Germing seeds - am I doing it right????????

Hi Guys

I have germinated seeds in the past with good success and in many different ways, currently I am trying a new method and I would love to get everyone's opinion.

I have placed 3 Papaya and 3 Ice regular seeds from Nirvana in 6 jiffy cubes in a tray. The tray sits on top of a tile that has a heat pad underneath. This is all covered by a plastic dome. Basicly the same setup I use to clone.

After 3 days the one Papaya seed popped, so I thought ok this works fine. Now after a week I have not had any others pop, so I am waiting on 5 to germinate.

Is this method ok? Or is the heat pad to much for a seed. I would have thought they would like it, but now I am not sure.

In the past my most successfull method believe it or not was to put the seed in a pot and to cover the pot with cling wrap or clear wrap to keep the moisture in, normally after 14 days they all would have popped.

PLEASE HELP

TheDude0007 said:

In the past my most successfull method believe it or not was to put the seed in a pot and to cover the pot with cling wrap or clear wrap to keep the moisture in, normally after 14 days they all would have popped.

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Of course. Isn´t that what market gardeners do?

Moisture and warmth is ALL seeds need to germinate. But once up, the sprouts need light.

It is only naive kids who have never grown anything else who think you have to have a paper towel.

Spanishfly said:

It is only naive kids who have never grown anything else who think you have to have a paper towel.

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QFFT

Plants have been on this earth way longer than paper towels

Just how warm were they getting? your thought that they would like some warmth is dead on, it really does help germing and cloning and seedling root growth in all of my experiences, but if you let it get to hot you can fry them. last year i had a batch that was crazy, i fucked up and bumped my mat up to its hottest setting and didnt notice it till the next day when i checked on them, the water in the trays under the pucks and condensed on the lid was so fucking hot it burned me when i touched it but out of 20 seeds i still had 18 sprout. so i wouldnt count yours out yet. Yeah, its easiest to just toss em in the soil on the heat mat, thats my preffered method as well, after messing with the pucks for a while i decided their really wasnt any benefit to using them.

Spanishfly said:

Of course. Isn´t that what market gardeners do?

Moisture and warmth is ALL seeds need to germinate. But once up, the sprouts need light.

It is only naive kids who have never grown anything else who think you have to have a paper towel.

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I agree it is a nice method, however in my current space pots take up to much room, that is why I am trying it with the jiffy cubes. Have you got any experience of doing it this way?

darkdestruction420 said:

Just how warm were they getting? your thought that they would like some warmth is dead on, it really does help germing and cloning and seedling root growth in all of my experiences, but if you let it get to hot you can fry them. last year i had a batch that was crazy, i fucked up and bumped my mat up to its hottest setting and didnt notice it till the next day when i checked on them, the water in the trays under the pucks and condensed on the lid was so fucking hot it burned me when i touched it but out of 20 seeds i still had 18 sprout. so i wouldnt count yours out yet. Yeah, its easiest to just toss em in the soil on the heat mat, thats my preffered method as well, after messing with the pucks for a while i decided their really wasnt any benefit to using them.

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Thanks for your input dude.

They are not getting that hot. The heat mat is one that is used to heat up a rock for your pet snake Seriously. In Africa you gotta use what you can get. hahahaha As a result it has no setting switch, it is just one even temp. It is 25w and gets just hot enough, no prolems with any of my clones ever. I was just wandering if it was different for seeds. But obviously not from what you have experienced.

The only problem I had was that it took more than 30 days to arrive, so I am not sure if this has affected the seeds. After the one that popped in 3 days I think I became impatient. They still have not popped and I think it must be close on 10 days now.

In your experience how long would a seed take to pop? I have had it take about 14 days but I dont think ever any longer than that.

Its never taken me longer than 3 days to germinate a seed and this was just by putting them in soil and adding water.

I've had upto 14 days for a seed, i've read about 21 days.

i have heard of all kinds of ways to get them beans to pop.

recently i germd 3 different varieties:
1x greenhouse seeds cheese
1x greenhouse seeds super lemon haze
1x barneys farm blue cheese

this worked for me : root riot + warm dark cupboard + water = 72 hours MAX

the roots were sticking out on two of them after 72 hours and they had all sprouted (no bullshit)

no prop, no paper towel, no clingfilm and certainly no glass of water with hydrogen peroxide in (last resort)

i always see people struggling to germinate seeds on here and wonder why it is.
either i am very lucky, my method is good or the seed companies i got them from had superior genetics. (or all 3)

either way good luck with your germing

tip top toker said:

I've had upto 14 days for a seed, i've read about 21 days.

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Once had a seed take 26 days to sprout. Had given up on it.

Within 3-4 days mine normally pop through, i think the longest was a week or so.

Hi guys, sorry i'v been quiet. So much to do and so little time.

So here is what happened.

The seeds in the jiffy cubes did not pop, so I opened one up and I could see that it did pop, but then it died. I tried a few others and the same happened.

Luckely I had a backup plan. The 4 seeds I germed in pot's with clingwrap over it germed perfectly in about 4 days. I am only going to sex and then clone, so I just need 1 female of each, so I am holding thumbs. But I do still have 5 seeds left of the papaya and the ice. So if they are all male which i doubt, then I can just try again.

I am not sure what happened to the seeds in the J cubes, but I suspect that maybe the heatpad was to hectic for them. Also could just be that I did something. Anyhoo I will just stick with the tried and trusted pot method. Why change something that has a 100% success rate to my experimental results of 1 germ out of 6.

Thanks to all you guys for your comments.

tip top toker said:

I've had upto 14 days for a seed, i've read about 21 days.

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I once had a seed pop after 26 days. And it was a f***ing male !!!!

Jiffy Cubes are the problemmo

SwampFarmer said:

Jiffy Cubes are the problemmo

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I think so too. But maybe you could tell me why.....

Lol, I go straight for the biggest pot I can find, put the seed in the middle, water it a bit, and just keep the centre moist until it germinates.
The large pot forms a moisture reservoir at the bottom, and basicaly humidifies upper layers of the soil everytime it bakes in the sun. As my plants grow in I increase the amount of water I use.
I killed countless seeds trying to transfer them after the traditional germinating methods, the taproot seems to break if you just look at it too hard. Planting them without disturbance seems to give them an advantage.
Whatever you do, don't go stirring in the soil to see if its comming along...you'll break the taproot.... see point 1.

nice plant, is that cat in the background chewing on that leaf?