Seed starting MAF 2014

Hmmm...Where does one get a lifetime Sr. pass?

Not that I am planning to go anywhere..but you never know....

G.

Hey, typwc, I've got a green & burgundy coleus (the only one that's still looking good after the winter; I might be able to find its name) that would look great with your Velvet Mocha... I'll start some cuttings; maybe we can swap a couple.

An incandescent bulb under a metal shelf does a great job of providing bottom heat; gets it about 10 degrees above ambient temp in my basement. That's what I used before I got a "real" heat mat. Good growing!

Woopie, I found my lost Castor Bean seeds. Now we will see if they will germinate.

Holly, I direct showed the castor beans last year and only one germinated (out of maybe 10). I wintered about 5 and got zero germination.

How do you like to sow castor beans?

Very interesting article! That flannel mat is very similar to the one that comes with the Burpee mini indoor greenhouse system.

I started mine in pots in the GH. I am trying to remember if I soaked them a bit before I planted them or just stuck them in the ground. I do remember that I did have pretty good germination. I have a good many of seeds so I have a lot to work with. I am going to try to get a dozen plants, I plant about 3 of them so the extras would be up for grab if they grow.

>> That flannel mat is very similar to the one that comes with the Burpee mini indoor greenhouse system.

It is very much the same idea. At first I was trying to duplicate the store-bought versions, but I could find or think of a way to make a cheap, stable "platform" for suspending the seedling tray above the water-reservoir tray.

Then I had no time left to fiddle, so I just put the mat and the trays together without a platform. It works well enough for me, since I don't usually go away for days.

I don't think a wire rack would work, because the mat has to pressed evenly against all the holes in all the seedling cells.

Someone suggested a flat piece of plastic with many corks glued to the bottom. It sounded fragile, and I don't drink THAT many bottles with corks!

My crazed Rube Goldberg instinct wants to park a gallon jug ABOVE the trays, and run wicks from the jug DOWN to each tray. But I think that would flood the trays when the jug was full, and dry them out as the water level dropped. Also, the wick would have to lift water all the way from the water surface to the mouth of the jug - too high.

Hmmm. Maybe a low trough, like guttering, running perpendicular to the trays, along the narrow ends, so that 44" of guttering would water 4 1020 trays. Then just run a 9" wide wick of flannel from the trough into each 1020 tray. I bet that 11" of guttering would hold 1/2 gallon to 3 quarts.

The low height of the guttering would mean roughly the same amount of wicking whether the trough was almost full or almost empty.

The lowness of the trough would also mean that the wick would only have to carry water UP around 2-4 inches from the water level of the trough, and over the lips of the trough and 020 tray, then down to the mat.

If it wicked too fast, I could cut the wick to be narrower. If it was too slow, I could use a double thickness or a facecloth instead off flannel.

Hmm! Maybe!

Hi Rick, Glad to see you found us.

Thanks for the tip, HollyAnn.

I used to live in "Joisey", but I moved to the PacificNorthWet years ago.

I love the mild winters here (compared to scraping ice off my car in NJ), but the cool summers make growing tomatoes challenging.

Hi Ric! Good to see you here....You will contribute a lot...


Not seeds--but I was at Richardson Farms yesterday and checked out their bulbs
they are selling...WOW! The size of their caladium bulbs is amazing!
Way bigger than the biggest one I got in the Group buy. All--$5.69. ea.

Their Elephant Ear Bulbs looked like the largest Grapefruit you have ever seen.

I am not in need of either of these--just wanted to tell you.

I will have enough caladium bulbs from last year. Some really multiplied for me...
And--there is NO room here for growing an Elephant Ear...
G.

Gita, a senior pass is $10.

http://usparks.about.com/od/usnationalparks/p/park_passes.htm

Hi, Rick!

Thank you, Jan...Maybe some day I will get one... G.

couldn't get to it on St. Patty's day, but plan to plant our seeds indoors today!! yay

I'm going to go select some seeds now. I know for sure that I'm going to plant salvias as I do every year. definitely some lady in red, coral nymph, and Yvonne's. hopefully I find enough plastic cell packs.

Gita, I really love the bases you got at Ikea. We just have plain green square plastic ones that I got from one of the mail order catalogs

Wind, if you go to Ikea... those clear plant trays are the tops to storage boxes! They're the right dimension without the rims that my perma nest trays have, so they fit better under Gita's light. That was our big "find" as we hiked around Ikea together, chatting & getting to know each other... how many years ago was that?? :-)

Non-retired families can still get a Golden Eagle Pass, I'm pretty sure... although they may call it something different now... saved us a bundle when we did our family trips "out west!"

