my seed starting operation with pics

[GardenGeek]

That is cool. You are taking the best advantage of your place. Pics look awesome and I hope same for newly born plants.
Wishing you all the luck for these new plants and hope they grow up really well

[wolfie]

RG, for the long flourescent lights, do you know how much the housing is for them? are they 4 ft long or 8 ft long? do they need special wiring or just plug into a regular outlet? do u move the lights up as the plants grow ?

thanks!

[rainbowgardener]

They are regular 4 foot long shop light fixtures, each holding two tubes. I have an 8 foot long counter top with 4 of those fixtures hung over it, so 2 fixtures (4 bulbs) across and 2 fixtures (4 bulbs) long* But you could put 2 trays lengthwise under one fixture. They do plug into a regular outlet (yes I do have all those lights and two heating pads plugged into one outlet via a couple of those surge protector thingy's with all the outlets). The shop light fixtures are hung from chains, so they do get raised as the plants grow... just put the hook into a different loop in the chain.

*and then of course if you look at the pictures that started this thread, those four fixtures are hanging from another shelf. On that shelf will be more trays of seedlings. Above it is another shelf, from which hang the lights for the second shelf... but then I'm crazy!

[harvester]

Well, I was going to ask your advice on something. My dad passed away in 1999 at a young unexpected time. I have alot of seeds he had saved. I was going to try to start some of them. I would love to be able to start some of them. There are flowers like columbine, cockscomb, hibiscus and many more. Also some tomato and pepper seeds etc. Do u think it would be a waste of time to try to start these seeds?? It would be so cool to actually get some plants that he worked so hard on. I miss him sooo much! What do u think? I cant seem to throw them out.

There have been maize (corn) seeds found at Native American sites that have been successfully germinated and they are hundreds of years old! I bet you will have success. How neat to honor your father in this way.

[rainbowgardener]

Here's what it is looking like right now (the pictures above are from last year):

[img]https://i602.photobucket.com/albums/tt102/rainbowgardener/P1010008c.jpg[/img]

Sorry, it's hard to get a good picture that isn't too washed out by the lights. You can click on it to make it bigger.

Right now the bottom shelf is full but I haven't started on the top one. The area where the pitcher and other stuff is, will eventually be filled with trays of seedlings also. I'll try to remember to post another picture, once it's full!

The trays are from left:
*a tray full of basil red rubin in the 3" pots;
*native woodland shade plant seeds that are sitting around doing nothing;
*a little more red basil and borage, potted up;
*cabbage in pots;
*broccoli in pots (see seed starting thread here https://www.helpfulgardener.com/forum/viewtopic.php?t=21790&start=15 for close ups of the cabbage and broccoli);
*dill, thyme lupin and rosemary in cells;
*goatsbeard, woodland lettuce in cells, petunia and tomato seeds planted;
*lavender, tomatoes, peppers, impatiens, coleus in cells, petunia seeds planted.

The blue things are the heating pads, so seeds are germinated there, then moved off of them to make room for more seeds.

Just for contrast, here's the view that is in front of me as I type:

[img]https://i602.photobucket.com/albums/tt102/rainbowgardener/icicles.jpg[/img]

You can ignore the window art, done by a little niece of ours on a visit (it does help keep birds from smacking into the window) and admire the collection of icicles!

[gixxerific]

That's awesome Rainbowgardener kinda like I envision mine to grow into here shortly being double wide. Looks like you have your hands full. I need me some of them flats like you have.

I hate to do this but be careful with that water over your lights. BOOM! glass everywhere, small fire maybe. Yes I am very safety conscious for others but not myself I'm too insane for that.

[rainbowgardener]

Thanks, but I'm not apple... I think we must look alike, people have been getting us mixed up lately!

Yup, that's my famous pitcher of water with cinnamon and chamomile. I am careful with it!

PS... did you just change your post?... I could swear a couple minutes ago it said apple, not RG. I left this sit for a few minutes, because I'm busy cooking a curried vegetable stew. Came back and submitted it and the apple was gone!

PS again... The flats are very cheap from wholesale nursery supplier. I got mine from https://www.greenhousemegastore.com. They are now 10 for $14. I think they were a bit cheaper than that a few years ago when I bought them.

[gixxerific]

Thanks, but I'm not apple... I think we must look alike, people have been getting us mixed up lately!

Yup, that's my famous pitcher of water with cinnamon and chamomile. I am careful with it!

Dang it not fast enough I just changed it a second ago, a secret little fairy told me my mistake. Don't take it wrong I just look up to you both the same and I'm terrible with names. So sorry again.

I'm gonna go hide in a closet now.

