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Starting Seedlings Indoors

What do you need? Lights. Buy a 4-foot, 2-tube fluorescent shop light, but no fancy "daylight spectrum" bulbs are needed. A table in a cool room, preferably by a window. Sixty-five during the day, cooling to 55 at night is ideal. Plastic 6-packs for individual seedlings and plastic flats (trays) to contain them. Be sure the flats are the kind that hold water (some have slits for drainage). Sterile potting or starting mix. Optional: a heat mat designed for placing under a flat to warm seeds, speeding germination.

Hang the lights over the table, about six inches above your seedlings. I hang mine from the ceiling on jack chain (a fine metal chain available at hardware stores), so I can raise them as plants grow. If you hang lights from the ceiling, get toggle bolts to hold the weight, as screws will eventually come out of drywall, wreaking havoc below. Some people start a few plants on the windowsill. What they usually get, however, are tall, spindly plants that are struggling. If you do it, keep the plants as close to the glass as possible, as the sun's strength dissipates quickly as you move the plants back from the window. The bottom line? Our sun in the spring really isn't strong enough to do the job. Get some lights.


Six packs for planting come in various sizes, from 36 to 96 cells per flat. I always go for bigger cells, to allow more room for roots to grow, and to keep them from drying out so quickly.

The standard way of starting seedlings is to use sterile mix, which is a peat-moss based mix. Fill the 6-packs with mix and add water. The mix will be very dry and probably resist getting wet; fill the flat part way with water, and let the mix suck it up from below. That might take an hour or more.

Make a small divot in the planting mix and drop in a seed. Because not all seeds germinate, I make 2 divots and plant 2 seeds to ensure that at least one germinates. The older your seeds, the lower the germination rate, so for older seeds I might plant three. Most seeds are good for at least three years if stored in the fridge in a plastic bag.

To get seeds in good contact with the starting mix, press down lightly on it with your fingers. For tiny seeds, I don't make a divot, but place the seeds on the surface and sprinkle a fine layer of vermiculite on top. Vermiculite is a fine powder made from heat-expanded mica, and is used to hold water in planting mixes.

It's very important that your seeds not dry out while waiting to germinate, or when they are very young. The best way to prevent drying out is to cover the flat with a clear plastic cap. These are sold along with the flats, and unlike the 6-packs, can be reused each year.

Some folks use Saran wrap or even a plate of glass to keep in moisture. If, however, some seeds germinate and send up a tall seedling while others are still snoozing, you have a problem. The clear caps will let the early birds get a couple of inches tall while waiting for late starters.

You can use anything for starting seeds: old margarine containers, yogurt cups, etc. Some gardeners like peat pots, but I do not: they tend to dry out faster than plastic. Others make pots of used newspapers wrapped around a form - too much work for me.

After germination, I take scissors and cut off the smaller of the two seedlings. The sooner you do this, the better. If they get too big, they're competing with each other and both suffer - and you'll want to keep both.

I start most veggies about April 10. I've even started them later. It's not good to start too early because the less time they spend in a 6-pack, the happier they'll be. Peppers and onions should have been planted back in early March, but I didn't do it this year as I am traveling to Namibia. I'll buy some pepper plants, and hope to beg some onion seedlings from somebody.

Commercial starting mix has little nutrition to offer plants. After they are up and growing, water them weekly with a dilute solution of a fish and seaweed fertilizer. Neptune's Harvest is a good one. This will provide some nitrogen, phosphorous and potassium - and dozens of other good things from the sea.

There's a folk song I love with a refrain that runs through my head each June when I plant the garden: "There's only two things that money can't buy: true love and home grown tomatoes." Home grown tomatoes. Sigh. I can't wait.

Henry Homeyer is the VT/NH associate editor of People, Places and Plants magazine. His website is www.gardening-guy.com.