Ah.. it's now the America the Beautiful pass series... free for military or disabled, $10 lifetime pass for seniors, free for volunteers after 250 service hours. http://www.nps.gov/findapark/passes.htm

I direct-sowed some NOID seeds today because they were starting to germinate in the fridge, and put a Jiffy tray lid over them because I don't have any milk jugs. I opened a bag in my shed to find stakes to hold it down and was very surprised to find myself looking eye-to-eye with a rather cute little white-footed mouse. It must have been hibernating because it didn't run away. I didn't get my stakes, though.

I guess I should start tomatoes, eh?

I think my county park system has a free pass over 60, need to check that

hmph, no, somebody told me old information

typwc- I have a lot of tiny green things in the pot of amaranth seeds I sowed! only did that a few days (five?) before mailing them to you.

Yay Sally! I haven't sown mine yet. I just got the zinnias off the warm shelf and was thinking I ought to do the amaranths next. :) Glad to know they are still good! Did you want to know what I envision for them when the plants grow up?
http://www.pinterest.com/pin/244038873531275967/
What do you think, realistic or not?

ooooh nice!

Jill, I got Aleppo peppers! I had given up on them altogether and had planned on sowing another seed in the same spot. So glad I waited!

And I got my first variegation on fish peppers. I'd forgotten about their leaf color variegation and was worried for a second that it was diseased.

I've never grown zinnias before but now I have seeds from Joyanna. I'm going to sow some this week.

Glad the Aleppo seeds sprouted for you! I sowed a bunch after you mentioned them to me, and they came up pretty well... Not sure I'll pot up many of them, but I'll keep a few as "backups" for you and maybe a couple for me.

Does anybody want Aleppo pepper plants?

I'll try one of the aleppo peppers.

On Saturday, I raked out one of the garden beds that I've never done much with, got a load of topsoil/compost mix, and scattered the digitalis alba (1000) and hesperis (10,000) seeds that I got with the order critter put in at Hazards. This is a nice size garden bed, and I thought the seeds would go far, but they were so tiny and with two shakes of my wrist they were gone LOL. I should have done pinches at a time instead. I'll have to keep a close watch out for any sprouting seedlings. They'll probably be heavily concentrated in a square foot or two and hopefully can be lifted and spread out easily.

terri--
I can't imagine anyone counting out Digitalis seeds!!!! They are like dust....

You do know that they are biennial and may come up this year but not bloom until next.
Unless the ones you got are some different variety.

Jill--
The trays I bought at Ikea were just that--trays. not lids to any containers..
I got them about 6 years ago. Will check with Aina--she works there.
I may be wrong on this...
I need a few more--just these particular ones are no longer available.
Different ones will be --for sure.
G.

I'm using container lids on my plants, also. In the past I would do all the dirty work down in the basement so that I could be near the shelves with lights. This year I also made a huge mess in the kitchen so that I could just walk out onto the deck to put out my winter sow. I have almost 60 containers out there. I make a few of the same kind so that the seeds will not be sown really close and I can just lift the whole thing out of the jug and place it into a divot in the garden without picking seedlings to pot up or plant directly.

I recently ordered 100 blushing susie seeds from harris because the were cheapest at 12.00 and no shipping. The ones that I'd ordered previously didn't sprout. I always like to have lots of vines going......mostly Clematis, Japanese MG's and Thunbergia.

The few that I have under lights and on the window sills are mostly doing well.

Oh Roses, hope your Blushing Susie seeds germinate well. LOL

I got a Blushing Susi from Roses last year, but only got one seed out of the vine. Well, I wasn't always home to catch the seeds. I am going to try to start this one prescious little seed this year :o).

Have a pack of Cobaea scandens (cup and sauce vine) seeds. Will grow those this year.

The WS foxgloves and parsleys have germinated. Very exciting!!! Only one WS lupine has come up. Maybe the seeds were too old.

Started some hosta seeds collected from the 'Empress Wu' last year. Got some tiny seedlings now. Cannot claim them to be pure 'Empress Wu', but they should grow into pretty big hostas.

OK, sorry, I thought I remembered container lids from the day we spent browsing at Ikea.

Donner, I'm looking forward to seeing what you get from your self-pollinated Empress Wu seeds!

I got a dozen native plants "winter" sowed last weekend in 1 liter bottles, including some of the goldenrods etc. from Greenthumb. The rest of the seeds are back in the freezer but not moist-stratified... we'll see how the ones I just sowed do. If they sprout, I'll likely grow them on and plant in fall, sprinkling a few extra seeds around them.

It's time to sprout some pea seeds so they're ready to plant out when it warms up again on Thursday!

I bought the Empress Wu last year. It came in a single stalk! Hopefully it will get big enough for division in a few years. In the mean time, there will be plenty of baby plants to share :o).

None of my lettuce seeds have germinated, and some of them were sown almost a month ago. I know they need light for germination so they've been given plenty of light. All of the other ornamentals and edibles have germinated, except for lettuce and a few old seeds that I was experimenting with.

