How to Grow Beets Indoors

Beets are a great choice for an indoor container garden. They are easy to grow, nutritious, as well as being a colorful addition to your dinner plate. Beets are tolerant of a variety of soil types, temperatures and other conditions and are a good root vegetable for a beginning gardener.

Things You'll Need

• Beet seeds
• Potting soil
• Pots, containers or plastic tubs

Instructions

1. Drill drain holes in your containers or large plastic tubs if there are not some already. If you are using large plastic tubs for your containers, put the lid underneath to catch any overflow of water from the drain holes. The pots or containers should be at least 16 inches deep.

2. Fill your containers with potting soil to a depth of at least 16 inches. Beets need 16 inches of soil depth to grow properly.

3. Plant your seeds according to package directions. Pay careful attention to the seed spacing recommendations. Crowded beets will not grow well. Put the containers on a sunny windowsill.

4. Water your seeds and keep them uniformly moist until they begin to sprout.

5. Rotate your containers every few days if a sunny window is their only light source. Plants will grow toward their light source and rotating them regularly will ensure that they grow nice and straight. Turn the pots a quarter turn each time.

6. Water regularly, whenever the soil is dry when you push your fingertip in to a depth of 1/2 inch.

7. Harvest your beets when the number of days to maturity that was listed on your seed package arrives.

Tips & Warnings

• You may bring your beets outside to enjoy the weather when the temperature is around 55 to 70 degrees F. Beets are cool-weather loving plants, and will grow at higher and lower temperatures, but this range is optimal. If you use large plastic storage tubs, they will be heavy once the potting soil is wet. If you wish to move them outdoors when the weather is nice, put the tubs on dollies before you fill them with soil.