It’s been about two and a half months since I started playing with the Click & Grow (and it seems like a whole lot longer). I find that I’m enjoying the hobby, and I see no reason to stop. It’s not like it takes much effort to do this.

And the fresh herbs are really good for making my favorite soup!

But speaking of that, my basil plants have stoppped looking so appetizing. They still smell good, and there’s nothing wrong with them, per se, but the leaves are not as lush as they were. I don’t look at them and think “yeah, I could put that in my food!” anymore.

A glance at the app shows me that they’re a bit beyond their supposed expiration date.

Time to clean them out and start over.

Surprise!

My basil was placed right in the middle of the unit between my nice healthy chives (which are almost ready for a first harvest!) and the (seemingly struggling) oregano. Popping them out is easy enough; just reach in, grab the little plastic tab, and pull.

Or so I thought…

In truth, they did come out easy enough. What I did not expect, however, was for a root system to follow the plant cups out of the unit. And a big one, at that!

The basil’s roots, it seems, managed to burrow their way down through the wick to get at the water directly.

After staring a bit (and taking some pictures), I proceeded to remove them. Fortunately, I got to them before they created a nasty tangle in the tank that would have needed scissors and patience to remove. The root web just pulled right out, for all three plants.

Bit of a surprise, though!

Other Notes

The other thing I noted was that there was a bit of mold growth at the base of the plant, where the little U-shaped cover allows air to touch the dirt. There was no mold underneath the cover, just where light and air could get. According to the Click & Grow site, this is both perfectly normal and harmless.

Outside of that, pulling the plants was easy enough. I just popped the top, yanked the plants out, and dumped them in the trash. Then I lightly rinsed the plant cups in the sink.

The wicks, however, are another story.

I did make an effort to try to remove the roots from them, but that was a non-start. Instead I basically trimmed them off. I do have replacement wicks, but based on some commentary online, I decided to see if I can get one more round out of these.

It’s not like they’re expensive, but… I’m curious.

The Next Round

I did order more plant pods the other day – from Amazon, this time, though they were Click & Grow brand. Why? Because the shipping charges on the Click & Grow site made Amazon a lot cheaper to buy from.

I will repeat esomething I’ve said before: it’s sad when Amazon of all places can beat out the actual shipping companies…

I also kinda feel like Click & Grow should eat the shipping if you buy a certain amount. Instead, they charge insane shipping fees for their stuff. Minimum of $8 shipping for a single set of three plant pods?

Nope.

Their plant pod subscriptions do include free shipping, so I’m going to think about doing that, but we’ll see. I need to learn more about it, and see if it’s worth it (or will I not use what I buy?).

In the mean time, Amazon is far cheaper since I’m already a Prime member.

You do have to watch out, though, and make sure you buy the right item. I accidentally bought a basil mix, rather than nine of the generic basil pods. It’s fine in this case – I’m curious to see the differences with other varieties – but it was somewhat annoying on general principle.

The Trimmings

With my new basil pods (one each of the regular, the thai, and the cinnamon basil) planted and ready to go, the last thing was just to clean up. I took the time to trim down the oregano a bit – I’m not happy with how it’s growing, and it says that trimming it will help – and also trimmed the chives.

I probably should have just harvested the chives, but I’m not sure how they’re going to take that. And Click & Grow is apparently out of stock of those pods, and I can’t find them on Amazon either.

In light of that, I trimmed one plant by cutting about 75% of it off. That should tell me how it will fare. I hope it works. I haven’t actually cooked with these yet, and I’m looking forward to it.

I think it’ll go great as a replacement for the green onion in my favorite Party Potatoes recipe…

Conclusions

All in all, I’m fairly happy with the Click & Grow so far. The biggest irritant seems to be the shipping fee issue when ordering new pods, but most of those I can get on Amazon. Well, that and the fact that they bumped their prices up recently, which is very annoying. Everything is getting more expensive!

All the more reason to learn to grow my own food, I suppose…

I’ll let you know how things progress. I’m very curious over the chives, and I’m just not convinced that the oregano is doing well at all… But hopefully I’ll have more basil in a few weeks!

And yes, the Feline Protection System is still in place…