[rainbowgardener]

No hay problema!

[gixxerific]

While we are here what is you secret with the cinnamon? You just put one stick in the pitcher and one bag of tea or what?

I have been using powdered since that is what I have. Do you see a problem there? I keep thinking I'm putting too much on but I can't see where you could overdose your plants on cinnamon.

[The Helpful Gardener]

Gixx, it IS a volatile oil, and especially on seedlings you shouldn't go nuts with the cinnamon.

Easy does it. It doesn't take tons...

HG

[rainbowgardener]

I put half a stick of cinnamon and a bag of chamomile tea in the pitcher and just leave them there. A week or so later I add more, because the original is pretty depleted, but I haven't taken any out.

I'm not saying that is "right;" I have no idea what right would be since I'm making the whole thing up. It's just what is easy and convenient and keeps the water with a slight cinnamon/chamomile scent.

Last year I tried sprinkling cinnamon powder on the soil, but since I already had sprouted seedlings, it was hard not to get it on the leaves. It seemed to burn the leaves a bit.

[Sage Hermit]

keep in mind one important factor. Moisure level. Cinnimon and chamomile and milk and honey sprays and cinnimon sprinkle are links to the puzzle and by no means the only solution. You want to kill fungus right? Ok, don't water too much. Increase air flow, photosynthesis ect.

[gixxerific]

Thanks I haven't noticed any burning and have doused a few on accident. I have been putting it on about like you would fertilizer not super thick but with a good coverage. I haven't noticed any problems with any plant I have sprinkled though I have had fungus on a few that were not. They were also in humidity domes of one sort or another. I am starting to rethink the domes that everyone loves. I also have been a lot better at not soaking them and letting them dry out some. That was a big problem late last summer when I was doing some tests runs. The peat pots were a big part of my problems last year as well.

[applestar]

The domes -- you could always punch extra holes. Also if you off-set the dome so there's a gap along one side, with holes on the top, it will create a micro-thermal flow. Change the gap from one side to the other on regular basis. Holes that are low along one side, with holes on top or high along the other side also works.

[rainbowgardener]

[quote="gixxerific"] I am starting to rethink the domes that everyone loves.[quote]

Yup ... I don't use them. To me they don't seem necessary (since I sprout seeds just fine without them) and they do risk killing baby seedlings... Lot's more seedlings are killed with too much humidity than too little!

[The Helpful Gardener]

Agreed. Damping off is the #1 killer...

HG

[Ozark Lady]

Okay, here we go again!

I bought Jiffy seed starting mix... I can not get it to absorb any moisture... It continues to just drain straight through it.

I used hot water, I have closed it up in a plastic shoe box, I have added heat... it will not absorb the water...

Now what?

I know seeds will germinate in papertowels, so do I go ahead and use it? Do I mix it with something that will hold water?


Should I put a pot of water on the stove, get it boiling then add the seed starting soil? What would you do?

[gixxerific]

I have a bag of peat, (Don't hate me) so I know how you feel about the non saturation. I put about a bags worth of peat in my wheel barrel and 2 and a half bags of Black Kow manure and even then it's almost too dry. I have been using that mix as more of a filler than I top off the pots with Dr. Earth potting soil and worm castings. That stuff aint cheap so that's why I use the filler, if you saw the amount of 6 gallon pots I filled today you would understand.

So maybe you could get some manure or something and mix it with your starting soil. Around me they have Black Kow at Lowe's and Wal Mart I think at Home Depot too. It doesn't have to be that but something that will hold moisture better, the Black Kow comes out of the bag wet so it holds moisture well.

My 2 cents

[rainbowgardener]

Here's the update on how it is looking now:

cabbage seedlings:

[img]https://i602.photobucket.com/albums/tt102/rainbowgardener/cabbage_seedlings.jpg[/img]

broccoli seedlings:

[img]https://i602.photobucket.com/albums/tt102/rainbowgardener/broccoli_seedlings.jpg[/img]

overview:

[img]https://i602.photobucket.com/albums/tt102/rainbowgardener/seed_starting-1.jpg[/img]

and I'm going to post a couple tomato seedlings in the tomato seedlings thread/ forum.
Here:

https://www.helpfulgardener.com/forum/viewtopic.php?p=113804#113804

[The Helpful Gardener]

Throw a poly tunnel over the row and those brassicas are ready for planting!

Nice work, RBG!

HG

[rainbowgardener]

Thanks! I'm getting them ready, they've been outdoors for a few hours a couple times, then we got more cold and snow, but this weekend they will come back out to start hardening off and I will sweep the snow off the raised bed and put the tunnel over it to start warming the soil. They will be planted in a week or two.

