Last spring, I couldn’t get my tomato seedlings to develop.
I tried the whole thing. After using quite a lot of completely completely different seeds and seed companies, attempting completely completely different pots, altering the lighting, watering another way, and even replanting the whole thing, I threw up my fingers in despair.
Maybe I merely wouldn’t be rising tomatoes for the yr…
Nevertheless then I thought of the one variable that I hadn’t considered sooner than: the potting soil.
Later into the season, I made a YouTube video all about my seedling troubles and loads of of you shared associated experiences throughout the comment half. I moreover shared in that video the various experiments and evaluation I did in an effort to find out if it really was the fault of the potting soil (it ended up being kinda satisfying to dig into the thriller…strive the video below must you’re curious!).
As soon as I did this deep dive into the parts that made all my seedlings die last yr and the potting soil factors that started it, it made me very aware of the importance of wonderful potting soil for seed starting. So on this submit, I’m going to share with you some tips on one of the simplest ways to know in case your potting soil is harmful and one of the simplest ways to find good potting soil decisions.
When you occur to take pleasure in podcasts, strive my episode The Thriller of the Poisonous Potting Soil to get the information on my potting soil woes.
Does Potting Soil Matter?
I didn’t used to suppose so. Each time I was feeling formidable, I’d make my very own residence made potting soil. Nevertheless completely different years, I’d merely seize regardless of potting soil was least costly off the shelf of my native yard present retailer and often known as it good. And until last yr, I didn’t have any details.
Nevertheless now I do know larger.
As I devastatingly watched all my seedlings slowly stop rising, then flip yellow, after which start dying all collectively, I resolved to not let anyone else make the similar mistake.
Lesson found: If you would like healthful and thriving seedlings, then you must be careful with the soil you plant them in.
Unhealthy or unbalanced potting soil merely obtained’t have what’s essential for thriving seedlings and crops. Typically there are indicators that the potting soil is harmful, nonetheless, like I found last yr, some potting soil mixes can look fully large and however can actually be fully missing the vital components of healthful soil.
The 12 months of My Ineffective Tomato Seedlings
I on a regular basis start my very personal tomatoes from seed and I’ve gotten fairly first fee at seed starting after a number of years of observe (proper right here’s my seed starting setup). This time, nonetheless, after two weeks of wonderful progress, I started to notice that my crops stopped rising. They’d get their first set of leaves after which stop. After which the few leaves my tomato seedlings had started to point out yellow.
At first, I believed my develop lights have been too shut or too far-off from the seedlings. Then I puzzled if I was watering an extreme quantity of or not ample. After shifting the lights nearer after which farther away, and watering additional after which watering a lot much less, I wasn’t seeing any modifications of their progress, it does not matter what I tried.
The next issue I puzzled was if I had some type of fungus or mildew factors from improperly-cleaned seed trays (proper right here’s my tips on one of the simplest ways to disinfect seed trays). Nevertheless I double-checked and knew that I was using clear seed trays. So your complete frequent causes for poor effectively being in seedlings have been being dominated out.
I was stumped. After some worry that I was merely an horrible gardener with a ‘black thumb’, I put my energy into researching the issue and ultimately figured it out: it was the potting soil.
As quickly as I noticed that the potting soil was the issue with my tomato seedlings, I started nerding out over potting soil data and decided to check the usual of quite a lot of potting soil companies to see within the occasion that they’ve been associated to 1 one other. I used the Redmond Soil Testing Kits and mailed off a bunch of assorted potting soil samples.
After anxiously checking my e mail repeatedly prepared for outcomes, I lastly obtained my outcomes and one issue I found is that a whole lot of the potting soils I examined have been really low in nitrogen and phosphorous.