Seed Starting Sticky! Please post your questions and answers here! - Page 6

[WannabeaFarmer]

First let me say that I am one of the most impatient gardeners...

I have pepper seeds that I saved from last year-and I am afraid I am going to have to buy plants-well that is most likely my impatience talking-Do they really take a long time to germinate???
Everything else except my Hales Best Cantelope(also from last year) and my peppers has sprouted up.
I prop my dome for air during the day when its sunny and warmer in my room where they are and then re-cover at night.
The flat and a half is under a light, in a 70-72 degree-ish room, and everything has SHOT up(in my full flat, the 1/2 flat is about two weeks behind the full).
So far I have moved these out of my flat and into party cups cause they are about 4-5" tall already:
Bush Cukes
Four kinds of pumpkins
Of course my every so happy peas and beans(Those I could have direct sown with great results like last year, but the munchkin wanted something to start like mommy)

And the rest of my stuff is still tiny lil first leaf sprouts, but just about reaching the lid-EXCEPT those gosh darn peppers and cantelopes....

I know I just need someone to tell me to RELAX
But im so excited....:
Anyone else have trouble getting peppers to sprout?
Im just afraid if it gets to where I have to remove my lid for everything else, are they not going to pop up from being to chilly?
Should they get their own lil seperate flat?
I really dont plan on planting outside for at least 3-4 more weeks, but I want em to be big n strong...

[lmonter]

Originally Posted by WannabeaFarmer

Anyone else have trouble getting peppers to sprout?
Im just afraid if it gets to where I have to remove my lid for everything else, are they not going to pop up from being to chilly?
Should they get their own lil seperate flat?
I really dont plan on planting outside for at least 3-4 more weeks, but I want em to be big n strong...

Yes. Peppers can take 3 weeks to germinate, especially if the soil is just room temperature. Peppers like it hot - like a soil temp of 85*F or so. My California Wonder Peppers have taken like 4 weeks to sprout, where my jalapenos and mini red bells were up within days (I had them on a heat mat for the first week or so). Tomatoes can handle warm soil as well, so I had peppers and tomatoes in that one heated flat. If you don't like how slow peppers are, don't immediately plant carrots in the spring. Although, I've gotten into planting my carrots in late June/July (when it's getting pretty hot here) and they sprout up pretty quick - like within a week. Then I let 'em overwinter and harvest in March. Seems to be working just groovy for me so far.

Originally Posted by allielb

I've got mold growing on the outside of my newspaper pots, I just noticed it last night before bed and this morning I can tell that it is spreading.

What should I do?

I'm thinking I need to repot? Should I do newspaper again or plastic? Is spraying vinegar on the outside of the pots a bad idea?

No vinegar. It'll kill your roots/plant.
I'd say if you want to stick with newspaper, re-pot, and stop watering so much. The soil shouldn't be completely crunchy like the desert in Nevada, but not sopping wet. My tomato lady says that's one of the things a lot of people do - overwater their seedlings. So I tend to slightly underwater mine. So the best of the best survive - darwinism all in my pantry.

Originally Posted by nadia105

Are peppers notoriously stubborn about starting? Is it too late to try the heating pad route to sprout them now? I'm in zone 4.

I didn't understand the 'leggy' plants thing (first year starting seeds indoors), but I have a bunch of broccoli plants that shot up too fast and are now breaking off . Since the ones left are already 3-4 inches, is it too late to use the fan on them? Should I prop with a straw or something?

Is it really bad to leave more than one seedling in a 4 inch pot? My tomatoes sprouted really well and I'm having a hard time snipping any of them. I transplanted some into other pots, but I still have more.

You can totally try the heating pad route for the peppers. Yes, they're picky and can be slow at germinating. Dig around though and make sure the seeds didn't just rot in your pots though. Might want to do that out in the garage though if they did - I've heard that smell isn't exactly fun.

Yeah, my broccoli's always been pretty leggy. Can you repot them and put the main stem a lot further down in the soil? They don't grow extra roots like tomato stems, but it can help. I've had some that I've plucked while thinning that I stuck in a random/empty pot of something that didn't germinate actually re-root and keep growing. Little buggers.

Well, if you have more than one seedling in a 4" pot, it means there's less nutrients for the plants involved. So they'll be fighting over the good stuff in the soil, whether you want them to or not. Plus their roots will get all tangled up together, making transplanting outside a bit more tricky/annoying. It just hurts when I lose a bunch of roots while transplanting, but that's just me.

[nadia105]

lmonter, thanks for all of the answers to my questions! I always learn a lot from your posts on this forum.

[serenetabbie]

I have pepper seeds that I saved from last year-and I am afraid I am going to have to buy plants-well that is most likely my impatience talking-Do they really take a long time to germinate???

