Diatomaceous Earth as a seed starting medium

[beeman]

I am using DE for the first time. I put 6 Big Beef seeds in a 3 inch pot of DE, 5 have sprouted.
Sounds good? Except each and every one has the seed case stuck to it's top. "Helmet head' as someone else described it.
I am loath to touch them, as they are so fragile at this point.
Is this just my problem, or is it a general problem with DE? Any suggestions on what to do?

[RayR]

Originally Posted by b54red

I like using small cells for seed starting. I use egg cartons because it is so easy to water them; but it doesn't allow enough room to leave the seedlings in them too long. I find myself potting up sooner when using the DE for seed starting. The difference in the root growth is amazing isn't it?

Agreed, I won't be making that mistake again, I'll be potting them up sooner.

Originally Posted by b54red

One real problem I have found with the DE happens when it develops algae on top. When this happens you may mistakenly think the DE is still moist when it is not. I lost a lot of pepper leaves due to the DE drying out too much because the algae made it look wetter than it was.

Agree with you there too. I get the same problem with algae growth on regular seed starting mixes too.

Originally Posted by b54red

I still have some onion seedlings that were left over when I planted them in the garden. They are still alive in the DE despite getting almost no care except a little water way too infrequently. They have been sitting outside in a small clay pot for many weeks now. I decided to let them grow and see if they will make little bulb sets for next year. I think I better give them a little fertilizer though. I would really like to see how big the roots are on them now. When I transplanted the rest into the garden nearly 2 months ago the root systems were huge.

Onions are pretty tough, they can take a lot more gardener abuse than other crops.
I wish I could get my onion plants outside, they're taking over the place and I need room for other things under the lights. It's 35°F right now and the high is suppose to be 41°F today. It's been a cold March, I've only had them outside 2 days all month when temps got into the 50's and 60's.

Originally Posted by b54red

Since I hate to just throw the DE from my seeding containers away when I pot up it ends up getting dumped into my potting soil. It makes the potting soil finer and a bit fluffier. I would guess my potting mix is now nearly one third DE. I'll see how it works and may even use it on a few container plants and check it out.
Bill

I do the same, amend the containers or the beds. I may just reuse some though after putting it in the oven to kill the algae first.

Originally Posted by zeroma

Have you done this with veggies, like tomato seeds? Looks good. I'm going to put some of my huge amt of marigolds in a DE pot just like that.

No, haven't done it with veggie yet. I've normally used coffee filters when I do pre-sprouting or germination testing. With using paper I get mold growth sometimes on the paper and any dead seed, I tried some old marigold seed in the DE too a few weeks ago, they were all dead and I forgot about them until yesterday. There was some mold growth on a few of the dead seed, but no mold on the DE.

[RayR]

Originally Posted by beeman

I am using DE for the first time. I put 6 Big Beef seeds in a 3 inch pot of DE, 5 have sprouted.
Sounds good? Except each and every one has the seed case stuck to it's top. "Helmet head' as someone else described it.
I am loath to touch them, as they are so fragile at this point.
Is this just my problem, or is it a general problem with DE? Any suggestions on what to do?

I haven't had much problems with helmet heads, no more than with conventional seed starting mixes. Do you cover your seed starting trays until germination? That seems to help a lot since the humidity is kept high and the seed coats stay moist and swell.

[jamserg]

Originally Posted by RayR

If you didn't feed them then I can see why the difference. DE is inorganic and inert, no NPK there, so you can bet they were starved. I would follow Bill's advise and start with a very light dose early, just to charge the DE with some nutrients. Bill's using MG, I've been using organics. Last year I waited till first leaves started to appear before I fertilized, this year I started earlier with the onions to get the biology going and that worked well, I'm will be doing the same with the peppers and eggplant I seeded the other day.

What variety of pepper are they?

Trinidad Scorpion Moruga

[RayR]

Originally Posted by jamserg

Trinidad Scorpion Moruga

I thought super hots were supposed to grow slow?

[jamserg]

Originally Posted by RayR

I thought super hots were supposed to grow slow?

germination takes 2-4 weeks, but the growth rate is normal

[kevn357]

Originally Posted by beeman

I am using DE for the first time. I put 6 Big Beef seeds in a 3 inch pot of DE, 5 have sprouted.
Sounds good? Except each and every one has the seed case stuck to it's top. "Helmet head' as someone else described it.
I am loath to touch them, as they are so fragile at this point.
Is this just my problem, or is it a general problem with DE? Any suggestions on what to do?

