I started my toms and sweet peppers off from seed a couple of weeks back - they are turning into little monsters! Very good growth! I am not sure how big they will get before the time comes to plant them! As I couldn't write at the time (broken arm) I have just done pot luck this year: sowed a few beefsteaks, a few salad, a couple of greens and some cherry types, and everything seems to have come up so I guess I will have a little of each!
I had a stroke of genius too for the peppers: i put them quite near the radiator in a plastic bag and once I saw the seedling tips emerge I quickly put them out on a tray in the light, and they have come on really well.
Anyone else's off to a good start?
Yes and no - chilies are doing OK as I went early but I have yet to get most of my toms on - in fact that's tonight's job if my bags of compost aren't frozen solid. Cabbages etc are soooo slow and greens are looking leggy. Onions and leek have not moved a mm in a month.
Quote from: BarriedaleNick on March 25, 2013, 16:35:17
Onions and leek have not moved a mm in a month.
Ditto!
Got a few tommies up, but chillis arent doing too well - my bhut jolokia havent shown at all which is disappointing :crybaby2: Im not even trying to sow anything else until the threat of winter is over for for fear of 'em going leggy and the ground not being warm enough for transplanting.
**checks calendar** It is nearly April, right???!! :tongue3:
Chilli and sweet peppers doing well. Now on a window sill and need to buy some kitchen foil to surround them so reflects the light. Tomato's doing well also. Have decided to grow at least 1 variety of plant from my collection, to see which ones grow/taste best. 30 varieties in all!!! :tongue3: Also need to foil these. Next week or so will pot on.
30 tomatoes potted on already and 6 more waiting. Lots of chillies coming through and needing potting on in the next few days. PSB desperate to go out or be potted on and Christmas basil, summer savoury, lupins and sweet peas ready for moving on since it's too perishing cold to put them outside and likely to stay that way for at least a week more.
Quote from: marcofez on March 25, 2013, 17:19:48
Now on a window sill and need to buy some kitchen foil to surround them so reflects the light.
Thanks for the foil reminder, marcofez, which might help my toms that are getting leggy. I cart them from sunny morning windows to the other side of the room for afternoon light each day- a bit tedious, especially now that I'm repotting many with many more to go. Snowed today so not getting many rays of sun at either window.
sown 8 days ago into the three hottest propagators... no sign yet...
(//)
These are a few of my tomatoes and chillies in the heated
greenhouse at home. The chillies were sown in January and
are doing ok-ish apart from the Scotch Bonnets which seem
a bit slow. I've still got loads of tomatoes to pot on, but I've
run out of space.
Nothing new there then..... :BangHead:
My early start was so good then turned into a disaster, lots lots to the cold, fungal problems.
Now starting again. :BangHead:
Yours look so good Squash :happy7:
Quote from: pumpkinlover on March 26, 2013, 08:24:55
My early start was so good then turned into a disaster, lots lots to the cold, fungal problems.
Now starting again. :BangHead:
Yours look so good Squash :happy7:
Sorry about the fungal problems PKL, is it both tomatoes and peppers that are affected? So disheartening when all the work babying early seedlings is lost. Wish you best of luck with the next sowing and hope they will catch up.
I haven't dared put the peppers into the conservatory yet - too cold - and also the peas there can't go into the cold greenhouse yet (weather and the earliest test tray got demolished by mice). So the windowsills are very crowded. The peppers are potted up but not yet into individual pots. About 6 peppers to a recycled small mushroom container from the supermarket. This is a space saving sort of inbetween measure. These pots are sitting on capillary matting in cat litter trays, currently still on the windowsill. The trays are sitting on a couple of bricks that were wrapped with newspaper so they don't scratch, just to elevate them a bit for better light.
The first tomatoes, which were sown much later than yours Squash, need moving on now - I can squeeze 24 toilet tubes or similar shaped home-rolled paper pots into a large mushroom tray with holes cut into the base. The next potting up will be into 500ml or 1litre yoghurt pots before they can go out. I may be making more work for myself but it saves space at this time of year. How often do others pot up? And into what size pots?
I have a few more cat litter trays I can use. But south and east facing window sills are getting very crowded now too. The most recent batch of tomatoes is only just germinating and none are anywhere near as advanced as yours Squash. Thank you for showing us your picture. Simply superb looking plants.
I find that peppers are looking very varied at this time. The 'pretty in purple' are still tiny plants barely an inch high, the 'pepperdew' on the other hand are nearly 4 inches high and have 3 sets of true leaves. They must be a little stretched, compared to your lovely looking ones though. Just wanted to note that they do seem to develop at different rates here too and your Scotch Bonnets are probably just doing what they are designed to do. Are you growing PIPs this year? I am finally growing the PIP seeds from you and also the seeds from Jeannine and both batches are doing the same - lovely purple/green leaves.
(//)
I covered a seed tray rack with strong bubble wrap in the lottery greenhouse at the allotments.
I was a bit worried to put anything in because the temperature in the main
part of the greenhouse has been below freezing lately but thanks to my excessive
seed sowing addiction I had no choice.
I put some Minibel tomatoes and Scotch Bonnet chillies in and covered the
trays with fleece as a 'belt and braces' precaution. I was very pleased to see
that they look fairly good this morning.
I have sown 26 moneymaker seeds and only 9 germinated :BangHead: and they are just sitting there looking like seedlings doing nothing. Thats all I have sown so far as I am a little aprihensive with the cold weather as I only have a cold greenhouse. At the moment it is a very cold greenhouse :tongue3:
When it gets a little warmer I will be sowing more tomatoes. I am sure they will ketchup or should that be catchup :tongue3:
I splashed out on Garland Grow Lights and am very impressed with the results. Growth has been so good that I am running out of space in them and have moved some out into a fleece covered frame in my greenhouse with a small frost heater underneath. Tomatoes, peppers and chilli's all doing well.
