Re: A busy day
Posted: Thu Feb 22, 2018 11:17 am
You can get strong UV tubes Mike, they're used for desert reptiles.
The Online Community for Cactus and Succulent Growers
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I have so much algae and moss this year, it's like I'm trying to start up my own Irish peat production plant. So I had to take them out of the bags early.ralphrmartin wrote: ↑Wed Feb 21, 2018 7:48 pm Finished filling the 2nd propagator with more seeds today. Phew. I need a rest!
To reply to some of the comments:
The propagators are heated to 20C with soil warming cables / sensors buried in sand. The sand was damped down before I put the pots in, as I want to keep the humidity up.
All the labels were pre-printed using a brother label printer, and stuck on to the plastic labels (on a dreary winter day some weeks ago).
Seeds and labels were also pre-sorted into batches, of 20-30, so I didn't have to hunt too long for the label to go with each packet of seed.
I usually use a purely mineral compost:
1 part sand
1 part fine vermiculite
1 part fine grit
1 part perlag (or cat litter etc)
1 part fine perlite
This time I couldn't get suitably fine grit, so instead of grit + sand, I used 2 parts grit sand.
All were well premixed (with a bit of water to damp it down) in my concrete, er, compost mixer.
I've got down to a fine art scooping up just the right amount of compost into a pot and quickly tipping it back level.
Pots are dunked almost to their rims (until you see the colour change) in a bucket of water to which I have added 1/2 teaspoon of my usual cactus fertiliser, and 1/2 a chinosol tablet (disinfectant). I do batches of 12-15 pots at a time.
I then empty each seed packet onto a sheet of A5 paper which a light crease in across the middle, which then lets me sprinkle the seed carefully and evenly over the damped pot, then the label is added.
I dont cover the seed except for a few succulents with really big seeds.
Pots are then put into the proagator, and given a final spray with the same mix used for dunking (tip - fill up the sprayer before you start dunking, as the dunking bucket slowly gathers bits from the compost ).
The idea is then to go out each morning, and spray the plants. Most will stay in the propagator until ready to pot on, apart from some succulents (e.g. mesems, pelargoniums) which I find do better in a less humid atmosphere.
By using mineral soil AND chinosol, I hope to avoid damping off problems. It seems to work pretty well, although I still get algae.
The key to successful seed raising is to keep the plants permanently moist. Seedlings have very different requirements to adult cacti. The baggy method works well for many people, but when you have a lot, the whole propagator replaces the bag. It has the advantage too of being able to see better what is going on.
Good luck with the retirement Mike! I've been at it for just under a year, and am enjoying it!