeroGarden plants are also susceptible to soil- and air-borne diseases affecting outdoor plants.
However, due to constant sheltering, these plant diseases do not pause serious threats to mints grown in AeroGardens.
Plant pathology has a wider scope, including microscopic plant tissue assessment.
Without such skills, you may not make the right diagnosis on your indoor mints; ensure you research extensively about mints before planting them in your AeroGarden.
That will help you understand possible plants affecting your mints and promote their growth.
Final Thoughts
Fresh mints have several health benefits.
For instance, mints will improve your digestion and relieve stomach upsets reducing the risk of cholesterol-related disorders. Additionally, you can add mint to your cocktails.
This plants are also extremely easy to grow especially if you are using an Aerogarden. However several factors such as lack of sufficient nutrient content, proper lighting, aeration, and water types and levels.
Other external factors include insect infestation, plant diseases, or water temperatures.
Fortunately, with early intervention, any damage caused to your plants might be mitigated.
