Is It My Lights Or Something Else?

twodaend 4/15/2013, 11:32 am

This is my first year starting seeds indoors and I've had mixed results. My peas are doing great, but everything is is grown very slow. Mostly they still have their true leaves and not much growth in nearly a month. i started all of my seeds in a Jiffy Seed Starter Kit with a heat mat below. Once germination started, I moved the started seeds under my lights.

I have 3 shop lights each with a daylight and a natural light bulb. My lights have been within 2 -3 inches of the tops since day one, but things like spinach, turnip, mustard, brocolli, etc have been very slow growing. My peas have shot up and I have to adjust their light higher almot daily. Over the last 2 days, I have begun to put my trays outside to see if some real sunlight will jump start them again, but with the weather, this will be a bit tricky over the next week.

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**camprn** 4/15/2013, 12:09 pm

Give them some weak liquid plant food, that should perk them up a bit. You didn't mention it, but what is the inside temperature? How far away from the lights are your plants?

I cannot see your photos when I am at work so my apologies if this is redundant.

twodaend 4/15/2013, 12:19 pm

They are about 2 - 3 inches from the lights. The seedlings are in my basement so the temp is about 60 - 65 degrees or so. When they where on the heat mat, I had it set for 70 degrees for germination.

I'll try adding a little weak liquid plant food to see how that helps.

R&R 1011 4/15/2013, 12:39 pm

Your plants look like they have some yellow leaves? Do they?

Are you leaving your lights on long enough? Turning your light off for 8 hrs? Over or under watering? How often are you watering them? Hopefully, someone can comment on whether your light bulbs are strong enough. Your plants are definitely look a bit small. Im comparing my 3.5 week old broccoli pic to yours and my broccoli was growing its first true leaves at 3.5 weeks.

Im definitely no expert. This is my 2nd year growing from seed/ 1st year being successful. Gardening is definitely trial and error.

Edit to add that my avatar pic is my broccoli at 2 weeks old.

twodaend 4/15/2013, 1:04 pm

Yea, a few leaves are yellow. I think I overwatered a few days ago, thinking I was not keeping them moist enough to grow. I have my lights on for 16 hrs a day and I recently put a small fan on the same timer.

Your 2 week old broccoli looks better than my month old broccoli.

plantoid 4/15/2013, 4:10 pm

Peas love natural day light and a nice damp pot of MM.
Even the best of artificial day light lamps will produce only a fraction ( around 1/8 th )of the UV and infra red light you get on an overcast day .

Harden them off on the porch for tow or thre days with them slightly dry , put them out so long as it is not frosty bring them in before it gets cold 45 to 50 OF is good kep them out of string sun and drying winds because those fibre pots act like wicks and will draw all the moisture out the MM , ( perhaps slip the who,e pot in a plastic pot as a sleeve ? ).

It's best to plant them out the pots and try to do it on a day when the temp is above 45 oF as they are reasonably hardy .
They will take a slight frosting for a few hours so the best thing is to cover them with a fleece overnight till you get to your average last frost day .

bwaynef 4/15/2013, 10:24 pm

I see you're using peat pots. I've noticed folks complaining that their plants' growth seems to be stunted when planted in them. I haven't noticed that from planting in the past, but I did notice that the plants that were planted in the garden that I didn't take out of the cup were a lot slower to establish than the ones I removed from the peat pot.

Also, 6500k bulbs are ideal when starting from seeds. The warmer bulbs help to are for flowering. Its not linear, but you could certainly increase your "effective" light by swapping the warm bulbs for 6500k bulbs.

twodaend 4/16/2013, 11:08 am

bwaynef wrote:I see you're using peat pots. I've noticed folks complaining that their plants' growth seems to be stunted when planted in them. I haven't noticed that from planting in the past, but I did notice that the plants that were planted in the garden that I didn't take out of the cup were a lot slower to establish than the ones I removed from the peat pot.

Also, 6500k bulbs are ideal when starting from seeds. The warmer bulbs help to are for flowering. Its not linear, but you could certainly increase your "effective" light by swapping the warm bulbs for 6500k bulbs.

Thanks bwaynef. I was thinking about switching to all 6500k bulbs. I'm going to do that as well as maybe restart half of them to see if I notice a difference.

twodaend 4/23/2013, 10:29 am

I changed my lights to all 6500k bulbs and gave the seedlings some weak liquid plant food. It has made a difference as I do see a few new leaves coming in now. They are still a bit small, but I have noticed a slight difference. I also have put my seedlings tray outside in the sun when the temps are up which I think is helping too. I'm going to stick with what I have and see how much of a difference the new lights and food make.

Hopefully, this will be a good learning experience for next year.

R&R 1011 4/23/2013, 12:24 pm

twodaend wrote:I changed my lights to all 6500k bulbs and gave the seedlings some weak liquid plant food. It has made a difference as I do see a few new leaves coming in now. They are still a bit small, but I have noticed a slight difference. I also have put my seedlings tray outside in the sun when the temps are up which I think is helping too. I'm going to stick with what I have and see how much of a difference the new lights and food make.

Hopefully, this will be a good learning experience for next year.

Hope they perk up for you. Check out Maxicrop seaweed for fert. I started using it on my house plants and noticed a big difference.

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