[The Helpful Gardener]

Right on!

And so it begins... Season 2010!

HG

[Gerrie]

I'm jealous/envious Rainbow. Those are beautiful big seedlings. When did you seed them ?

[rainbowgardener]

I planted them 1/21. They've grown a lot since the pictures. Would be ready to put out (to start hardening off) if the weather would cooperate, but we have snow all weekend!

[The Helpful Gardener]

Dumped today here too, with more tomorrow.

But the sump pump is running to keep up with the thaw from days of rain. We are warning back up in the soil... soon...

HG

[gixxerific]

Sorry about your snow still. It has melted here and actually gonna be in the 40 next week, though freezing nights. 40's huh I'm gonna have to get my shorts outs and sandals out.

[Ozark Lady]

Thanks for the photos.
I am showing them to my hubby.
Seems that I just turned commercial.
Tomorrow, I am picking up 300 trays with inserts, to start seedlings, for the local fruit stand. The owner's health is not so great, and he has decided that he wants the plants and does not want to grow them.
I had offered to sell some tobacco seedlings, now it is all the seedlings.
I'm scared!
I know that I can grow seedlings, not a problem... but 300 flats for the fruit stand, and I also have to grow some for the feed store, and what about the Farmer's Market... and my garden...
This is getting big... in just one phone call!

It surely got my hubby motivated, he sees my hobby could help pay off some bills. But, gotta help me get set up... and your input and photos are giving us ideas... make shift for now...

How many lights for 300 flats? Alot I betcha.

Help! I need input, on big growing!

[rainbowgardener]

Jeez!! That is industrial scale, way more than I ever thought about doing!

I line the trays up short end toward me, to get the most trays on the counter space. If I really squeeze, I can get 9 trays on my 8' counter, but the ones on the end are sticking out a little bit and I have to keep rotating them, because the plants lean toward the light. Over those 8-9 trays, running perpendicular to them are 4 shop light fixtures with two bulbs per fixture, so 4 bulbs running across each tray. Doing that way you would need nearly as many bulbs as trays. You could probably get away with spacing it a little wider. If you had a wider counter top so you could put two deep on it, three fixtures across the two trays, not four, I'm sure would be fine. At that point the 8' counter top would have 16 trays and 6 light fixtures = 12 bulbs. That would still mean 224 bulbs in 112 fixtures for your 300 trays.

I don't know anything about other kinds of lighting metal halides, etc. But this might be the time you think about that. For hobby purposes we say they are a lot more expensive. But for industrial growing, maybe not. The high energy lighting you can have a lot further away from your plants, which would mean lots fewer lights to buy. Is it enough fewer to make up for how much more expensive they are? Now you need some kind of expert consultation.

But my first thought is Are you nuts, lady?! I hope you are in this for the long term, because no way are you going to make enough money selling plants this year to come anywhere close to covering the cost of all the equipment you will need. Over a period of years you can recoup it, but not this year.

[wolfie]

wow, I don't even have enough space in my house to hold 300 trays!! Good luck to you! I was thinking about calling the local farmers market to see if they wanted me to supply with some stuff, but now am afraid lol

how did you go about finding out who to call etc?

[Ozark Lady]

I have bought fruit at the market for 15 years, and gotten to know the owner pretty well, and his daughter in law grew up locally with my kids.

It is a small community. I even see the owner at the local gas station, and his sister in law, at the grocery store.

I had tobacco plants growing, and lots of seeds. The owner smokes, and I simply was telling him about growing his own tobacco, maybe selling tobacco seedlings there.

We always visit alot, and we discussed my growing some heirloom seedlings also to supplement his hybrids...

I think this move surprised us both, him deciding not to grow seedlings, and my getting such a large order.

My husband recommends building a website, and making my seedlings "branded" locally, produced by: type thing.

And not be just one year. Even if not doing fruit stand next year... get known for quality seedlings, and variety.

Hubby is talking greenhouse. Which I wanted anyhow, even before the phone call. And with that number of lights, the greenhouse might be cheaper route to take.

300 trays to start with, more when ready... Yikes!

Okay, I think I qualify as self-employed!

[applestar]

Wow, sounds like a great opportunity! You're going to be a busy lady, Lady!

If I may interject with my tiny two light fixture setup (upgraded from just one after PM of tinkering in the garage)... I've hung the second fixture from a wire shelf above the first one. Rainbowgardener and Gixx both have similarly multi-leveled setups I believe.

What precautions did you take about water getting on the lower light fixture? Line the upper shelf with plastic? Double drip trays?

