Feed #102 – Introducing Subpod Grow Bags & home gardening to save on groceries

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Introducing our new Grow Bags!

We're always looking for ways to make composting and gardening more accessible, no matter where you live or what your budget is. Our new Grow Bags are the perfect lightweight option for renters – or anyone who wants to build a garden on a budget!

So, what is a Grow Bag? They have a few different names, sometimes also known as fabric pots or pouches. They're usually quite small, just big enough to plant a tree or a few veggies in. But we thought – why not turn one into a garden?

And that's exactly what we did! Our Grow Bags are similar to many of the medium-sized raised garden beds on the market, but they have the added bonus of being fully movable, assembling instantly, and they're even made from 100% recycled water bottles.

We're so proud of how they turned out, and we hope you'll love them as much as we do!

$11 for a head of lettuce?

Headlines this week have been focused on an unlikely topic: lettuce. More specifically, the fact that the price for a head of lettuce in some areas of Australia reached $10 – $11 this week, almost four times the average price from just a few weeks ago.

It's not just lettuce though – tomatoes reached $10 per kilo in some stores, and cucumbers are getting close to $7 each in others. The message from food growers is that while the price rises were sudden, they'll probably be slow to lower.

Between food instability due to the war in Ukraine and reduced harvests in Australia this year due to heavy rainfall and severe flooding in several states, it looks like expensive veggies are here to stay. But that doesn't mean you have to pay those prices!

Home gardening is thought of as more of a hobby than a necessity these days, but it wasn't long ago that most people grew a large portion of their food at home. If you learn to garden and harvest your own seeds, you'll never have to pay for staple veggies again!

Lettuce, cucumbers and herbs are the perfect starter crops for beginner gardeners, and now they're some of the more expensive food items you can buy – so if you've been thinking of starting your own home garden, now's the time to do it!

How to grow large harvests at home

Home growing is officially booming right now! Australian nurseries are recording record numbers of seedling sales as people turn to gardening to offset spiking food prices. But how do you make sure you get a good harvest if you're a first-time gardener?

A recent article from The Conversation analysed the productivity of urban home food gardens, and discovered 3 factors that can drastically influence how big your harvests are.

Here's a look at the third factor, and one of the most important ones (in our opinion):

3. Know what’s in your soil

Good soil is a key factor in productive gardens. It needs a good structure (one that allows water and air to enter and drain easily, while retaining enough moisture) an ample supply of plant nutrients and a rich microbial community...

Having good soil is one of the biggest influences on growing bountiful fruit and veg. But how do you get it? There are a variety of fertilisers, organic and chemical, you can use to offset poor soil quality, but we prefer to take a page out of natures book.

Compost nourishes and regenerates soil, restoring the microbial activity that creates the rich, airy soil plants love. If you compost with Subpod, you've probably noticed that plants grow bigger the closer to Subpod they get in your bed. That's the power of compost!

Want to make your own compost?

Check out Subpod, the compost system that feeds your soil for you!