LITTLE COOKS
ROCKET SCIENCE...
RHS Rosemoor and the RHS Campaign for
School Gardening take seeds to space – and show you how to plant your own rocket at home.
I
f you head to Devon’s RHS Garden Rosemoor between July 23rd and August 29th, you’ll find 5 fun-filled weeks of space-themed activities to take part in, including storytelling, crafts, a Rocket Science Exhibition, puppet theatre workshops and more. These rocket science-themed summer activities have been inspired by the RHS Campaign for School Gardening and UK Space Agency project Rocket Science, which saw 2kg of rocket seeds sent to the International Space Station. These seeds spent several months in microgravity under the care of astronaut Tim Peake, and have now been returned to Earth, where they’re being grown by hundreds of thousands of schoolchildren in a huge experiment to investigate the impact of microgravity and space travel on seed germination and growth. The growth rate of the ‘space seeds’ will be compared with that of a batch of rocket seeds that remained on Earth, and the results will be released in September. The aim of the project is to help young people to think about how we could preserve human life on long-term space missions, and how to grow food in inhospitable climates – such as those found on other planets.
If you’re looking to grow your own rocket seeds at home, it’s an easy crop to grow – either as individual or cut and come again plants. Its slightly hot, peppery leaves can be harvested from April to December.
62 | THE WEST COUNTRY FOODLOVER
PREPARATION Rocket can be grown
under cloches or a polytunnel for an early crop as it germinates in low temperatures. It prefers well drained fertile soil, which should have been cultivated before sowing.
Sow rocket seeds in modules for easy planting out, direct in containers (such as a window box) or direct in the vegetable bed.
EQUIPMENT Rocket seeds Bamboo can Modules Compost Watering can Label & pencil Trowel Horticultural fleece
STEP BY STEP For a cut and come again crop;
1 Create a narrow seed drill by pressing a bamboo cane into the soil.
2 Sow the seeds around 3cm apart, cover over with soil and water well. Don’t forget to label the row.
3 Early crops can be covered with fleece or cloches.
4 Continue to water and thin the seedlings to 10-15cm apart.
5 Harvest the leaves when they are large enough to eat.
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