I had that problem since I was only bottom watering. I just sprayed the tops with a spray bottle and most fell off so I just picked the leftovers with my fingers. Just make sure the seed case is wet before trying. IT should slide right off with no force needed.

[b54red]

Ray it sounds like it is warm enough for onions to go outside. I have never lost onions to freezing but I do live in a much warmer area. I don't know how cold it has to get to bother onions but it hasn't gotten that cold in years down here. I usually transplant mine into the garden in late December and January.

[Dork Fish]

Okay, i thought that i would try this. Sorry to say that i am very disappointed...DE on the right.

Sent from my SGH-T989 using Tapatalk 2

[RayR]

Originally Posted by Dork Fish

Okay, i thought that i would try this. Sorry to say that i am very disappointed...DE on the right.

Sent from my SGH-T989 using Tapatalk 2

What did you fertilize them with?

[Father'sDaughter]

I just up-potted about 42 pepper and eggplant seedlings from DE to potting mix. The seedlings all had amazingly huge root systems in comparison to the top growth. And after just one day on potting mix, they all have very visible new growth. Usually I find growth stalls for a few days after transplanting, but not this time around.

My take away from reading all the info here and trying it myself is that DE is fantastic for seed starting and root development at the beginning stages, but as I believe others have mentioned, the seedlings should be moved to potting mix early on. I usually leave the tomato seedlings in their starter pots until the middle of April, so I'm anxious to see what kind of root systems they have in a couple of weeks.

[billy_prewitt]

I planted these march 15th using nc tomatoman's dense method using metro mix 360. Tomorrow I'm potting these little babies into 3 inch pots. I was going to try the DE. but to many folks had concerns about the results.. I'm happy with the results I getting from the metro mix

[Father'sDaughter]

Oh yeah, one other observation -- last year I had quite a few tomato seedling that never shed their seed coat. I was able to coax a few off, but there were many I lost in my attempt to free the leaves. So far this year I have about 55 successfully germinated tomato seedlings, and not a single helmet head in the bunch!

[RayR]

Growing seedlings in a soilless media is going to require fertilization. Expecting a plant to put on healthy root growth and vegetative growth without nutrients is expecting what's impossible. The seed contains all the nutrients the seedling needs from germination until true leaves form, after that the little roots are looking for food.

Off the shelf seed starting mixes and potting soils come in two forms. Straight soilless peat or coir mixes do not have any significant amounts of nutrients and will require the grower to supply fertilization. DE also fits in to this category.
Other mixes contain a small starter synthetic nutrient charge (like Fafard and Metromix which have been mentioned on this thread) with an emphasis on Nitrogen, the starter nutrients can sustain a seedling for a few weeks.
Organic mixes (like Fox Farms) contain organic nutrients sources and microbes to mineralize the nutrients into plant available forms.

Some of us have already explained our fertilization regimen in DE.
What are you other folks using, organic or synthetic? When do you start? What have you found that works or doesn't work for you?

[b54red]

Now that I have had time to try the DE with just about everything starting last fall, I have learned a few lessons from my experimenting.

Germination rates are much higher with the DE and much faster with most seeds using the DE.

Growth after sprouting with DE is considerably slower after a few days than with other seed starters I have used. So I now start giving them a dilute fertilizer drink every few days soon after they sprout and the results have been fantastic.

Since I use very small containers for seed starting (egg cartons) with most seeds the necessity to pot up sooner became obvious. After a few weeks even with fertilizing I can tell the plants need potting up. If left in the DE too long some seedlings deteriorate noticeably more than in regular seed starting mixes.

Root system growth is phenomenal with the DE which makes potting up much easier and more successful.

Best of all the DE has virtually eliminated damping off in my seed starting process and that was the main reason for me trying it in the first place.

Bottom watering is by far the most effective when using DE; but it can be more time consuming especially if you are using larger containers.

Be very careful when handling any container in which the DE has dried out as the least little bump can send the DE flying out.

It is much easier to separate plants if the DE is on the dry side. I couldn't believe how easy it was to separate my onion seedlings while keeping the roots intact.

If you allow a container to dry out too much plants suffer more in the DE than peat based mediums.

I thought it would be far less likely to get algae on the surface but that doesn't seem to be the case for me. Once it gets algae on the surface it is far more difficult to tell if it needs watering.

Bill