Starting Seeds Under Lights

After poring over catalogs all through January I usually find I want a greenhouse by February so I can get an early start with all the seeds I've ordered. Growing plants from seed at home is not for everyone. The plant selection at area nurseries and the farmer’s market has steadily improved in the past few years and you can now find unusual tomatoes and peppers at Project Grow's plant sale. It is often easier to just purchase healthy greenhouse grown plants from area growers and forget it.

Still, some people prefer to start things at home because they can’t find certain varieties, or they just enjoy starting plants from seed. For me, there is something special about any plant, from a primrose to a tomato, that I started from a seed.

My first attempt at starting plants from seed was disappointing. The seeds started readily enough but then grew tall and spindly, leaning toward the window. Some seedlings grew fuzzy fungus around their bases and keeled over before they were even two inches high. By the time I placed the seedlings outside the first breeze flattened the few top-heavy survivors.

If you have had failures like these, or been afraid to try because you've feared these kind of results, take heart, because you can learn from my mistakes. I have since successfully started everything from strawberries to leeks and dozens of kind of flowers from seed under lights. I’m sure there are other, better ways to proceed but this is what has worked well for me.

Soil
It is important that whatever you use be light, well-drained, moisture retentive and sterile. Unsterile soil harbors nasty fungal diseases and also weed seeds which make it difficult to recognize your seedlings. Rather than bake soil in the oven (it stinks to high heaven) I find it easier to use commercial seed starting mixes like Jiffy-Mix or Hoffman’s. You can also mix your own using peat moss, perlite and vermiculite.


Containers
You can use clay pots or plastic food containers or anything you have but it must have drainage holes. If the containers previously contained plants you must wash them (the paranoid say with bleach) to avoid the risk of disease. I usually find it easier to go the ecologically unsound route and buy sheets of plastic six or 4 packs, or liners. You can buy a whole sheet of these (12 six packs, 72 cells per sheet, 12 four packs, 48 cells per sheet) for a couple dollars. This will also tend to help you pack the most seedlings per square inch of indoor growing space. Liners can be purchased locally at Downtown Home and Garden or online.


Light
I've never lived anywhere that had nice sunny windows, and Michigan has no sun in February anyway,
so I use artificial lights. You don’t need to do anything fancy here. I use “shop light” fluorescent fixtures and the cheapest available bulbs - cool white 40 watt. You can get these at Home Depot or Lowe's. Newer fixtures come with thinner 34 watt bulbs to save energy. However, you want to maximize the light output, so you want 40 watt bulbs.


You want to mount the fixture on light- weight chains so you can raise it easily as the seedlings grow. The light should only be about two or three inches from the tops of the plants. I know this seems really close but remember that most plants want full sun and fluorescent tubes are very dim by comparison.


Fluorescent bulbs put out significantly less light as they age, so if you decide to borrow a fixture out of
the laundry room or garage, you may want to replace the bulbs. If used only for starting plants, the bulbs should be replaced every few years.

The lights should be operated about 16 hours a day. I use a grounded (3 prong) timer to turn them on and off. On the other hand, my father, who figures that if 16 hours of light is good, then 24 should be better, starts seeds under fluorescent lights that are never turned off and has fine results.


Sowing the seeds
Fill the containers with grow mix and moisten it. You want the mix moist but not sodden. I find it easiest to bottom water the container and let it absorb the water and then sow the seeds. Fine seed that needs to be surface sown can be moistened after sowing with a spray bottle. Under the controlled conditions that we are creating the germination rate will be much higher than when sowing outside so don’t over sow.


Temperature and humidity
Seedlings usually sprout best with warmer temperatures and high humidity. I have had best luck using clear plastic domes that fit over a single flat. (also available at Downtown Home and Garden). They are easy to take on and off and last for years. Follow packet directions, but most seeds will sprout nicely at around 70 degrees. I usually set the flat under the lights immediately so that the seedlings will be exposed to light as soon as they emerge.


After the seeds sprout and have true leaves, prop the dome open for a day or two to accustom the plants
to less humidity before removing the dome.


Watering and fertilizing
Plants should not be fertilized until they have at least two sets of true leaves. Fish emulsion diluted to half or a third strength works well. You may also be able to find other organic fertilizers which don't smell quite so bad.


Hardening Off
At least a week before the plants are to be planted outside they need to be accustomed to outdoor conditions. This is called hardening off. If you don’t have a cold frame, choose a mild day when it is not blazing hot or pouring rain, and leave the plants outside for an afternoon. An overcast day provides less of a shock. Each day, increase the amount of time they are outside. This will give the plants time to acclimate to outdoor conditions before being set out in the garden. I have two small cold frames and try to get the plants outside as soon as there are warm days. At first, wind is as much a danger than anything else and a cold frame really helps.

I'm back though not in business

I have not logged into this blog for a couple years and when I did today I was surprised to see how many people read posts here (Google tracks all that stuff if you ask them to).  I am still working for Project Grow and not coming back to the cut flower business but I will be growing some cut flowers for me this year. I am thinking of continuing the garden blog but have it be about all kinds of gardening that I do rather than just for the business.

For the first couple years after I ended the business I didn't want to raise any flowers for cutting.  The business was a lot of fun but a huge amount of work and it exhausted my interest in growing flowers.  I had never thought that was possible, but it happened.  I grew lots of vegetables in 2012 and 2013.  This year I will be growing the veggies again (though probably not so many) and some flowers for cutting.

