I shared a method to quickly sprout ginger roots in the “Sprouting Ginger Quickly” post last week. Ginger roots that have been on the heat mat covered with a humidity dome are doing really well. I thought I would post an update in case you want to try this method to sprout ginger roots for your spring/summer garden. It’s not too late to give it a try!
For a quick summary, you will need a seedling tray, humidity dome, heat mat, and thermostat, some potting mix, and of course, ginger roots. Add a thin layer (about 1 inch) of potting mix in the seedling tray, place ginger roots, cover with potting mix again, and add a little bit of water. Then, put a humidity dome over it and place it on the heat mat. It took only 10 days to see the first sprout without battling with mold!
Because there was a small space left in the tray, I squeezed in a Japanese sweet potato as well trying to harvest sweet potato slips. It turned out, slips got tall, and they were touching the humidity dome. I decided to place them to a bigger (longer) seedling tray (10″ x 20″) and add turmeric as well.
When I took out the ginger roots, most of them had a new sprout! Some even started to develop roots! This method has been working very well so far and very reliably. This was much better than expected.
The turmeric roots that I harvested in December last year were also added. I kept them in a pot and left them in a garage. I recently brought them outside as it was getting warmer. Luckly, they were firm and not rotted or shriveled. They looked very healthy.
Let’s see how many days it will take for the turmeric to sprout! Hopefully soon enough so that I can plant them in the raised bed soon after the last frost date.
If you haven’t been successful sprouting ginger reliably, give this a try! I’ll post an update again once I see new shoots from turmeric as well.
Just a side note, these are harvests from two small turmeric roots that I bought from a gardener nearby. I didn’t know anything about it, so I just threw them in a 3-gallon pot with some potting mix and watered them occasionally. They had nice, healthy leaves all summer. I was mostly out of town for most of November and December, so I brought the pot in early November to the garage and forgot about it. Then, in late December, I remembered about this pot! I dumped the soil and found two big turmeric roots!! I kept some for replanting and made turmeric power from the rest.
Turmeric has a lot of health benefits such as anti-inflammatory, promoting liver health, improving heart health, and more! If you are consuming turmeric regularly, try to grow some on your own. They did very well in a nursery pot!
If you know a better method of sprouting ginger and turmeric roots, let me know in the comments section!
Happy Gardening!