"pelirojaroja" wrote:

How long did you soak? I will be trying it soon, myself, and would
appreciate knowing.

Thanks!

Most of them 16+ hours, a few longer, a few as little as 12 hours.
Basically I popualted the tray during the evening and planted them the
next afternoon. I had some leftover lettuce seed in one cube that sat
for two+ days and they all sprouted roots...so you don't want them to
sit that long. I did keep them room temperature while soaking. I
used two ice cube trays, with a legend keeping track of what was in
each cube. After a few hours I stirred the seeds gently and many
stopped floating... a good thing, absorbing water, getting heavier. By
the next days almost everyone had stopped floating. Since some seeds
were so tiny I used an eyedropper to suck up a few seeds with some
water and squirt them to their planting spot. I was seeding very few
and not doing large rows of seeding. Once wet they stick to fingers as
does the dirt at planting so the eyedropper is a good way to go.


I read a thread somewhere on using a weak chamomille or other tea
solution. You make a cup of tea, throw it out, them reuse the same tea
bag to make a second weaker cup. You then add that to 2qt of water. I
don't really know if tea made any difference, but I think soaking did
for most.


Tuesday afternoon will be the 14-day mark for the first plantings. I'm
hoping to see a few more sprouts from the slower germinators. Soaking
may not benefit all seeds equally or speed germination dramatically.
Of my bachelor buttons only 1 of 5 seeds seem to have grown (unless
that one seedling is actually a stray from something else!). I would
make a list of what you soak and try to track when they break ground.
I'm wondering if it hurt the violas or petunias. Niether germinated.
Sunday or monday I will probably start a new set of each indoors or
jsut give in and get ordinary varieties from the nursery. The lack of
sun for the last week+ is probably a cause as well.

DiGiTAL_ViNYL (no email)