When I stopped the business, I had about half an acre of flower beds - around 120-130 100 square foot beds.  I continue to rent about 1/10 of that space.  Half of it is planted with blueberries, raspberries, strawberries, asparagus and a couple grape vines.  The other half was planted with corn, cabbage, pimentos and other veggies.  This year I will still have corn, peppers, collards, and some other veggies but will also be growing delphiniums, lisianthus, asclepias, cosmos, dahlias, and dianthus for cut flowers.

Hope to continue posting regularly.  I've already started lisianthus and delphiniums!

Cut Flower Business Ending

I decided to take a position as Managing Director of Project Grow and finished the Good Scents flower season in August 2011. I have been involved with Project Grow since the mid 80s, as a gardener, volunteer in numerous positions and board member. When the Managing Director unexpectedly resigned in June, I decided to apply for the position, have since been hired, and started on August 1st.

While it might be possible to do both - I ran Good Scents for the first 6 years while working full time - doing so would defeat the purpose of me stopping the business in the first place. While I love growing flowers and many other things about the business, it is a very time consuming job that leaves no time for any gardening outside of work!

Wet,Wet, Wet

I got started last Monday this year (April 18th). It has been a cold Spring and wet, wet, wet. There is standing water in the paths at the farm, which is how I informally keep track of how wet the weather is. Between the cold and the constant rain, I have not had many working days. This week is supposed to be wet, too, but maybe the first week of May will be better.

Transplanting Already

The Lisianthus I started the first week of January have reached transplant size so during the past few days I moved all of them from 200 cell plug trays they were started in, to 12x6 liners. About 75% of them come up and survive this long so that about doubles the amount of space they occupy under the lights. In addition, I've also got seedlings for onions, pimentos, delphiniums, several Camnpanulas and Lady's Mantle, but all of those are still small.

I'm going to move some of this stuff to the greenhouse about the beginning of March, but right now the greenhouse is still unheated and freezing cold.

Another thing I am doing differently this year is I am not forcing lilies for May. I decided that they take up too much greenhouse space, plus the crates are really heavy and too much work to be schlepping them in and out of the greenhouse during hot and cold spells in May. I originally started doing this in hopes of avoiding having to buy flowers in late May, but I ended up buying flowers anyway (a lily stem or two does not create a bouquet, as far as I am concerned). They are nice but given my very limited greenhouse space, they are really costly.

I still plan on buying frozen lily bulbs from Ednie during the summer and planting those in crates, so there will still be lilies out of season in the summer, just no lilies in May.

Seed Swap

Project Grow is holding a Seed Swap this Saturday February 12th from 10:00-11:30 am at the Downtown Home and Garden barn. If you like swapping seeds and meeting other gardeners, then this is a fun event. I will be there with:

Sweet Pimento

I grew lots of pimentos last year. I find these much easier to grow than bell peppers. The fruits are small but are quicker and more productive. I only grew this kind of pepper in my vegetable garden so the seed strain should be pure. You have to be careful when saving pepper seed because they are pollinated by bees. If you are growing many different kinds close together, they will cross pollinate and your sweets may be hot and so on. I originally got the seed from Fedco.

Red Bull Onion

Onions are pretty easy to grow and this year I decided to grow 'Copra', a yellow storage onion, plus a few red onions. Because I started only about 1/4 as many red ones, I had lots of seeds left and I'll be bringing them to the swap.

Dianthus barbatus

The past few years I started saving the most interesting Sweet William seeds (Dianthus barbatus). I really liked the 'eyed' ones that were purple, so I saved those, and also a purple that has an eye but is lighter and more diffuse. I've been growing these apart from other Sweet William for the past few years, so the strain is fairly consistent, and even when it isn't, the flowers are still pretty.

Genovese Basil

Project Grow's Director, Cindy, saved these from her garden last year and supplied them for the Project Grow plant sale in May. However, Cindy saved so many seeds, I'm going to make up a few packets and bring them to the seed swap, too.

I may bring along some other flower seeds that I got this year for Good Scents, too. Hope to see you there!

Delphiniums

I had a fairly big die-off of delphiniums this past summer. For the past couple years I planted 'Aurora', one of the varieties I have long used, plus some seeds from Dowdeswell Delphiniums. The Dowdeswell varieties are beautiful and unique but don't seem to hold up as well though our hot and humid summers. I assume it was the summers because I have read delphiniums are super cold hardy and all the delphiniums were treated the same, so I don't think it was a difference in cultural treatment.

In previous years, in addition to 'Aurora', I have grown 'Clear Springs'. However, this year it was dropped from the GeoSeed catalog so I am instead growing 'Magic Fountains'. 'Magic Fountains' is an older strain, kind of a dwarf 'Pacific Giants'. There are more separate colors available than in 'Clear Springs', and you can get white and dark bees, which is kind of cool. So why haven't I grown them in the past? I think I had the impression that 'Magic Fountains' was maybe a little too short, plus I always had such good success with 'Clear Springs' that I had little incentive to try something different.

In addition to the Delphinium cultorum 'Aurora' and 'Magic Fountains', I am also starting some Delphinium belladonna 'Oriental Blue'. I grew this a couple years ago but unlike the other Delphinium belladonna I had grown, most of them died after the first year. They bloomed at the same time as Clarkia and looked really nice with them, so hopefully I will have that pairing again this year.