[rainbowgardener]

None, just that everything is in trays and the water just gets poured into the tray. Also the light tubes underneath are in fixtures that flare out so in case there are some drips it tends to roll away from the tubes...

[The Helpful Gardener]

Poly high tunnel is the cheapest thought for this type set up; when's your frost date? Lights are pretty much a necessity; I agree that's a limiting factor, but if this is going to be your job, good tools are always better.

OL, I might seek an ag extension agent for help getting started. This is what you pay them for, dear...

HG

[Sage Hermit]

is it ok to post my indoor seed starting op. pics here? I don't use grow lights at all.

[Ozark Lady]

I learned a secret today, with the phone call, we were chatting about starting seedlings, and he takes a tray, lines it with newspaper, wets the newspaper, then takes another tray and puts the inserts in it, in order to keep the humidity high.

I was going to fire up the humidifiers, so that trick will help...

I bought lights, and tags yesterday, so I am ready to put lights on my little 24" shelves, but they only hold one tray at a time.

I think I need to back up and look at this, one tree at a time, and not see the whole forest!

I transplanted little tomatoes today, they are barely starting to get true leaves. I like to do it while the roots are small and not so tangled up.

Are tomatoes tougher than cole crops? I broke or severely bent 1/3 of the cole crops... and not one tomato.

The tomatoes were only on the dining room table facing a north window, no lights on them at all. The cole crops had lights, but still got leggy.

Okay, which is easier, to raise the seedlings to the light, or lower the lights to the seedlings? I thought maybe dog chains and cup hooks for the lowering mechanism on the lights. And various shelf heights are another idea... Just move the tray to a taller shelf... which would be easier?

[applestar]

Are the newspapers in the drip tray with the cell trays on top? Or is he keeping wet newspaper-lined trays around?

Okay, which is easier, to raise the seedlings to the light, or lower the lights to the seedlings? I thought maybe dog chains and cup hooks for the lowering mechanism on the lights. And various shelf heights are another idea... Just move the tray to a taller shelf... which would be easier?

Both. Also adjustable shelves.

I use everything from aluminum covered boxes, extra trays, bucket lids, to dowel sticks, to raise the seedlings up... even Lego pieces for leveling. After raising and leveling the tops of the seedlings for a while, I have to redo the whole thing because then I start to have everything EVENLY higher than they need to be.

Usually it doesn't hit me until I run out of head space for some taller seedlings, and realize that if I put these guys on the bare surface, it would fit but then I'd need to lower the light a bit, but REALLY I *don't* need that extra box under everybody else anyway. ... get me?

[rainbowgardener]

OL as Apple said, both.

Here (down near the bottom of the page)

https://www.helpfulgardener.com/forum/viewtopic.php?t=21904&start=60

I posted a picture of some tomato seedlings sitting with their tray on top of an upside down tray to get them closer to the light. Later I was able to move some of the taller plants to the top shelf and take the extra trays out and lower the lights. The shop light fixtures come with chains, which are hung from S hooks, so they can be easily moved up and down.

So the shuffle goes in and out and up and down !

It seems like for the newspaper thing to work, you'd have to have two different size trays...Once you line the tray with newspaper (unless maybe it's a very THIN layer) the next tray won't fit inside it any more?

SageHermit post away! Interested to see how you manage to start seedlings without any supplemental light!

[applestar]

So the shuffle goes in and out and up and down !

THAT'S the other song! I posted in [url=https://www.helpfulgardener.com/forum/viewtopic.php?p=116224#116224]this[/url] thread, that "DO THE SHUFFLE!" starts repeating in my head, often alternating with some childhood memory of playing musical chairs around this time of the year as I do the endless seedling jigsaw puzzle to even out the tops of their foliage. I don't know the rest of the song but, "Up down, and all around, la la la la, la, la la la la." is another accompaniment.

[Ozark Lady]

Since, my germinating needs just grew quickly, I am considering...
I have a heated lap pad... it is like half the size of a twin bed blanket.
What if... I cover it with heavy plastic on a counter top.
Then set trays on it and turn it on, it has high, medium and low settings.

I don't get the tray thing either, unless, maybe they are drip trays with holes in them?

I ordered 10 solid trays and 10 that will drip freely... so maybe we are thinking solid and he has ones with holes?

If they have drainage holes, the paper would hold them damp longer...

And all the trays do stack up, I got 20 trays and 30 sheets of inserts in one box, all nested into sets.

I drowned alot of seedlings with solid drip trays last year with the rains.
I had plants outside, and went to town, before I could get home and rescue them... they were swimming for their lives, and they did not survive, even though I dumped them immediately... So I figured, solid for inside and the drip ones for outside. I would rather soak them at will, than have them drown again.