On the counter over the dishwasher, in front of the newer fridges on the floor because that is where they vent, on top of the satellite receiver, and the list goes on.
I use a heat mat and a cover only for germination. Once they are up, I take the cover off, remove them from the mat & get them under lights. Upon the advice of Margaret Roach , I plan to put a thin coat of sterile sand on top of the potting mix to reduce chance of damping off.
Hey guys I have decided to use my old heat mat and hope I don't fry the seeds. I'm not totally confident it works right. But hopefully it will work until I get my other heat mat. Thanks for all your guys help.
Say Cayu--just be sure that the sand is rough sand (grit)...that is to say not fine. Have a look at this old BBC episode from the series, "Life In A Cottage Garden", featuring Carol Klein. I like Carol because we do so many things exactly the same. The portion of the vid of interest to you would be close to the beginning: ~two minutes in.
What about the lights? For my peppers and tomatoes last year I did 16 hours on 8 hours off. Would this be good for the onions as well?
I start with 14 hours and then usually by the time it is okay to plant out (around April 28th-30th) it is 14 hours of natural daylight and days are getting longer. Onions can go out sooner than other annuals because they've got built in "anti freeze".
Hey guys I planted my onions today. I just checked on my heat mat and its 1.4 degrees above set temp I set it at 77 degrees Fahrenheit. It's still heating and I'm wondering at what temp can onion seeds fry?
Onion germination is fastest as 68-77°F (20-25°C), with slight temperature drops at night. most seeds 80oF is perfect, but this is a cold weather crop.
I started mine on the 16th, yesterday one of the seedlings popped up. That's 7ndays. At first I thought it must have been a stray non onion seed but it is the correct shape. Don't know what expedited it...
