Starting Tomatos?

[msta999]

Out of 2 packets of tomato seads, one reg organic and the other the hybrd cherry tomatos, only two seads sprouted on a wet paper towl under a lamp. I did try planting some in the garden first and none of those started either. Anyone else having problems with tomato seads? Also my cucumbers, none started in the garden and only 5 started under the heat lamp. Just wondering if anyone else is having problems with some of thier seads?

[Deberosa]

I am overrun as usual with tomato plants. I usually put two or three seeds per cell and of course all three sprout, then I can't thin of course! ;-) So I separate them into 4 inch pots and they grow like crazy. I now have a green house full and they are two feet tall, some in blossom!

They won't start in Western Washington planted directly in the garden. I also use a high quality germinating mix, it just makes all of the difference. Doesn't matter so much when you transplant but the wrong soil can keep them too damp.

Haven't started my cuccumbers yet - will start them inside this week to put out in mid June. Everything is behind the season in the Pacific Northwest this year. I've looked at pictures of my gardens from past years and it's about 2-3 weeks behind what it was in the past!

[msta999]

I drove past a small field/large garden yesterday and that guys corn was over a foot tall. I'm having problems just getting mine to sprout. I wonder if the brand of seeds have anything to do with it.

[msta999]

Well, after 2 days of ignoring my tomatos in thier planter, I was going to through then way and do something else and there they are, it took 3 weeks, but they are about 1.5 inches tall now. I just spent 45 bucks on 11 plants. 7 plants (3 diff types of tomatos), 2 cucumber, 2 corn. Seems kind of spendy, I'll have to get the seed thing down to make this cost effective. I'm trying something new, I took some egg cartons and filled them with peat moss and put new seeds in there. That way when/if they get going I can let them stay under the 200 watt lamp longer and let them get bigger, then just cut the cups and plant the hole thing. We'll see. I think next year it might be better to just do a green house, but it would take up a good part of the back yard, so that may not work.

[FirestarterKY]

I have to agree on the soil thing.
I used cheap soil for starting and I'm just getting by.
Next year I'll put a little extra money in soil for starting.
My business neighbors hubby is a college grad in plants...dont know what they call him.
But, I can give him seeds and he can tell me, "with this seed you have 35% germination.
Sometimes it is the seed.
I hope to get a green house too.
And, yes with the weather pattern looks like we'll all be really really busy int he fall putting everything up.
The farmers here have only half of their corn in....so they say, their % of loss is going up every day, so they say, look for an increase in corn prices.
They have all their corn in usually by now.
And it is usually all up by now too.
I'm in N/W KY.
Been lucky here for no tornadoes but the rain!
Man!
Too, for me, I just have better luck planting dirrectly in the ground for most things, except toms and peppers.
I tried the in house starting thing this year for the first time really with effort, and am having trouble "hardening?" the plants.

You all take care!!!!!!

Good luck!

[homesteadingnky]

Sorry things aren't going better with your plants man. It could be the soil or the seeds or even both. I haven't had a lot of luck starting seeds in my house. I just don't have the right set up. Some folks do great this way. I prefer to use a simple homemade float bed outside and for soil I prefer a mix of peat moss and perlite.

For seeds I order most of mine from Baker Creek but I save some of my own as well. We do get a few things from the mennonites who live near us occassionally.

This year we went with a cheaper type of peat moss/potting soil and it's really hurt our germination rate and there's even weeds growing in the seed trays. We will definately go back to real peat moss and perlite next year. We still have a decent stand of seedlings (as we usually go over board on how much we sow to start with).

As far as tomatoes go, do you ever sucker or prune the plants and then replant the cuttings to propagate new plants? I do this all of the time with great results. Last year I set out a large plant in April and immediately broke off two suckers and put them in a cup of water for a week. At the end of the week I set them out in the garden and watered them with manure tea (thanks to my rabbits). A month later to the day they were about 2' tall and blooming all over. I love to do this. You can get hundreds of plants from just one tomato plant. Just food for thought if you haven't tried it.

Best wishes with your garden!!

Homesteading Dad

[msta999]

I didin't think about the dirt, dirt is dirt right? Maybe not. I did mix it (my raised gardens) with 50% bull manure, hopefully that will be good enough. My ground garden is just the dirt that was there. I thought the hole idea of having your own garden was no chemicals, so that is how I am going.

[WileyCoyote]

Well, um msta, everything is made up of chemicals, including us! ;D
Fresh bull manure or year old bull manure? Fresh bull manure takes longer to break down and put its nutrients into the soil.

