Most indoor gardeners begin growing plants on a windowsill, usually herbs or foliage house plants. They eventually graduate to grow lights when they move on to flowering plants or planting seeds, both of which require more light exposure. That’s when most experienced growers upgrade to one or more beautiful lighted plant stands, built for display as well as function.

Shown: Smaller tabletop grow systems and a one-shelf floor cart. Clicking images will take you to shopping pages.

Lighted plant stands come in a wide variety of sizes and styles, from tabletop grow lights to five-tier units. And with a stagnant economy, prices have never been better.

Why not take your indoor garden from shop lights in the basement to an elegant display in the living room with a beautiful lighted plant stand that will show off your green thumb, create a point of interest in the room, fill your view with blooms, and keep your herbs within reach of the kitchen.

More grow light styles:

Compare Grow Lights and Indoor Plant Light Stands:

In the few weeks, we lost two leaves quickly to rot (Rob’s Seduction and Rob’s Shadow Magic). We suspect that the air circulation in the area of the AeroGarden unit is insufficient, leading to the loss of the leaves as well as the additional problems with powdery mildew, surface mold, and rust rot noted below.

At 4 weeks, the back leaves are bleached out from too much light, and Rob’s Seduction is rotting away.

Leaf rot.

Plantlets are beginning to show at the base of Shirl’s Hawaiian Lei leaf.

All the plugs are choked with algae and spotted with white mold.

At 60 days, the situation is worse:

Rob’s Slap Happy is prolific but bleached out and tinged with rust.

Rob’s Boondoggle is very susceptible to powdery mildew.

Shirl’s Hawaiian Lei is succumbing to rust rot.

Rob’s June Bug is choked with algae and not producing plantlets yet.

Our F2 hybrid leaf is bleached out, choked with algae, and spotted with white mold.

Leaf Experiment Unsuccessful

At 60 days, we deem the experiment less than successful. We’ll transplant the growing African violet plantlets, and start the next batch of leaves with better air circulation and less intense light. Stay tuned…

First, we chose seven leaves from our African violet plant collection and prepared them for planting by washing them and then cutting the stems at an angle, leaving as much stem length as possible. Peat plugs were inserted into the plastic AeroGarden baskets and placed in the AeroGarden unit, which had already been filled with water. Plugs were covered with plastic discs (homemade, cut from plastic file folders) to reduce algae growth. Finally, the unit was set to “Herbs” which allows for the longest light cycle and most frequent water cycle.

Preparing AV leaves for planting

Ready for the plugs

Placing the plugs in the AeroGarden unit

Plugs are covered to reduce algae growth

Ready to be labeled:
Back row: Rob’s Slap Happy, F2 hybrid (single red pansy), Rob’s Shadow Magic, Rob’s Seduction
Front row: Rob’s Boon Doggle, Rob’s June Bug, Shirl’s Hawaiian Lei

Rooted Leaves

Twelve days after planting, a tug on each leaf confirms that they are well-rooted. There’s no way to predict when plantlets will emerge. We may have to cut off the tops of the leaves to prevent the leaves themselves from growing instead of producing plantlets. Stay tuned!

Leaves are well-rooted two weeks after planting

See the experiment turned out on the update page.

Five days after sowing, we’ve got sprouts: grape tomatoes, cherry tomatoes, small F1 hybrid tomatoes, baby bell peppers (red, orange, yellow), thyme, sage, oregano, dill, marjoram, and several different varieties of basil.

With a germination rate of nearly 100%, this is going to be a good growing season!

Plants at 1 to 2 weeks:

Tomato plants at 7 days

Tomato plants at 14 days

Baby bell peppers at 7 days

Baby bells at 14 days

Basil plantlets at 7 days

Basil plants at 14 days

Various herbs at 7 days

Herb plants at 14 days

Plants three weeks after sowing:

Tomatoes at 21 days – strong stems and root systems

Baby bell peppers at 21 days

Resources:

• Jiffy peat pellets
• Herb seeds, tomato seeds, vegetable seeds and more

The scraggly remains of the winter AeroGarden planting (from back): thyme going to seed, purple basil, Genovese basil. In front, a small catnip plant (for a friend’s kitty) and more basil.

The basil went into a batch of pesto, and the hydro unit will be readied for our next experiment: propagating African violets in the AeroGarden.

We’ve started herb and vegetable seeds in Jiffy plugs, about 10″ under lights on indoor plant stands. Lights are on approximately 16 hrs. a day. Every available sunny windowsill is in use, too, at this time of year.

Organic basil (8 varieties)

Left: catnip and cat grass (for friends’ kitties); Right: tomatoes

Commercial: grape tomatoes, cherry tomatoes
Organic: “Money Maker” (small tomatoes), Falcorosso F1 (plum tomatoes)

Baby bell peppers (seeds from last season’s AeroGarden crop)

More basil varieties, and some oregano

Sage, watercress, chives, dill, rosemary, marjoram

Resources:

• AeroGardens and accessories
• Jiffy peat pellets
• Herb seeds, tomato seeds, vegetable seeds and more

(click images to enlarge)

click photo to enlarge

This plant is a Burpee container plant that we have neglected to transplant into a hanging basket. Since the plant started flowering and developing strawberries so quickly we thought it best to leave it alone.

Strawberries grown in the house under lights do equally well as strawberry plants in windowsill containers.

Strawberry Seeds

Strawberries can be grown from seed indoors year-round if you provide warmth and light. Growing strawberries from seed is more challenging, but think of all the plants and strawberries you could produce! Nothing beats fresh, home-grown strawberries. You can find an assortment of strawberry seeds here.

Strawberry Pots & Planters

If you prefer to grow strawberries on the deck or patio a strawberry pot or planter is an attractive and efficient method. Here are some planters made just for growing strawberries:

• Strawberry Jars
• Strawberry Pots
• Strawberry Planters and Grow Bags