On Feb 24, 6:09 am, "Grave Yard Guy" wrote:
Last year I decided to start my own seeds indoors. I wasn't always finding
the varieties of seedlings I wanted at the local nurseries and I thought I
might save a few $$

I purchased 6 of the self contained little greenhouse operations, the ones
that have a black water tray, a seed tray and a clear plastic dome. Three
used the compressed peat pellets and three used square peat pots containing
a starting mixture. I planted a variety of tomatoes, cukes, zuchini,
peppers, eggplants and brussel sprouts. Each tray held 72 peat pellets or 50
peat pots. This was too many but I wanted to allow for loss from possible
damping off.

The trays were placed on glass shelving in South-Southwest windows(almost
full sun) on Feb 14. Room temperature 65-75 degrees. Everything germinated
well in 10-14 days. I placed a fan in the room to keep the air circulating.

However, within days I had 5-6 inch, spindly, white seedlings with two small
leaves at the top of each plant. They would lean towards the sunlight and
when I would gently turn the trays, they would break or become entangled
with the other spindly plants. I did end up losing almost half of them by
planting time in May. It wasn't from the anticipated damping off. It was
through breakage.

Any advice from the experienced seed starters? A friend suggested that I
shouldn't start them in full sun, but this didn't sound logical to me and he
couldn't remember why you shouldn't do it.

Perhaps your friend is referring to hardening off. Seedling started
indoors should not be planted in full sun until it had a chance to get
used to outdoor light. If you plant one in direct sun right out of
the house it can be killed by the strong light.