papertowel

ok i know i seen a post on here about starting seeds in papertowels,can anyone help me on this? i know that you can do the small seeds etc. but wanted to know which ones is better for it and who has used this and what seeds they done it with and do you need to cover them in a plastic baggy or what any help would be appriciated and thxs
moretz

I can tell you my late experience with it. I used coffee filters. After soaking one in water/hydrogen peroxide mix, (1 part hydrogen peroxide to 5 parts water) I put in morning glory seeds on one, and hollyhock on the other. I then laid another soaked coffee filter on top and each one went in a plastic bag. The morning glories germinated in like 3 days, the hollyhock in about 10 days. So far, my experiment with this method is giving good results. I now have tried some hidcote lavender and some crocosmia. Too early yet to tell on either one.

The 'DENO' method works beautifully for me. I use it to germinate all of my med to lg sized seeds.
Papertowel, coffee filter, it all does the same thing. Although coffee filters inhibit the new roots from growing through the fibers a bit, so transplanting them to pots is easier I think. Often times I transplant sprouts with papertowel still attached so as to not damage the tender roots.

http://tomclothier.hort.net/page38.htm

Marc

PAPER TOWEL METHOD: I got this method from Norm Deno, who says he got it from someone else. This is very easy. Take white paper towels. Fold them in half three times. Label the towel with the variety, date and any other information, like oscillate temps before bringing to warmth. Dampen the towels, squeezing out most of the water. It should be well dampened, but you shouldn't be able to squeeze more than a couple of drops out of it. Open the towel open two folds. Sow the seeds inside. Fold back up, and place in a thin, non-ziploc bag.

Whether you are placing them in the fridge, or not, you need to open them up at least once a week to check for germination and allow air to circulate around the seeds briefly. When germination begins, I move the germinated seeds with tweezers to a seedling pot. If I know the variety well enough to predict it's behavior, I don't wait for more than one or two seedlings to germinate before moving them all to pots. Some seeds, with erratic germination, have to be moved as they germinate. These are the main ones I sow in towels. If you sow seeds with erratic germination in pots, the ones that germinate first will crowd out the later ones, and if you try to prick them out one at a time, you may end up burying the others. I also sow very rare and valuable seeds into towels, as overall there is a better success rate. The only other ones I sow in towels are those needing alternating cycles of warmth and cold. Germination is faster this way.

You can place several towels into each bag, although you should be careful to place seeds that actually need light to germinate in bags by themselves. (There actually aren't very many that do. Most of the ones that light is recommended for actually don't require it, but are very small and just shouldn't be sown too deep or they won't be able to break the surface). Make sure you do not put the bags in the sun, as they will overheat. I place mine on the end of the same shelf the seedling pots are on. Norm Deno uses a separate method for seeds that require light to germinate, sowing the seeds on top of the towels. I don't, I've found that they get plenty of light to germinate through a white paper towel. If the towels begin to break down, or get really moldy, just transfer the seeds to a clean towel. You will often have a little mold growing on the towel, or internally infected seeds. Remove the bad seeds, but don't worry too much about the mold growing on the towel. After three years experience with this method, I can say for certain that I've only had one case of seeds being killed by the mold in a towel, and that was some I left in the fridge over the busy spring season without remembering to ever check them.

Lastly, use this method of sowing only if it's necessary, or you have the time to transplant the sprouted seeds. It is a time consuming process. And don't use this method on dust like seeds. You can never get them loose from the towels as the ultra fine radicles root immediately to the towel.