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livingontheland - Re: [Livingontheland] seed starting medium?

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  • From: yarrow@sfo.com
  • To: Healthy soil and sustainable growing <livingontheland@lists.ibiblio.org>
  • Subject: Re: [Livingontheland] seed starting medium?
  • Date: Fri, 29 Jan 2010 23:07:17 -0800

At 6:01 PM -0700 1/29/10, Tradingpost wrote:
Interesting. Speaking only for myself, I see no point in sterile potting mixes. I've never seen any evidence it avoids disease or other problems. And I don't spend money on heating pads and lights. I tell myself KISS - keep it simple stupid ...

I just use some commercial coir-based mix, with small amounts of the things that go in the beds, soil, alfalfa meal, screened manure, bonemeal, greensand, maybe some vermicompost. Hardly sterile! And I germinate in 4" pots in flats indoors, then move to get some light soon as stuff sprouts. Never had a problem with disease or damping off.


I used homemade compost the first year I grew a lot of seeds and found that some of the volunteer tomato seeds sprouted before the tomato seeds I planted. (All tomato seedlings look alike at first.) So ever since, I've used a coir-based purchased potting mix.

I've grown tomatoes and peppers in a cold frame (google wintersown for more ideas), and I agree that keeping the seedlings in a cooler environment helps prevent diseases and damping off.




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