let there be light
My mom informed me that this post is delayed and for that, I apologize. In true, supportive motherly fashion she believes that everyone that is planting seeds is following along and doing exactly as I say. If you are - bless your heart and again, my apologies because if you’re waiting for my instruction you’ve probably already realized that you are missing an important next step. Now that we’re almost three weeks out from planting, most all of your seeds should have popped! If there are still some you’re waiting on, check the seed packet to see the expected days until germination. Some take a little longer than others and that’s perfectly ok! So, now that you have plants (GO YOU!) the fun can really begin.
I spoke about water in my last post and the only thing that is equally as important, and stressful, to raising healthy plants is light. As I’m sure you remember from elementary science class, light is used as energy for making food through a process called photosynthesis. If plants don’t get enough light they go searching for it which causes their stems to grow too tall, too fast and the plant becomes “leggy”. Leggy plants often don’t thrive and if they do, they have fewer flowers and fruits. The easiest way to combat this is to get your plants a tanning bed in the form of fluorescent lights.
You might be thinking, “Isn’t the huge glowing thing in the sky sufficient enough?” The answer is yes, and no. There is definitely nothing wrong with setting your seedlings in a windowsill to get light but know that it might take a little more coddling to get the plants where they need to be before they go outside. The two things you have to do if you’re growing using natural light is choose a south-facing window and rotate your plants regularly. You’ll notice that the plants will begin leaning toward their light source. By rotating them, you’ll help promote straight stem growth and ultimately healthier, sturdier plants.
While it might seem counterintuitive to use artificial light to grow plants, it is the best option when growing indoors. The only downside to going the fluorescent light route is that there is an up front cost. There are a lot of ways to set-up your lights but I’ll share what we’ve done that has seemed to work for us the past few years.
In addition to water and light, temperature is the next most important element for a plant’s success. After seedlings have germinated, they like being in a room with a temperature in the high 60s. For this reason and many others, we decided to keep ours in the basement. It keeps the dirt/water mess out of our everyday existence but also provides a cooler environment for them to thrive in as our upstairs is always a little warmer. We bought the following supplies to get us started two years ago and have used them with success each year since.
Wire Shelving
Let me be clear that we use this as storage for suitcases, bags, etc. throughout the year when we’re not growing plants so we thought it was worth the cost. That being said, you certainly don’t need something this large if you’re just using it to grow plants. I also don’t remember it costing this much and you can probably find one cheaper elsewhere.
Fluorescent Lights
We initially only bought one of these and then promptly planted 72 seeds. We learned pretty quickly that we needed more light and went back and got another one the next day. I don’t think this is the exact one we have but any ‘ole fluorescent shop light will do. Just make sure you can hang it!
Don’t mind the fan. More on that later.
As you can see from the picture, our set-up is extremely high tech. Put the wire shelving where you don’t mind getting a little dirt, fasten the lights to it and VOILA! The lights should only be about one or two inches above your seedlings. This keeps them from reaching for the light and getting leggy. Even though it’s not as imperative with fluorescent lights, I still rotate my plants to keep them standing as straight as possible. And lastly, seedlings need between 14 and 16 hours of light each day so make sure you remember to turn those lights on (and off)!
Until next time y’all!
P.S. - Sorry for the delay Mom.
-cate