First time I've tried using my propagator in my usually unheated greenhouse, this year I'm using an thermostatic electric fan heater to keep the temp around 10 degrees. So far its working well, nearly all the tomato plants are pricked out into 12 module trays, but as usual I have grown loads (over 200), plenty for the lottie plant sale in May! :happy7:
Chillies all germinated brilliantly in the propagator on the highest setting, they all have true leaves and seem to be holding their own.....
I've got chillies slowly on the go, all at about 2in high with first true leaves coming through. Toms are just germinating, but they were an experiment, most of them are staying in their packets for another 3 weeks or so. All my seedlings are on a sunny (when there is some!) windowsill with tinfoil collars.
My chillies have hardly 'moved', they are alive but that's about it. our spare bedroom is very cold as there is hardly any heat at all..very chilly for chillies.
First bulk of tomatoes were sown few days ago and those are more and less germinated..now under lights and second lot will be sown today.. :icon_cheers:
I like to get really early tomatoes so I sow at the beginning of February in a heated prop, then onto my South facing windowsills, and then into my conservatory - but it's far too cold in there this year. I'm just moving them on to 4 and 5" pots and filling every available sill, I may not get away with it this year but if fuss and attention can do it, then that's what they'll have. On balance, I think they are my most precious crop because of the range of uses and the difference between home-grown and shop-bought.
mine as of today but I'm on my last windowsill
Quote from: galina on March 26, 2013, 09:02:50
The first tomatoes, which were sown much later than yours Squash, need moving on now - I can squeeze 24 toilet tubes or similar shaped home-rolled paper pots into a large mushroom tray with holes cut into the base. The next potting up will be into 500ml or 1litre yoghurt pots before they can go out. I may be making more work for myself but it saves space at this time of year. How often do others pot up? And into what size pots?
I find that peppers are looking very varied at this time. The 'pretty in purple' are still tiny plants barely an inch high, the 'pepperdew' on the other hand are nearly 4 inches high and have 3 sets of true leaves. They must be a little stretched, compared to your lovely looking ones though. Just wanted to note that they do seem to develop at different rates here too and your Scotch Bonnets are probably just doing what they are designed to do. Are you growing PIPs this year? I am finally growing the PIP seeds from you and also the seeds from Jeannine and both batches are doing the same - lovely purple/green leaves.
Because of the lack of space I sow usually about 10 - 15 tomato or chilli seeds per small square
pot and then pot them on to individual small pots when the first real leaves grow. I leave them
in those pots till the roots fill the pots. By that time is is usually warm enough to put them in
the cold greenhouse.
I forgot to save Pretty in Purple seeds last year! My Scotch Bonnets are the smallest and
slowest of all my chillies. The only reason I'm growing them is that we have many West
Indian plot holders and SBs are the one they always ask for.
In the photo the chillies are (l to r) Scotch Bonnet, long hot red unnamed, Naga Morich, Little Elf and Jalapeno.(//)
Yours are looking really good Manics and you are so lucky to
have windowsills! I've only got one and it's being used for
other plants. I recognised Minibel, they make such nice compact
plants don't they?
The photo shows what I've still got left to pot on. The reason
there are so many is because of our plant sale in May (and also
because I can't seem to control myself when I'm sowing seeds)
(//)
Quote from: Squash64 on March 26, 2013, 17:11:44
Because of the lack of space I sow usually about 10 - 15 tomato or chilli seeds per small square
pot and then pot them on to individual small pots when the first real leaves grow. I leave them
in those pots till the roots fill the pots. By that time is is usually warm enough to put them in
the cold greenhouse.
I forgot to save Pretty in Purple seeds last year! My Scotch Bonnets are the smallest and
slowest of all my chillies. The only reason I'm growing them is that we have many West
Indian plot holders and SBs are the one they always ask for.
In the photo the chillies are (l to r) Scotch Bonnet, long hot red unnamed, Naga Morich, Little Elf and Jalapeno.(//)
Thank you very much for taking the photo Squash. Yes the SB do look slower, but not by much. Size wise yes, but not so much when you count how many sets of true leaves they have. I have just looked carefully at my PIPs and found the same. They are producing their third set of true leaves, but the stem between each set of leaves is very short. I'd love to return the favour and give you some seeds back when they produce chilis.
Ok on the potting on. I wondered whether I was making work for myself - ah well. Does save a lot of space though.
Little Elf sounds an interesting variety. Are they hot or sweet? One experiment I have done this year, because you said that it worked for you, was to grow a few seeds of the very long, red sweet peppers from our Turkish greengrocer. And those plants are quite big.
Manics - looking good! Love the plastic knife plant labels :happy7:
One thing I have done and may need to do again this year is put 2 stacks of 5 or 6 bricks on top of each other on the window sill, topped by an extra 'shelf' to get more growing space in the upper half of the window. But this arrangement is more prone to accidents with curtains etc and with slightly less light for the lower tier of plants.
Good that the double wrapped greenhouse plants are going ok too. Hopefully won't be long now and this cold spell will be over. That will make life easier :sunny:
Quote from: Squash64 on March 26, 2013, 17:15:46
Yours are looking really good Manics and you are so lucky to
have windowsills! I've only got one and it's being used for
other plants. I recognised Minibel, they make such nice compact
plants don't they?
The photo shows what I've still got left to pot on. The reason
there are so many is because of our plant sale in May (and also
because I can't seem to control myself when I'm sowing seeds)
(//)
ditto about the plant sale , plus, the minibel are mostly for our schools and special needs groups . Just need to take some to the poly :toothy10:
Manics - looking good! Love the plastic knife plant labels
thank you, Ray's idea :toothy10: