Why my seeds didn't sprout ?

Hi there guys, so this is the situation:

I made a seedling house of wood with a plastic cover. I thought they were going to be in a perfect environment and therefore they will open the cotyledons in 4-5 days as last seeds opened them at 4 to 7 days. The temps in the box were 17.5 to 26 and the RH 58% to 81%. I plant them directly in jiffy pellets from day 1 as always.

I was so looking forward to see them grow happy but it didn't happen. Instead, out of 6 seeds, one did open the cotyledons at day 6, two more did it today at day 10 and there are three more that haven't done it yet.

The seeds are mine, I breede them this summer, so they are around 3 months old and I choose the better looking seeds.

Oh! and still have the last 3 that will hopefully do it at day 13 to 15!!

Any ideas why did they take that long to pop out ?? I thought they would love the box but I must be missing something here.

seeds dont need to much other then water but heat and darkness helps

i always use a heating pad and i normally do them under my flouresent tube although lights are not needed until seeds break soil

i normally start by throwing them into the bottom one inch of a plastic beer cup i put them in the folded paper towel then completly cover them with water when done i put on heating pad and cover with a upside down cup for darkness

the next day if split i put them itnto a cup with wetted starter soil and holes in bottom- about 1/4 in down, point downward-i cover with a baggie and a bubberband-till seed breaks soil -then i remove baggie

if seed is not split the next day i pour off excess water holding on sid til drip stops then i put back on heating pad untill split and proceed

it seems that it only needs water-- could even be tap thats what i use
humidity--water and heat will provide if keep covered but they do like
heat--heating pad set at about 80 works fine ive heard of people putting them on cable boxes,water heaters, and top of frig just a little heat helps

after about a week i get rough i feel as though nothing to lose i start useing sand paper and doing what is called scarcification picking parts of shell off, and splitting with a blade -carful not to injure the embrio or puncture inside

the last step often brings my numbers up

good luck

Wow many thanks for that reply. Do you know how long do they usually take to open the cotyledons ?

I'll be running some test during the next days/weeks to see if I can find out why is this happening. Maybe it's just genetics but it's weird that just one broke ground at day 6 and all the others are taking more than 10 days.

On my test I'm planning on putting some inside the growing box, some outside (just anywhere in the room) and some more in the seedling box I made. May also try to put them in wet paper and other germinating techniques. We'll see.

Well, any ideas about why could that happened are still very welcome and if anybody has any suggestion for my test let me know because I'll be willing to try, and now is the time.

I use a heating pad in a dome, under 1 T5. They break ground in 3 days.. Almost %100 germ rate..

Thanks for the reply Tym. Then it could be because of the light because I didn't use any, I'll put some under one CLF during the test instead of using the grow box, I haven't got much space in the grow box anyway so it'll be better

I would just like to add that seedlings don't need high humidity like clones do, and high humidity can be bad for seedlings. They don't need a dome and they don't need to be covered. A soggy medium or high humidity can lead to damping off, a fungal infection in which the seedling either doesn't emerge from the seed or shortly thereafter it falls over at the soil line. The ideal relative humidity for seedlings is around 40%.

Also, the temperatures are best when kept as constant as possible. Jiffy pellets/peat pucks are made of sphagnum peat moss, which is quite acidic and needs lime to balance out the pH. Some brands are pH balanced and some are not.

i doubt it has anything to do with the light. it might have jus tbeen an old/dud seed. light only help create heat it has nothing to do with the germination process

I agree with nullis...

The dome and high humidity is probably with gave you slow growth

I put my seeds on a warm damp paper towel. Put that in a baggie,then I stick them in my bed covers. Sleep with them all nice and warm and three days later all 9 sprouted. WARMTH for seedlings. Lots and lots of it.

ok lets do a ckecklist 1. fresh seeds=yes 2.genetics say germ by day 7=yes 3.invironment and medium suitable=yes 4.human fingers fishing around in jiffy disturbing the delicate germinating seed= YES
wonder what caused it?

Nullis said:

I would just like to add that seedlings don't need high humidity like clones do, and high humidity can be bad for seedlings. They don't need a dome and they don't need to be covered. A soggy medium or high humidity can lead to damping off, a fungal infection in which the seedling either doesn't emerge from the seed or shortly thereafter it falls over at the soil line. The ideal relative humidity for seedlings is around 40%.

Also, the temperatures are best when kept as constant as possible. Jiffy pellets/peat pucks are made of sphagnum peat moss, which is quite acidic and needs lime to balance out the pH. Some brands are pH balanced and some are not.

Click to expand...

Yes, humidity could be a problem, I checked my ref. guide and it says 50-60% humidity so I may have overdo it a little Will definitely have this one into account but will be dificult to measure it in the test coz I've got only one hygrometer. I'll try my best anyway

wannaquickee said:

i doubt it has anything to do with the light. it might have jus tbeen an old/dud seed. light only help create heat it has nothing to do with the germination process

Click to expand...

Well, actually the light could "indirectly" reduce the humidity and therefore totally affect the germination process even if they don't use the light as they are underground

Nunotmp said:

I agree with nullis...

The dome and high humidity is probably with gave you slow growth

Click to expand...

Yes, that may be it, probably a bulb or even the box opened would have helped.

princesshigh said:

I put my seeds on a warm damp paper towel. Put that in a baggie,then I stick them in my bed covers. Sleep with them all nice and warm and three days later all 9 sprouted. WARMTH for seedlings. Lots and lots of it.

Click to expand...

That's really cool dude! never slept with my seeds but it sounds great for sure, may try it some time

*BUDS said:

ok lets do a ckecklist 1. fresh seeds=yes 2.genetics say germ by day 7=yes 3.invironment and medium suitable=yes 4.human fingers fishing around in jiffy disturbing the delicate germinating seed= YES
wonder what caused it?

Click to expand...

haha, yea, I'm totally guilty of disturbing them but it was actually after day 6 when I did that so thinking about it as a kind of punishment for not sprouting (even if it was my fault for not giving the right humidity/light or whatever). Will probably be a humidity/light problem, will see in the test if I'm able to make it happen

Well, so about the seeds, today is day 11 and 5 of them already opened the cotyledons, just one left which I can already see her breaking ground, she will probably show me her leaves tomorrow but she will die as I haven't got space for all of them .

It looks like they accelerate the process a little bit since I opened the plastic cover but wouldn't bet on it.

Anyway, will try to put some seeds in germination mode today or tomorrow to see how they sprout faster. I have got only until the 31 to run this test and at the 31 I'll have to get rid of all of them. I'm thinking of putting 2 seeds in the box, 2 outside, 2 under a light and not sure what else and see what happens.

Only 14 days to run this test so I'll try to plan it today/tomorrow and start doing it also tomorrow the latest if any of you have any suggestions let me know.

Thanks to all for your replies

Well, in case anybody is interested, I'm gonna run a little experiment with 21 seeds to see what happens

I'll be posting the information here: https://www.rollitup.org/grow-journals/384315-pc-grow-12-12-fs.html