Any ideas why?

Thank you for the welcomes!

>> None of my lettuce seeds have germinated,

Ssgardener, this is just speculation, but I've read that lettuce seed is one of the shorter-lived seeds (like 1-2 years, or 2-4 years, depending on what you read).

Maybe they are also sensitive to humidity when being stored. If they were stored for more than 1-2 years, and not stored really dry, they may have lost most of their viability. Have you tried a germination test on a wet coffee filter or paper towel?

Also, I think lettuce likes cool soil for germination. Tom Clothier says 70 F soil temperature. Johnny's says 60-68 F, and "barely cover with vermiculite".

Thanks for pointing out that they need light! I tried my first lettuce last fall, and I followed the #%^*# seed packets that said to sow "1/8th inch" and "1/4 inch" deep. No wonder nothing came up from most of the varieties I tried!

I did learn that even though 'Marvel of 4 Seasons' and 'Flashy Trout’s Back' are very pretty, I don't like any "bitterness" in my lettuce, even as an aftertaste.

None of these came up:
Valmain (Romaine)
Buttercrunch
Tom Thumb
Matina Sweet

Rick, How thick is your flannel pad? I was thinking maybe two layers?

The first Blushing Suzy to germinate will have your name on it, Holly. I might have some really nice Lisianthus for Wind, also. If they are kept alive while I'm in Key West for 2 weeks starting next Sunday, I will have White, Blue, Red, Yellow, Purple and Pink Lisianthus.

My lettuce seeds are a couple of years old, so that may be why. I'll go ahead and sow the newer lettuce seeds and see if that makes a difference.

>> How thick is your flannel pad?

Just one thickness, but then I'm only watering little seedlings in small cells with it.

It is a pretty thick fabric: around as thick as denim (or thicker since it is fuzzy), but not as dense as denim.

It does spread the water horizontally very effectively. I never saw one side of the mat damper than the other side.

My guess is that the trickiest part of the "watering mat in tray" is making sure that every cell sits flat and the mat reaches THROUGH the hole in every cell to touch the soil mix. But it did work for me last year. And I had some "72 cell, six-pack" inserts that had kind of irregular holes, and relied partly on narrow slits. They still got watered!

But I would suggest testing it for a week or two, through several waterings, before going away for a long time. Make sure all the cells get water from below.

And the grooves do not hold very much water!

Up-potted tomatoes this afternoon... I'll put half of them out as soon as they look big enough, and the rest will be in reserve in case of a late frost or other mishap... so if all goes well, I'll have some extras to share at the spring swap. I should have about 10 extra 'Potato Top' plants regardless. :-0

I also got 32 'Gypsy' peppers up-potted, and my 'Carmen' seedlings should be ready in a couple of days. I had poor germination on several of the hot peppers I wanted to try this year, but I've got 'Fish' and 'Hot Portugal' peppers ready to transplant, hopefully tomorrow. The basil is looking good too, starting to get "true leaves," nearly ready for clump transplanting!

I also need to see about anything else I want to start under the lights... this week is about my last chance to sow seeds for an early start. (I usually figure 8 weeks before planting out for most things, and there are a lot of annual flowers, peppers, basil, etc., that I don't put out until the soil warms, usually end of May.)

jeeze, Jill, I haven't even planted my tomato seeds yet
8 ^/

Do you all have a lot of shelves at home? Where do you keep all the seedlings once they are potted up?

Have sympathy for your cat, SSG, LOL! You know who did it if you see a pot of seedlings on the floor one of these days.

Light shelves in the basement. It's my "greenhouse," dirt floor & all. (Not really a dirt floor, just sprinkled liberally with potting mix!)

LOL Critter, I have a dirt floor in my second fl bedroom.

Started two kinds of tomatoes, nicotiana 'Only the Lonely' and salvia Forest Fire. And took a couple coleus tips off to root, more needs to be done. That was a good antidote for the cold .

Sally, have you grown Only the Lonely before? Looks interesting! Huge plant! Does it really smell nice? I've never grown or smelled fragrant nicotianas. This could be due to the fact that I hate heavily scented flowers (I can't decide whether I detest the smell of Lily of the Valley or Wisteria more). The only exception to the rule is Lilac. What about Only the Lonely made you want to grow it? The flowers are pretty but It's kind of a gangly looking plant (no offense).

You probably already know this, but just in case, nicotianas need light to germinate. I bought seeds of tobacco 'Marshmallow Mix' from Pinetree Garden but they came coated. Nothing has germinated, and I think it was that the seeds didn't get enough light through the coating. Sowed them at the same time as my pink tobaccos which I collected from a market pack plant last year, and those have been up for days.

So I don't know what happened there. Not too worried about it though.