Planted these directly into the medium in propagation tray, no lid. It’s down on the cold tile so I have a SunBeam heating pad under there for bottom warmth and it should evaporate that water in the tray nicely. Just plain top soil, finely ground with my fingers, it is light and completely crushed to allow for the roots to penetrate and air flow. literally sprinkled it into the 3” square pots. Actually about 1 inch down is a mix of about 60/40 top soil and perlite. top inch is pure top soil just to retain the moisture well for germination. gently stuck the seeds in about 1 cm and poked them down with a chopstick. sprinkled soil on top to cover. Spray bottle misting for water. pH neutral tap water from decanter resting for several days. twice a day, not soaking it too much. Cya in 4-10 days.
Just two seeds. these baby girls will be going outside in about 2 months or so.
The third is actually a free Super Lemon Haze from Canuk so this should be a solid case of top shelf genetics vs. some of the cheapest.
EDIT:
I shouldn’t act like I know anything about genetics. According to True North’s reviews, Canuk has the bomb Super Lemon Haze. So stoked that this free seed germinated. I also read here that someone said Canuk just redistributes wholesale Spanish seeds. As in they are not an actual breeder as much as just a brand of imported Spanish seeds. Not sure if that’s true or not.
It’s a 1-6 scale… It was actually so cold on my basement tiles that I moved it up to the counter top and cranked it to 6. I have an infrared digital thermometer that reads about 100 F right on the pad… by the time it induces through the tray full of water and up the pots I think that should be a decent base temp, maybe not enough even. here’s the readings of the heating pad, the tray, and the top of the soil. It needs time so I’ll check again tomorrow.
So just about 4.5 hours later and we can see the temps have gone right up. I like this condition. maybe reading a little warmer right up top would be perfect. I know ideal germ temps are 75-85. Pretty darn close with this range of temps right now. I’m going to try to maximize air flow with the lid off and just hit it with the spray bottle 2-3 times a day. It’s actually a very fine misting spray bottle, it was from the Costco three pack of lenses cleaner, I just cleaned it and rinsed it with apple cider vinegar and then filled it with my decanter tap water.
Well the heater at 6 and no dome seems to be running too cool down in my basement. Temp also varys a lot between night and day and when the heater comes on. I’m settling on level 3 on the heater pad and lid/dome closed. I’ll be opening it a few times a day to monitor moisture in the soil.
That put the base of the tray in the high 90s, and the top of the tray at 77… when I cracked open the lid and measure the soil surface at the top of the pot it comes out high 70s as well but I think it must run warmer with the lid shut as it probably cools almost instantly when opened.
So now I just have to be patient and wait. I’ll update watering frequency… I think with lid on it’ll be less than twice a day.
Well after messing around the with the settings, water amount within the dome, and amount of lid gap/totally closed, I realized the best settings are actually running it on level 1 with the lid cracked open quite a bit.
When I lift it just enough to quickly get a reading on the top of the soil where the seeds are planted, it starts right around 81 and quickly drops to about 78 within seconds. So I assume when closed it gets a bit warmer than even that reading. In other words, it’s all you can do to keep this thing under 85 on level 1 with the lid on but cracked open. I might have run it a little warm for a bit before realizing that…
This is a drug store heating pad from shoppers drug mart. It was about 60 bucks or so. there’s one there for 30 there too i think. We just had this one already and I thought it would work good for this job too.
Anyway, for these smaller propagation trays level 1 is plenty warm! lid shut tight would probably run closer to 90, lid cracked seems right around 80-85 with air flow too. So this should work well. I’m only needing to water about once every 24 hours I think.
I would ditch the heating pad I find if the dome gets to hot and wet the plant won’t grow properly. If your dome is that moist I’d think it might be running to much heat. 68-78 temps plants can thrive. Have you tried no heating pad yet ? If you continue to use the pad I’d wipe down the dome once a day.
Ok thanks for the advice. I’m gonna ditch the dome and just keep misting. The heating pad underneath with no lid should be good though. It would easily go lower than 67 without it. we just had 10 cm of snow today! Kitchener, Ontario, Canada.
So at this point I will just continue to water frequently… Just did now. Will again around 5:00 am tmrw and then again around 5 pm. I think I should be good to continue watering every 12 hours with the spray bottle. No dome and heater on lvl 1.
EDIT: I brushed away a little soil and is seems all three seeds have germinated. I hardly even buried them so yeah I could have been patient and probably seen them pop up but I also feel like this is actually beneficially for air flow as long as you don’t rough them up and do damage. So hopefully they’re all standing up tomorrow.
Don’t have a very good view of the other two without disturbing them but what I’m seeing looks like germinated seedage. So as per Mongobongo’s advice I have ditched the heating pad. I think that’s something that might have helped in the first 48 hours to get that ideal mix of dark, warm, moist to start the process. After 48 hours it probably does nothing but harm, even in a cooler room. The seeds popped so now they want air and light more than heat and dark, right? Roots even like cooler temperatures later on, I believe, so would the early tap root not also probably benefit more being 60-65 instead of say 75-85* F. (which is ideal for germination but maybe not early root growth in the first 24-48 hrs after the tap root has successfully emerged, that’s when germination is over.)
Anyway, they are all exposed to the air and light now, no heating pad, and getting water every 12 hours by misting/spray bottle.
