Starting Seeds

ilovetoskiatalta said:

Nice I appreciate the help, I think my mistake has been keeping thing too cool. I thought the heating mat was a gimmick.

Click to expand...

I'll share. Popping seeds and then getting them to come up well was a bigger issue for me than most. I tried everything including heating mats. I now follow this protocol and I've had success rates above 90-95%. Here's what I do.

1. Soak the bean in a small cup of water for 2-3 hours. Add 1 drop of "Superthrive" to the water. Note: this is the only time I ever use Superthrive.
2. Soak at least half a folded napkin in the Superthrive water, and squeeze together so the folded napkin is equally wet.
3. Put the bean in the napkin, and place the napkin in a 1g plastic bag. Fold the bag over 2-3 times, don't close the end of the bag.
4. Put the folded bag (should be about 3" wide, and 8" long) on your cable box/stereo receiver or anything that stays warm. (I find heating mats temperature varies too much. Electric boxes just wok better for me. I then place a guitar pick or small item on the bag.
5. Check the bag for a tap root after 24 hours, and then check every 3-6 hours until you see the tap root.
6. Wait until the tap root is about 1/2 inch long, then plant close to the surface with tap root down.

If I just follow those rules, I've had no more issues.

Good luck!

My indoor grow style is no-till soil, so I just plant my seeds like any other seed straight in the soil where they will spend their lives. As long as I remember to keep the top of the soil damp where I planted them for a few days, gemination is never an issue. That way I don't have to worry about screwing around with tiny seedlings, disturbing the soil too much from transplanting, and from the time they first sprout their roots can begin to form all those "permanent" fungal associations. Now I view transplanting as an unnecessary step in my setup.

I soak overnight and then into a solo of moist coco, put somewhere that is room temp or greater.

I had issues with damping off when just put in medium and watered, it took longer to sprout and seemed to need a moister medium that allowed pathogens to take hold. I had some luck with applying fungicide when sprouting to keep stuff at bay and get them past that past that vulnerable stage.

@HGCC for some reason I had a lot of damping off issues with peat pellets. I've had a loss rate greater than 10% before, so I stopped using them and never looked back. The way I help prevent damping off in my soil is by stopping all watering the second I notice the appearance of the stem emerging. By the time the stem straightens and pulls the seed coat out of the soil, the top of the soil is already pretty dry. The root of the seed grows downward first and reaches a depth that will keep the plant alive even at that early stage.

However I couldn't do this with peat pellets. If you let them dry on top, they're just as dry in the middle and on the bottom too and your tiny plant will be dead! So they have to be kept moist throughout until transplanting time. It's a perfect recipe for fungi that might want to ruin your grow plans. Did I mention I hate peat pellets yet? I won't even get into that "netting" that is made out of something that seems engineered to last 1 million years.

Lol, yeah those gave me all kinds of trouble. Seemed like they would have been great, but not so much.

So i found a seed on the floor in my basement. I almost stepped on it. Every once in a whileIi find a seed while trimming NBD. It was dark and mature. I put it a shot glass(my buddy explained his method). I soaked it for 2 days and it popped. It then went to the paper towel in a pint plastic container from a deli. It almost shed its shell on its own. I put in soil mix that this lady makes for seed starting in a condiment container and put near the kitchen sink window. I will put it in a solo cup in a few days. The only reason I am doing this was because I saw the seed and i almost fell not to step on it...so fuck it because it all starts with a seed.

I grow in coco. Always just put the seed in the coco and water. 100% success rate. Minus few mutants here and there

this is one of my many off the wall experiments,
using a Job Crystal rolling paper (totally clear rolling paper) to act as a sprout/sow tube.
I misted the paper, placed the seeds in the crease and rolled it up loosely leaving a little room.
I put some wax paper to prevent it from sticking to the dish if it starts to decompose, then into a ziploc. Folding it over eliminates the easy view a bit, but I'll leave it like that for the first day to keep the tube moist.
the object is to easily see of course and after germination to cut just above the shell and just below the tip of the root and plant that directly in the soil without disturbing delicate tap roots.

xtsho said:

Good seeds straight to soil. Water them in. Done.

It's a simple as that. There is no magic. A good seed will grow.

Click to expand...

Yep, get soil moist and warm a couple days ahead of planting seeds.simple and effective.

my above experiment is flop. No sprouts. The water never left the inside of the paper tube and I think they didn't get any air.

After rethinking this cutting a small piece of paper towel would accomplish the same thing I was attempting.

ilovetoskiatalta said:

I want to start a thread on different seed starting techniques. Starting seeds is my biggest challenge.
Hoping to see how others have had success. This thread is basically about making sure I don't fuck up @BobBitchen Slymer seeds(Maybe this will turn into a journal).
@Mohican @ttystikk @Bubby'sndalab @ColoradoHighGrower @TintEastwood @jigfresh any help with technique is appreciated.
I have used the paper towel method, glass of water, directly in soil, in coco.
I have read about a diluted H2O2 solution to clean soften seeds. Also wondering about heating mats.
I am not into gimmicks, most successful method has been paper towel into soil starter mini six trays in a humidity dome.
Thanks,
Alta

Click to expand...

24hrs soak in water then paper towel for at least 2 days before roots pop. Also, for those harder shells place seed in between fine sand paper

Here's my seed saver. I had some heat mats that were too hot, so I now do this. I had a mushroom grow and some old seeds. I put paper towel on a foam plate, arrange the seeds on it, cover with paper towel, mist thoroughly, dab up excess moisture with paper towel, cover this with a smaller plastic dish {I use the tops from cool whip or cottage cheese}, Now place on top of mushroom box and cover lightly with a cover or towel. Done. A friend does similar but uses his aquarium for his base.
The mushroom box is merely 2 matching 4 gallon plastic totes. Fill the first 25% with water, add a small fish tank heater set at 80F, set the second tote inside the first, and there is the mushroom incubator. When not shroomin' you can set the sprouter inside the second tote.
The aquarium heater keeps temps damn near exact. Grow on...