How To Grow An Endless Supply of Anti-Inflammatory Turmeric, Ginger and Garlic at Home!

If you want to turn your outdoor (or indoor!) garden into a sea of pain relief, then this is how. Growing turmeric, ginger and garlic is as easy as reading the steps below and actually doing it. Some of these rhizomes take up to 10 months to mature, but once you have the plants started, they grow like weeds and never stop producing!

How to Grow Turmeric and Ginger

If you’re sick of paying exorbitant amounts of money for these herbs, then start growing today!

Turmeric

This super anti-inflammatory perennial herb re-shoots every spring once you grow it. Growing this root organically on your own is not at all difficult. There was a farm I visited often in Costa Rica, and there was always limitless turmeric. It literally grows like a weed!

Turmeric can be grown in garden beds or wide containers. The soil should not be water retaining, because it will rot the rhizomes, and will reduce the yield. The advantages of growing turmeric in pots is that the plant can be moved indoors in winter time, or, if you live in an apartment, it can be grown on the balcony.

It thrives best in direct or indirect sun, but can grow in light shade. Heavy shade for prolonged periods will reduce rhizome yield. It prefers soil that is well-drained, so make sure to mix some good quality soil with river sand or mulch.

To grow turmeric, follow these steps:

1. Buy some turmeric from your local store (can be found in health food stores or Asian food stores), and break the rhizome into a little rhizome piece that has some buds.

2. Fill your pot (maybe 2-3 feet wide and 4-5 feet deep) with rich natural soil, organic fertilizer, and river sand and/or mulch.

3. Place the rhizome around 2-inches beneath the surface of the dirt, with the buds facing up.

4. Water the container about every 2 days, and watch your turmeric grow! Water only when you feel the soil slightly dry to the touch. This will prevent the leaching of vitamins and minerals due to over-watering.

Turmeric takes around 6-10 months for consumable rhizomes to develop, but once they start, they never stop! When you are ready to gather, dig carefully at the side of a clump and remove rhizomes as needed. Return the roots back under the soil – it will continue to grow, and new shoots will grow each spring.

Ginger

This natural home remedy has the potency to combat cancer – even better than the leading chemotherapeutic drugs. Ginger is low-maintenance, loves partial sunlight and can even be grown indoors!

Ginger does not tolerate frost, so if you live in an area where frost occurs, make sure you grow it in a pot so you can bring it indoors during the cooler days and months. It also takes 10 months to mature, so keep that in mind as well (a little waiting time for an abundance of ginger – I’m down!).

Ginger can be grown in a place that doesn’t get full sunlight. It enjoys partial, to full shade, and so growing it indoors is ideal. Similarly to turmeric, you only want to remove little bits of ginger at a time, while the rest continues to grow.

Grocery store ginger is usually sprayed with growth inhibitor to keep it from sprouting before purchased – however I normally buy my ginger from a local organic store, and it is often budding – so look for good quality organic ginger that has the ability to bud! Whatever kind of ginger you buy, be sure to soak it in water overnight to remove any residual growth inhibitor.

To grow ginger, follow these steps:

1. Buy some organic ginger from your local store (can be found in health food stores or Asian food stores), and break the rhizome into a little rhizome piece that has some buds. It should not be shrivelled, but plump with tight skin. Look for eye buds – more green, the better.

2. Choose a pot that is shallow and wide – ginger loves these conditions. The roots grow horizontally, so make sure the pot you use can accommodate its growth.

3. Soak the ginger root in warm water over night.

4. Fill your pot with well draining, organic potting soil. Adding in some organic fertilizer is also recommended.

5. Stick the ginger root with the eye bud pointing up in the soil. Cover it with 1-2 inches of soil and water well. Make sure the soil stays moist.

6. Place your ginger in a spot that stays warm and doesn’t get too much sunlight.

7. After a few weeks, some shoots will pop up out of the soil. After 3-4 months, small pieces of ginger can be harvested. Always harvest from the edges and return the soil when finished so the ginger can continue growing.

Ginger can be endlessly harvest if well cared for. It will continue to grow for as long as you need it!

Garlic

Last but not least – garlic! A lot of the garlic you find in stores is poor quality garlic, and doesn’t give you the health benefits that organically grown garlic does.

Garlic is high in sodium, potassium, selenium, calcium, magnesium, silicon, sulphuric and phosphoric acid, as well as vitamins like C, D and B. It is one of the most effective all-natural antibiotics, thanks to the chemical allicin, which is activated when you crush the garlic pods.

To grow garlic indoors (or outdoors) all you need is one good garlic head (not bought from conventional grocery stores). Make sure you invest in some really good garlic, either purchased from a farmers market, or from an organic food store. This way you will ensure that the garlic you are eating has some good genes in it!

1. Fill a large, deep pot with high-quality organic potting soil and organic fertilizer.

2. Break your garlic cloves apart and stick each individual clove vertically into the soil at a 1-inch depth. Cover the cloves with soil and water until very wet. Make sure the soil stays moist and that it doesn’t get too dry throughout the growing period. Water every 1-2 days.

3. Place the pot in an area that gets direct sunlight (garlic LOVES the sun!).

4. Clip off your garlic greens once they are around 3-4 inches tall, leaving about an inch of it to re-grow. The greens will eventually stop growing.

5. When the greens have died and turned brown, dig up your garlic clove, take a clove from that clove, and start over! This is why it’s good to plant one whole bulb of cloves at once so that you get a bunch of garlic cloves when it comes harvest time!

Check out the video below for some more growing tips (visual always helps me!):

Sources:
http://www.mykitchengarden.info/2014/08/growing-turmeric.html
http://www.healthy-holistic-living.com/grow-endless-supply-ginger-indoors.html
http://livingtraditionally.com/grow-endless-supply-garlic-home/