The difference is in organic and non-organic... non organic adds chemicals you may not want, or may not need, and oftimes forces bloom or fruit proliferation which can be detrimental to your soil and plants and eventally your body when you eat them. Fertilizers may have an organic source but the processing of their ultimate end product can add undesireable elements to your soil and plants. For example, some rose fertilizers have not only growth chemicals but fungicides and insecticides that you do not want to eat. Herbicides like Roundup may help you clear your soil initially but can leave residual elements in the soil that can poison your vegies and hence, you, for a year or sometimes more.

"Natural" fertilizers like manure and decomposing compost are not used by conglomerate farms because it does not treat the plant immediately (like miracle-gro or other fertilizers) but has to break down in the soil and then be absorbed, which can take a season or more depending on composition of the manure and soils. "Quick fix" nutrients are good if you are planting for this year, but do not add to the soil nutrients and can actually over time break down good soil, as the soil is planted and planted and planted with only surface fertilizers used. For sustainability it is better to feed the soil than to feed the plants. Soils that have been amended properly in the beginning will produce better growth and disease and even insect resistance over time. Quick fertilizers only produce hardy plants - every year you use them.

A whole nother problem is treated seed, even seed that has been genetically altered with animal DNA or crossed with Round-Up. These seeds are very prolific, and their plants resist diseases and bugs, even other plants - but are under fire for being so hybridized that their seeds are non-productive, and their blooms' pollen and nectar can actually kill pollinators like bees.

Heirloom and non-hybrid seeds are best to look for if you don't want the chemical or DNA alterations in your ultimate food supply.

Some use one, some use the other, some use both. It depends on your purpose and your goals. *

As for the greenhouse, you don't need a big one for starts. Ours is ten by eight feet, we used the "plastic wrap" at first but the winds and weather tore it up in two years so we went with the rippled hard plastic at Home Depot and it has lasted for 10 years. Wood posts, wood framed shelves with screen shelving (dirt rinses and drops thru - less rot) stapled to them... very simple.

[Deberosa]

The importance of dirt is something I am learning also as I do more gardening. Dirt is a living thing - with many organisms thriving in healthy soil. Adding chemicals upsets that balance and can make things worse. It's a complex thing but basically you can't go wrong adding compost from what I've seen!

As for starting seeds - the mix is even more important so the right amount of moisture is retained and the proper air circulation is permitted for root growth.


It's just like when you are raising livestock you are really farming grass, which again leads to the health of the soil!

One other thing you may want to test for in the Northwest is your soil PH - you can get a simple kit to do this but I could almost guarantee it's too acidic because of all of the rain we get. Adding dolomite lime to the soil is the solution for this. Except for plants that like acid soil like rhodies, azaleas, blueberries and such. It's part of why they thrive in our environment.

[homesteadingnky]

To quote from Crow Miller, (author of Let's Get Growing)Grow the soil first and you'll have a great garden. You can adjust your N-P-K naturally without harsh chemicals and synthetic fertilizers but you still have to make adjustments sometimes. With greensand, blood or bone meal, wood ashes, or the best thing you can do is to make good nutrient rich compost and add to your soil. The plants have mineral needs just like we do and many soils are very low in mineral content. In fact, a spot of bare ground left over the winter will leech many of the minerals and nutrients out of the ground and a good cover crop is all you need to hold those nutrients there until you're ready to turn it under and plant your garden.

When I mentioned peat moss and perlite I was refering to a seed starting mix not to put it in your garden, not that it would hurt anything. You can use garden soil to start seeds with but they are very suseptable to diseases and funguses and if you you a serile mix you just put the odds in your favor until your plants get more stamina as they grow.

My compost has a lot of cow or rabbit manure, straw and leaves, grass clippings, kitchen scraps (no meat or dairy products),etc. More brown (leaves) than green (manure/fresh cut grass) at about a 3:1 ratio. That very thing when completely composted is the best thing I can do for my garden. I apply it on top of the soil as a mulch and every time it rains or I water the garden those minerals work their way down to the plants roots. The organisms in the soil also continue to dreak down the compost and make it even better as they turn it into humus. And if compost is good, humus is better (Crow Miller), Earth worm castings is even better than the compost if you are interested in taking it a step farther.

Best wishes,
Homesteading Dad

[lateaprildawn]

I couldnt agree more about the importance of the soil in seed starting.

