Thursday, January 3, 2013

Seed starting my way

This will demonstrate my process for starting seeds with a Burpee Self Watering Seed Starter and Grodan rockwool cubes.

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These are some of the items needed.  1.5" Grodan A-Ok Starter Plugs, pH up and down and a pH meter.  You can use a pH chemical test kit from the pet store instead of the electric one here.

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The Burpee Self Watering Seed Starting system is the what we are using for a greenhouse.  It comes with a seed tray and peat moss pellets.  Those will not be used.

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First thing we have to do is adjust he pH of the rockwool.  Test your tap water to see what the pH is first.  Use your pH up/down to adjust it.  A word of caution use only a couple drops at a time to adjust the water.  Test each time until the pH is at 5.5.  Then soak the cubes for 30-60 minutes.

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Next the cloth mat is soaked in water then placed on the stand in the tray.  I use the same water used to soak the cubes in the tray.

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Then the rest is easy.  Set the cubes on the tray and put a seed in the hole.  Place the dome on top of the tray and place it under light.

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In 3-4 days you should have seedlings.   At this point the seedlings were hitting the clear dome.  Only 8 out of 12 have come up so far but I expect the others will show up in a couple days.  For some reason some seeds take longer than others.  I will let these sit on the tray until the secondary leaves start and roots are coming out of the rockwool.  Then it is time for the ground.

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