Yes, IME they take longer than a lot of other things. I try to start mine a week or two before I start the tomatoes because if I plant them at the same time I wonder what's wrong with them

[eirual]

Forgetting about lighting

What should one do if they forget to turn the lighting for plants on/off and the plants are given an abnormally long period of light/darkness?

Should you skip a cyle and have like 24hrs of light, then 24 hrs of dark? or half the cycle (correct the mistake for about 4 hrs, throw in another quick cycle and get back on track asap)??

...or does it matter?

I forgot to turn the light off one night, so my plants got about 24 hrs of light.

[FarmerCathy]

Originally Posted by eirual

What should one do if they forget to turn the lighting for plants on/off and the plants are given an abnormally long period of light/darkness?

Should you skip a cyle and have like 24hrs of light, then 24 hrs of dark? or half the cycle (correct the mistake for about 4 hrs, throw in another quick cycle and get back on track asap)??

...or does it matter?

I forgot to turn the light off one night, so my plants got about 24 hrs of light.

It doesn't matter. I do it every once in awhile if I forget too. I have them on a timer now though and that has solved the problem.

[Shane]

Starting Strawberries from the berry?

I want to start a strawberry patch and don't want to pay $4.50 for each plant. I can't find strawberry seeds at the stores near me, but I do have a lot of strawberrys I've picked from a local farm. My question is how do I grow a plant from the berry? I've googled and googled and can't find anything on it.

TIA
Steph

[MadiMamacita]

steph- i don't know what i'm doing in the garden. this is my first attempt (we started all our seeds waaay too late so i guess it was a practice run..) and i dried some strawberries, cut them up and then tried to germinate them, but nothing. so thats clearly not the right way.

ok i have a few other super newbie questions.
last night i picked a few seed pods off of a neighbors sweet pea flowers.
1. do seeds have to be dried before they can be planted (if so, why??)
2. do i dry the whole pod and then open it up to plant the individual dried seeds, or pop the pod open now and dry the seeds themselves?
3. this one is potentially really dumb.. are those pea pods of the edible variety??

then, since i started my seeds way late (we started them in may.. i had a babe in jan and wasnt up to planting right away..) so the only things that have promise this season are green beans (already eaten some of those) and carrots. my tomatoes are like 5 inches tall, peppers about 3 inches
what would it be like if i put those plants in pots and had them as houseplants all winter?

its so late in the growing season, I hope someone actually reads this!
for the record, i'm in zone 5 but we have a really short growing season (about 50 days) in the high desert in Oregon

[lmonter]

Usually you just get strawberry plants from runners from the mother plants. As in, you start with 5 plants in year one, end up with 20+ in year two, 80+ in year three. Or more. So you can totally just start with a handful of plants. It's too late to really plant strawberries right now, unless you want to plant them when the days start cooling off, then you can just fall-plant and mulch them really well (or just cover/smother them with 6+" of straw). I've gotten little strawberry plants off freecycle years ago, and gave some extras to a neighbor this year. If you've got a local farmer's market, it doesn't hurt to ask around - my tomato lady had 20-25 Tribute strawberry crowns for like $5. A way better deal than anything at Home Depot, and these suckers were already acclimated to our region.



last night i picked a few seed pods off of a neighbors sweet pea flowers.
1. do seeds have to be dried before they can be planted (if so, why??)
I think so, but I'm not sure. Other than maybe thinking that a raw pea would probably just rot in the ground if it's not sure what's going on. Plus dry seeds certainly last longer (as in, years) in storage than wet/damp/raw seeds.

2. do i dry the whole pod and then open it up to plant the individual dried seeds, or pop the pod open now and dry the seeds themselves?
I'm not sure. I just let my peas and beans that I want to save seed from dry on the vine. That way I know the seeds are mature and all that jazz. Then once everything's all crunchy, I pull the pods and bring inside to shell, sort and label.

3. this one is potentially really dumb.. are those pea pods of the edible variety??
Usually by the time peas have formed, the pea pods are tough and not as tender/sweet. I'm not sure whether sweet peas are edible or not - I don't dabble as much into flowers and ornamental stuff as other folks do. I'm weird and prefer my flowers to actually do something for me besides look pretty (like marigolds help repel some things, chamomile and feverfew are good herbal goodies to have on hand, etc.) Well, unless I can basically ignore them like the roses and daylilies up front - those have taken a beating and been ignored like there's no tomorrow, and they just keep going.

My tomatoes are like 5 inches tall, peppers about 3 inches
what would it be like if i put those plants in pots and had them as houseplants all winter?
You could certainly try it. I'm actually planning on starting a little Kootenai tomato plant and a new basil plant in a week or two to throw in a pot to keep in the kitchen window come frost time to see how that goes. We'll see.

[MadiMamacita]

thanks!

[AnnieNimIty]

Sweet peas.... Don't eat them. They are poisonous.