First Fail

Wow. A lot has happened...or not...over the past month. None of the seedlings that I planted from seed, made it. Probably about 3 weeks ago, I decided to try hardening them off, and they died in the process. I'm not sure what happened. Many of the seedlings were scraggly. I think it might have been insufficient lighting. If I try by seed again next year, I will start later, and get a longer light fixture. As you can see from the picture below, they didn't look very healthy to begin with. Here are the seedlings right before I began the process of hardening them off.

Transplanting Seedlings

Today I transplanted the last of my seedlings into peat pots. My last post, I'd been concerned about the varying rates at which the plants were growing. Well, some of the earlier plants (zucchini, cucumbers, roma tomatoes) have grown a bit scraggly, and some have died. The slower growing plants (peppers, eggplant, tasty lee tomatoes) look stronger than the earlier plants. This could be attributed to a couple of things, 1) the temps have been warmer, so I turned off the under tank heaters a couple of weeks ago. 2) I've been keeping the grow lights on 24 hours for the past 3-4 weeks. I've read that "legginess" of plants sometimes occurs when there is not enough light. I'm considering starting the seedlings a week or two later next year. Here's what things are looking like now:

Over all, I'm not too upset at my first attempt at growing plants from seed! Planting time is still a good 3 weeks away, so I'll reserve judgement!

Some things I'll be doing in those three weeks:

• Turn compost and resume kitchen composting.
• Look into fencing options to keep the bunnies away.
• Determine whether supplemental seedlings will need to be purchased.
• Look into fall crops.

Everything's coming up

A week ago today I planted my seeds. Here is what my seedlings look like now. Things are coming up at different rates, which seems normal, but still worries me. I had to remove the condensation cover because the zucchini and cukes were bending. I'm worried because the sweet peppers, scallions and tasti-lee tomatoes are taking their time. They are only just starting to sprout, and I fear they may need that extra moisture the cover provided.

I also had to raise the light fixture today. I just hope the little guys get enough light!

Signs of life

By Wednesday, some of the seeds had already begun to sprout! Excited.

Sowing seeds

March 23rd was seed planting time! It felt like this day would NEVER get here. I used the Burpee Seed Starter Kit that my dad gave me.

It comes with two 36-cell seed trays; 72 soil disks; a water absorbing mat (it's self watering!); a resevoir for the water; a stand for the seed trays, and a condensation cover. It's great! Just like a mini-greenhouse.

To start, you put the pellets into each of the cells.

Next, add water. The discs swell up and the dirt loosens.

Finally, plant (and mark) your seeds! The kit recommends one or two seeds per cell. I planted one. Most of the seeds take 7 - 10 days to germinate. The peppers take 7 - 21 days.

I planted zucchini, eggplant, cucumbers, grape tomatoes, tasti-lee tomatoes, roma tomatoes, sweet peppers, scallions and marigolds.

It's almost time!

On March 16th, I tried to find a way to use those light fixtures I'd collected over the years, from my various reptilian pets, to no avail. I ended up ordering a whole new fixture (at a great price!) from Amazon.com. I bought a fluorescent grow light fixture, and a light stand, both from Hydrofarm. Each piece was $30, so it only cost $60, as opposed to the whole thing for $150 on Burpee! Such a deal. Here it is:

All I had to do was add bulbs and a timer, and I'm good to go!

I found this on facebook. I love the message.