I can see the Super Lemon Haze has popped but I don’t know if it’s rooted, seems to be ok. And the Apollo’s look good. I helped the seed shell off that other one, it was totally detached just hanging on like a helmet.
I successfully helped off the thick seed shell from the Super Lemon Haze last night. Saw it doing something this morning so I misted it again before work. Came home and definitely saw a hint of green but it was like fused shut cotyledons that should have be opened by then. Tried to gently help open… and realized a clear membrane from the inside of the seed was still there. Got that off and they visibly sprung open. So 3 outta 3 and we are on our way with the seedlings. They are now living with a Bag seed Papaya a little over a month old.
Got the Papaya to smoke… was nice but it had seeds! So that why that’s there. Only got one outta 7 seeds to germinate because I tried “heated paper towel germination” in a metal dish with way too much heat… I don’t even know how this one survived I basically used a lamp and had the dish just sitting in the lamp shade and basically steamed the seeds so this must be a good one.
Lighting:
19W FEIT Led Grow Light + 23W Phillips cool white CFL
Temp reading about max of 70* F in the back of the shelf now.
Premier Top Soil 60/40 with perlite. About a half inch of 100% Top soil on top (where the seeds were planted).
Watering every 24 hours and misting the seedlings 2-3 times a day. Almost time to ease off and let the medium dry out more. Rotating the pots as they lean over toward the CFL… I know it’s not ideal but they’re co-living with the other plant in a hack job shelf for now - so good enough.
My runty little Canuk Super Lemon Haze seems to be pulling through! I have high hopes for that thing.
No watering. Just letting them dry right out. That will be 72 hours between watering before work tomorrow morning. I’ll probably water then if the soil looks totally dry on top.
I moved the plants closer to the CFL so they stopped stretching for it. interesting that even at 6” from the 19 W LED they still stretched toward the CFL. Probably most of all since they weren’t close enough to the CFL. So I just got them about 2-3 inches from the CLF now. Also moved my computer fan so it gives the lightest possible breeze. I just aggressively misted them, soaking the soil. It was 3 and a half days and the soil felt totally dry. Next time I water I’ll just use a regular watering can till i see run off. They are just vibrating in the mist.
I finally cleaned up my shelf so I can finally just leave these poor babies alone and let them grow. They are now under 2 FEIT 19W LED growlights. About 71 degrees F. 12V computer fan blowing. I’ll wait at least another day or two and then give them their first full watering with a watering can.
The plan is to veg these until about middle of May and then transplant into… at least 3 Gal pots for outdoor finish. I think I want to keep it to 3 Gals for more portability/less size… just so I can potentially bring them into the house if we get rainy/cold days/weeks in sept/oct. I think the Super lemon Haze is a longer flowering period and the local report on the Apollo 11 2.0 is that it’s likely longer than 6-8 weeks… The Papaya should be the fastest. But either way, I want the flexibility to bring them into the garage with a fan&dehumidifier.
Waited 4 days there for the soil to dry right out, gave a little foliar mist once in between as my humidity is quite low. But the temperature and air flow are good. in the mid-high 70’s. about 23-24 *C… I put a little worm castings and kelp meal on top of the soil and watered well with watering can last night. Here’s the exactly two week old seedlings. And my son’s brocolli and kale seedlings photobombing too!!! .
Last watering was three days ago and the pots are bone dry… Looks like I over watered!!! again…! hopefully this new growth comes in ok. I can’t imagine a small layer of (1 cup of worm casting & a 1/8 tsp pinch of kelp meal), layered only about a half inch on top of these 3” square pots, would nute burn 2 week old seedlings that bad, could it?
That was probably unnecessary but i think it was the amount of water I put through the that was the bigger issue. Maybe just too much water and could have really even used another day or to two before they actually wanted water.
I haven’t touched them for at least two days now. they feel totally dry when picked up. I’m scared to water again. I have shamed these seeds with my amateur gardening skills… shame on me.
Well out of fear of the kelp meal in the top dress being part or all of the problem I decided to water the tray this time from beneath as that should help avoid activating the top dressing nutrients with the watering can. I just filled this tray (the top of a jiffy root propagation dome) with less than half an inch of decantered tap water… It absorbed into the soil quickly. Hopefully I will have a more positive update soon.
Forgot to check pH. My tap water must be quite alkaline because that mix is just like 60/40 top soil and perlite. Unless that perlite is alkaline… wow sitting way too high according to this meter.
I also forgot that the last seed I successfully grew was getting tap water that had been acidified with unfiltered organic apple cider vinegar. I decided to mix some of that up and run it through as well. I just did that and emptied out the run off out of my tray. It got the pH down from about 7.5 to 7.1… At the risk of over watering again… This was all done immediately after watering the tray from below so I just fully activated the kelp meal and worm casting top dress as well.
Lastly, I pruned off the dead and dying leaves.
Now I need to leave it alone. I may have done too much already but we shall see.
Kelp will not cause burn, the EWC may, if you’re humidity is low there is a chance to burn plants with even the right amount of nutrients, as the plant uptakes more water and nutes with it.
Looks more like watering problems to me.
I don’t trust those multi meters have you tested it in a known PH solution.
I find if the dome gets to hot and wet the plant won’t grow properly. If your dome is that moist I’d think it might be running to much heat. 68-78 temps plants can thrive. Have you tried no heating pad yet ? If you continue to use the pad I’d wipe down the dome once a day.