My garden soil is very good but not quite good enough for seeds.
I was being a tight wad this year and instead of buying even an average seed compost I went for a knock down super cheap brand.

After hours of sieveing the chunks of bark out i ended up only half of the original 120 liter sack.
The cost then worked out to the same as my usual seed compost.
The horrid stuff formed a "crust" that stopped a lot of the seedlings coming up.
The surface of the soil went mould and green even with good ventilation.

Lesson learnt !

last autumn I collected sacks and sacks of fallen leaves from my local park, they are composting beautifully but werent quite ready to be used as seed compost this year. They should be lovely for next year though mixed with a little pearlite. So it seems to be a 2 year plan.

The other thing i have noticed is that if the soil is too fine , eg goes dusty and fine in hot weather then the seedlings seem to suffocate.

A few of you guys reccomended the book "how to grow more vegetables" by john jeavons . In it he describes soil lilke "a sponge", light and airy and able to hold water.

So its a bit like baking a cake,

;D you follow the recipie but sometimes it just goes flat ;D

Best wishes,
April

[aerontg]

Want a FAIL PROOF method of starting seeds? Stuff each pod in a seed flat with strictly compost and keep the compost moist. If the seeds are any good, and you rotate the seed flat once a day to get equal amounts of sunlight to both sides of the tray, you will get seedlings when you're supposed to get them. Forget potting soil, use just compost! I buy my compost by the truckload from a horsefarm for $15. The lady I bought the compost from said that the compost only comes from the baby horses there, and those horses are rarely vaccinated. She said that anything that might have been in the manure (vaccinations) would have been cooked by the composting. In my garden, I prefer variety over quantity. I use lots of different types of seeds of pumpkins, tomatoes, beans, peas, etc. In each "row" I have 10 "cells", with each cell being a different type of seed. In each cell I have two "rows" for the seeds, with one row using just chopped up dirt and small amounts of compost, and the other row using just compost. Guess which row has the best germination? :D

Aeron

[aerontg]

Aprildawn, skip the pearlite. Yes, it helps to make the soil fluffier and helps with moisture retention. It's a waste of money, though. If you just used decomposed leaves and manure, you should be fine. My soil is very clay'ish and compost alone has done wonders for me!

Aeron :D

[msta999]

I found out what the problem was. My seeds just were not getting warm enough. I put tinfoil on top of the lamp I am using to start my seeds and that makes the heat from the 200 watt bulb go down on the seed starter beds and walla! My seads are growing like wild. The corn is hitting over an inch and the cucumbers are too. My tomato seads are comming up good. I think I'll let them all get to atleast 6 inches maybe more before I plant them outside.

[msta999]

The tomato plants I bought, when I planted them, I just left them in the biodegradable containers. Now they look like they are starting to wilt a little, even though we just had a good rain fall. Should I have taken them out of the containers?

[homesteadingnky]

Congrats, and thanks for the update. Another important ingredient in the equasion....heat. Sometimes we forget the simple things. It's good to be reminded! And great to hear how good they are doing.

Hard to say about your tomato plants. They will probably be ok in a few days. How long have they been in the ground? A little manure tea works great to perk up wilting plants and it's great to use when you transplant!

Homesteading Dad

[msta999]

Here I am, buying books, searching the internet and all the info I need is right here on "our" home web site.

http://www.backwoodshome.com/advice/ajo070510.html

Thank Jackie for her article on Transplanting tomatoes .

[cubcadet]

Hey msta,
I also recommend compost and HEAT! What kind of lighting are you using?Fluorescent lights work good for me. Surprisingly, they generate enough warmth for tomatoes. Other seeds like eggplant and pepper need bottom heat. Try reptile mats next time, or a NEW heating pad, like you use on your sore back. Don`t buy seeds from Costco or the seed rack at Agway. Always buy from a seedsman like Baker Creek or even Burpee. Make sure the lighting tube is right down on the soil and even touching the seedlings so they`ll not get leggy. You`ll do fine.

[msta999]

Cubcadet,
Thanks for the input.

I am using an old 200 watt standard old type bulb in a lamp with a lamp shade. I put tinfoil on top and the heat comes down on the seedlings.

I was talking to a neigbor and he said something about using ultraviolet light. Ever heard of that?

I have been putting them outside the last couple days and between that and the lamp, they seem to be doing pretty good.
I think I know why many of my seads in the garden haven't come up. The top layer of dirt is real hard. I'm thinking of getting a fork or something to stick in the dirt with some twisting to loosen the dirt up.