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Mind-Blowing Things People Are Growing in Their AeroGarden
Mind-Blowing Things People Are Growing in Their AeroGarden
Pet food, a berry patch, a pine tree? Yup. Intrepid types are cultivating all kinds of amazing things in their countertop gardens. Prepare to be astounded.
By: Aliza Gans
We humans tend to be curious types. Innovators, even. Not just to get jobs done, but to get hobbies done. This is especially true for gardeners. As a kid, you might pop impatiens seed pods and send the contents flying. As an adult, you turn a countertop herb garden into a full-blown experimental lab.
What was designed for bumper crops of basil and cherry tomatoes has, in the hands of Redditors, become something far stranger and perhaps more fascinating. Reddit is the hub where countertop growers do their knowledge-sharing on gardening techniques. But the internet’s most devoted tinkerers have also taken this hard-working hydroponic system and asked: What else can I grow in here?
The answer ranges from impressive to unhinged.
Here are a few of the weirdest, funniest, and most genuinely inspiring things people are growing in their AeroGardens right now.
Lemongrass (Tall, Sharp, and Slightly Threatening)
Why stop at basil and mint, the countertop garden classics? Someone asked if it’s even possible to grow lemongrass (which adds the magic to many Southeast Asian dishes) in an AeroGarden. The answer: yes, but with attitude. The feedback: “It gets leggy” and “It grows like a weed, and it’s weirdly razor-sharp.”
So what you’re growing is either a fragrant cooking ingredient, a supermodel, or a weapon. Possibly all three.
Self-Styled Hybrid Tomatoes
Cherry tomatoes are one of the AeroGarden’s biggest success stories. But Redditors, of course, take it further. People are planting heirloom seeds and sometimes even saving seeds from previous AeroGarden tomatoes to grow a next generation indoors. When multiple varieties are growing close together in the same system, they can wind up cross-pollinating, producing hybrid offspring. “Heirloom” is the romantic word for it. “Franken-tomato” might be more accurate.
Unstoppable Alpine Strawberries
If you thought AeroGardens were just for herbs, meet Attila, an alpine strawberry variety that grows long, cascading runners — basically vines — with fruit dangling off them. “It can fruit year-round…some describe it as a curtain,” reports one Reddit evangelist.
A curtain. Of strawberries. Want to give it a whirl. You can find the seeds online, pop them into a pod, and this season or next, your kitchen can look like a berry patch.
An (Unintentional) Cat Playground
You thought you were growing herbs. Your cat thought you were building a jungle gym. This has nothing to do with planting catnip. The AeroGarden can have anything in it. Cats just love chaos. One AeroGardener explains, “My cat pries the pods out and carries them off. Tape doesn’t work. He’s too smart.”
The solutions offered on Reddit escalate quickly:
- Build a double laundry-basket fortress
- Wrap everything in foil
- Install motion sensors
- Deploy a water sprayer
- Construct a literal cage
At a certain point, you’re no longer gardening, you’re defending a stronghold. The AeroGarden becomes less of a planter and more of a medieval castle under siege. And the cat? The final boss.
Pine Trees (Yes, Really)
Some people are using AeroGardens as seed-starting labs for trees. Like… actual trees you might want to hug someday.One forest lover grew ponderosa pine seedlings indoors before transplanting them outside, with the following warning: “Don’t plant these near where you work… the bark sheds like razors. But the smell is incredible.”
So when you bring the outdoors in, expect a little wildness along with it — plus the best homegrown air freshener.
The Seriously Weird Thing We Grew in an AeroGarden
As you might guess, the AeroGarden team is always experimenting, and they came up with something that is equal parts bonkers and brilliant. “I’ve grown pumpkins in an AeroGarden,” says Justin Clifford, Senior Research Development Specialist, “the ones that are about as big as a large softball.” Once they get started, the vines grow eight to 12 feet long, says Clifford, “so I wove them around the cabinet the garden was in, as if it were a trellis.” Some supplemental light may be required once the gourds are no longer under the AeroGarden nourishing glow…but we bet you’d be the only person with an indoor pumpkin patch come next Halloween. That’d be serious bragging rights!
A Citrus Grove
We all need some more Mediterranean villa vibes. This kind of dolce vita is very obtainable (read: cheaper than a vacation to Tuscany) with a counterop garden. Says one intrepid soul, “Took a seed out of a lemon, sprouted it in a wet paper towel, and then placed it in the AeroGarden.”
Frankly, AeroGardens are excellent nurseries. You germinate fast, grow strong seedlings, then move them to soil. From pod to tree — give it a few years, and hello, limoncello.
A Blooming Desert
Hydroponics for cacti and succulents? It sounds backwards — but it’s really about consistency. Cacti need tons of light, and young seedlings actually need more regular water than mature plants.
People start cacti and succulents in AeroGardens to speed up early growth, then transfer them into soil. One commenter noted, “I gently remove the sponge and roots and plant them together…then water more than normal while they adjust.”
Some even use leftover AeroGarden nutrient water for the first watering or two, so the plant isn’t totally shocked by the move. Usually when you buy a cactus or succulent at a nursery, it’s already somewhat mature. Starting from seed is much cheaper, and you actually get to enjoy that adorbs baby stage.
We’re biased, but there’s something deeply appealing about these AeroGarden experiments. No neighbors judging your weird horticultural choices. No squirrels making off with your harvest. Just you, a countertop, a little controlled ecosystem, and the glory of success. And if Reddit has taught us anything, it’s this: You can grow almost anything in an AeroGarden. And that’s where the fun is at.
Have you grown anything unusual in an AeroGarden? Tell us about it on Instagram @officialaerogarden
About the Writer
Aliza Gans is a writer, artist, and plant lover living in Brooklyn. She can be found ambling through the Brooklyn Botanic Garden with traffic-canceling headphones, or block printing for her brand, Gansa.