Seedlings / Greenhouse

I know I am a bit early here, but trying to plan ahead!

I am going to try a raise plants from seed this year and have invested in a heated propergator, but due to money constraints a basic small one was all I could get (hence the planning)

I intend to start them off in the propegator then when they come through move them into my greenhouse (natural light in our house is very poor so my previous attempts have ended up with "leggy" seedlings). My new greenhouse ) well my dad's old one that is, should be sited by end February / start march. It has had the glass replaced with greenhouse plastic (child friendly is a must at our house!).

If I start the first lot of seedlings off mid / late march - will they be ok to move out to the (unheated) greenhouse straight away so batch number two can go in the propergator and so on and so on.

In an ideal world I would keep them in the house, but as I said the light is poor & I really don't have that much room for them in here. What would you guys sugest? Is there a better route that I am missing

 

I raise seedlings on my sitting room window as it is south facing, but lack of room forces me to be inventive. I have had some success with them at the back of my back garden-also south facing. I use coir pots covered in sandwich bags ( or to be more truthful I have been known to accidentally on purpose snaffle extra veg bags from supermarkets for the same purpose). Water the compost before sowing seed. Use an elastic band to attach them to the pot then slip a bendy straw under them and blow the bag so it is like a balloon. It won`t stay inflated but you can always top it up from time to time.


It is a common and understandable mistake to think gardening needs to involve a great deal of expense and effort-imagination and trust in nature makes up for a very great deal.

I hope this helps.

 

Thanks Clair - you come to my aid once again - can I have you on speed dial? :lol:

Did try something similar once but no matter what I do they always seem to grow about 4" long with just one set of leaves. Then they go all floppy (my ace gardening lingo there).

The kitchen & the front room are the only "bright" windows, but the front room is french doors which we open up, and DH hates tripping over my "weeds" his words

Will they be ok to move them straight out into the greenhouse? My other option is put them in the kitchen (not in the window though), but would that not make them streach for the light anyway?

 

Hi digger - I can't say that I know the answer, because I have only just got a greenhouse myself. But I would think so. You shouldn't get any frost inside a greenhouse in mid March. Perhaps the worst that could happen is that it is still cold and they don't grow very much.

It will depend on what you are growing. Hardy flowers, perennials and annuals, should be OK. I would leave the tender plants to a bit later. I don't know anything about veg. With a propogator that takes one large seed tray, I would always grow at least 4 different types of seed in it at one time - and you can do more. I use half size trays and always split them into two with a big plastic label horizontally across the centre,on edge. You could sow into small square pots of compost and get anything up to 15 pots in a propogator.

Its always worth experimenting and I would get a max/min thermometer for the greenhouse so that you know what is going on. I always only sow part of a packet of seed at any one time, so I have some left over if I have a disaster.

 

Thanks Peter - I like the small pot idea, that is one I will deffo try. Brought some of those today from the garden centre just cuz they were on offer! Now I have a use for them (yah!)

 

I grow my seeds in small pots (their ratio of width:depth is less "deep" than normal pots) in plastic bags. Fill pots, firm gentle (I use the bottom of another pot the same size), sow season spar$ely on the surface and sift a little compost over the top. Bigger seeds can be pushed into the surface with a pencil. Label them! you won't remember which is which ...

I pay attention to the temperature for germination on the packet, and those that like it hot go in the airing cupboard, the rest go in a gravel tray on top of the fridge - so I can easily get them down to inspect each day. Watch out for any that are very fine - they are hard to see through the bags and can get leggy before you realise it.

I water about once every three months - take pots out of bags, soak in a bowl of water. Of course everything you are growing will probably germinate in a few days, but I've also got things that want 6 - 12 months, or more ... they don't need water other than that until they germinate.

Once germinated move the the bags to a well light area, that it still "warm". Open the bags a bit - an hour or so per day at first, but eventually the bags can come off. For some crops that will only be a couple of days, other things take quite a while to get beyond the two-leaf stage. When they are big enough to handle prick them out into individual pots or trays and grown them on. They are still going to want some warmth - putting them straight in a cold greenhouse in March is growing to slow them right down, or kill them. I use once of those mini plastic-sheet 3-shelf "greenhouses" inside my conservatory, with a light bulb in the bottom to keep it warm during the night.

I used to grow two-types-per-tray (like Peter) but I found pricking out a nuisance when one lot germinated more quickly than the other and the slow ones got disturbed, so now use pots instead.

Keep a record of Sown / germinated / pricked out / planted out / first harvest / last harvest. (Planted/Last harvest will help you planning the plot next year)

For things that take a long timer before they can be pricked out (see your notes from last year :D) put some vermiculite on top of the soil - otherwise it tends to get a green mushy mould on the top

 

Kristen is quite right about the danger of putting seedlings straight into a cold greenhouse after the warm of your own house. I should have mentioned that any plants grown in the warm need to be hardened off before putting them in the cold. Hardening them off means getting them slowly aclimatised. This is usually done by putting them out during the day, and bringing them back at night. What happens is the plants are encouraged to grow a protective outer layer of woody type cells, that help to insulate them from the cold.

 

What I would suggest to you is when they have germinated to move them to the lowest shelf in the g/house this should stop them getting as leggy as you have previously experienced as you are reducing the light from above,which encouredges them to go for the light

 

For tender stuff, like toms, peppers, half hardy annual flowers etc I sow in the propagator, and once they are up I move them to the house at night and to the greenhouse during the day. This seems to work fine.
If the packet says to sow at around 10 - 15 degree temperature, I don't use the propagator but leave on the windowsill in the house.

For hardy stuff at that time of year you should get away with sowing and then leaving them in the greenhouse, however if the night time temp looks like dropping below 0 you could cover them in fleece.
Good luck

 

It should be two pairs of leaves John

 

I usually bury up to the base of the seed leaves, it makes the seedling stable. If you pot on again and they are still leggy, and providing the seed leaves have dropped off, you can bury them again to just under the first pair of leaves leaving a short stem. If you bury any leaves under the soil it can cause rotting.

 

I bury mine up to the first pair of leaves leaving a bit of a stem approx a cm or so.

Perhaps that isn`t horticulturally correct-I don`t know but it does me very well.

 

In addition to the good advice here and I don't need to add any, you migt do well to buy a horticultural fungicide such as Chesunt Compound as damping off is something to avoid as it can be devastating overnight.

Covering seed with vermiculite gives a more sterile environment for better germination.