Quote from NASA: "Space Flower! NASA astronaut Scott Kelly, who took over care of the zinnias aboard the space station after the plants weren't thriving from growing procedures on the ground, such as scheduled watering days. Kelly told the ground team, “You know, I think if we’re going to Mars, and we were growing stuff, we would be responsible for deciding when the stuff needed water. Kind of like in my backyard, I look at it and say ‘Oh, maybe I should water the grass today.’ I think this is how this should be handled.” And so, Kelly became an autonomous gardener aboard the space station. Today, the zinnias are thriving!"



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I'd LOVE the opportunity to grow flowers in space. What fun!

Looks like a green thumb to me! I didn't even know they were growing plants up there so that's cool to see!!

Maybe we should send some Asters and Pearl crescents , while their at it ,
Butterflies in space

The first lettuce grown and eaten on the International Space Station ISS Aug. 7th, 2015 Bred and grown by Frank Morton - Wild Garden Seed, OR
And the 'Veggie' growing system was developed in Wisconsin @Orbitec - featured @the White House Astronomy night Oct 2015.
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From GeekWire:
"Astronauts on the International Space Station ate space-grown lettuce for the first time today — an Oregon-bred variety of “Outredgeous” red romaine that’s perfectly suited for outer space as well as the Pacific Northwest.
Nobody is more surprised that Outredgeous went into space than I am,” Frank Morton, the founder of Wild Garden Seed in Philomath, Oregon, told GeekWire."

I find good stuff in ATP!!!

I was wondering why they planted zinnias rather than some sort of vegetable. Sounds like they have both, food for the body and food for the soul!

A Heinlein novel wrote up the same idea. Some clerk sent them some flower seeds instead of vegetables and they found out while half way to Mars. So they planted the flowers and "discovered" what a morale-booster it was.

But I forget which novel! Probably one of the juveniles ... late 1950s? early 1960s? It was back when his novels had to be acceptable to Junior High School librarians - no free love or "Thou art God" in those novels!