Monday Seedling Update

Since I've taken my LED light down, the seedlings have had to survive with just natural light. In the morning they are down in the laundry room. That window gets the morning sun well. Then around 1:30pm I move them to the dining room which gets great afternoon sun. Needless to say this is a lot of work. It worked great while the sun was shining, but for the last couple of days it has been cloudy and dreary. The seedlings are starting to stretch out a bit. Before they were nice stocky little things.

Inside I have the plants that were seeded a week ago. They have started coming up. Above is a container of flowers: Borage (lowest two blocks on the left), tihonia (lowest two blocks on the right and the whole right hand column), marigolds (twelve center blocks, only eight of which have germinated so far), and under the plastic to the far right are my three monarda blocks only one of which have come up yet. They are tiny little things. Their seed is like dust.

I also have some chard inside (not shown) and a group of 15 chili peppers that were sown two weeks ago. I drew a picture of where they all were. I do this for all my blocks since labeling them seems wrong. Usually I mark one side so I can tell which way to orient the container when comparing it to the drawing, but I forgot this time. Whoops! Now I'm not quite sure which side the cayennes are on. I'm hoping I'll be able to tell as they grow. I have them in sets of 3 cayenne, 6 serrano, 6 jalapeno. So if only there is a difference between the ones on the ends I'll be able to figure it out. So far not so much.

The peppers are growing well. One of the chili peppers didn't fit in the above container so I left it with the brassicas and lettuce outside. So far the outside one has survived, but it isn't quite as large. It is still cold outside and not yet pepper weather even under plastic.

The outside plants were all sown two weeks ago under the LED lights. Shown above bottom to top: broccoli, cabbage (one which is a tricot), chard, Chinese cabbage. They are mostly doing well now that they are seeing real light. The last couple of days of dark weather has them starting to strech again. Sigh.

I put in toothpicks to hold up the worst offender the Holland greens. One of those plants seems to be doing OK, but this one has fallen over again amidst the Tatsoi and Fun Jen. It was growing between the LED lights which are spaced 3/4" apart. If it was directly under it would have been fine, but because it grew up between, it just is too leggy. I'll plant it anyway, but I'll plant it deep. Not yet however as it still needs a couple of weeks of growing like the rest of these plants.

Even though a few things have gotten leggy, I've been pretty happy with how things are going. There have been no major disasters. No tripping on the stairs. No pots upturned. No damping off. Currently I'm spraying the inside seedlings every day with chamomile tea and that seems to be doing the trick. The blocks are holding together better now that I'm treating them well. I put boards under their containers so when they get moved they don't tip over. I just need a real light for them. I'm going to buy a shop light soon. The buds are swelling on the trees and as soon as they leaf out, no more sun in the laundry room. Time is ticking. I need to get to the store.