How We Start Our Seeds In The Greenhouse At Country Gardens Farm.

We start many of our vegetable plants from seeds in our greenhouse. In this short video you will see some of the different environments we use to get our seeds to germinate and to grow on to make strong plants that we can transplant out into the garden. Watch the video and then read the steps I have outlined below to see how we start our seeds.

• We plant our seeds into a soil mix of peat, perlite, worm castings and azomite.
• If we are going to move our plants up one time before planting outside we start the seeds off in a 288 tray . These trays have very small cells so they are moved up to 4″ pots after about 2 to 3 weeks. We mostly use this method for tomatoes and peppers.
• If we are going to plant directly into the garden from the pots that we sow seed into then we use ether 36 or 72 cell trays.
• We cover our seeds with vermiculite to hold moisture and allow air to the seed.
• We place seed into the seed germinating cabinet on onto a bench covered with plastic to provide the correct germination temperature.
• We take the seeds out of the seed cabinet before they are fully sprouted so they can have sun on them as they finish sprouting.
•  After the seed is up and growing we can move it out into the greenhouse that stays 65 degrees at night and no more than 80 during the day.
• We fertilize our seedlings with a solution of fish emulsion about two weeks after sprouting
• After the seedlings are about 4 t0 5 weeks old we start moving them to a cold frame which offers some protection from the cold but begins to harden off the plant before it is planted in the garden.