google images of celery seedlings. celery is very slow to get started.

Randy41...I did google but got nothing back...
Thanks anyway...

yes from 9 to 21 days to start....

try this.

Here is a link that might be useful: celery seedlings

One small point - you say 'all my other brassicas' - lettuce and celery aren't brassicas. Just for future reference.

Celery is EXTREMELY slow to start. So slow it runs a risk of being covered by nearby rows of vegetables. This spring I gave up on it, but eventually it poked through and gave me a nice row. From now on I will grow it in blocks. Seedlings are difficult to distinguish from parsley seedlings, some similarity with parsnip seedlings as well.

Here is a photo of my Tango Celery seedlings taken on August 22. The seeds were started on June 6.

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Here is a recent photo of them taken Dec 1:

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Celery takes a LONG time to develop. Now 175 days from the date I started the seeds.

Raybo

I can not thank you enough all of you. (Raybo, Glib, Flora and Randy)

I looked for pictures of seedlings...but my private search engine... IXQUICK.com (which does not reveal my IP address) probably does not let me see all the Google results...so your efforts to show me these seedlings is really appreciated.

I am also glad to know the delayed germination might be a reason I have not see them yet sprout. What I thought might be seedlings is really weeds I need to pull...

Grateful
Jesse jr.
(Softguitar)

My celery looks like flat parsley seedlings. It's not doing much yet, due to lack of light where I have it planted. I did notice that after a dose of weak chicken manure tea, it had a small boost of growth.

Mine is just now coming out....
I found seedlings this morning...and yes they do look a bit like parsley....

Now I can readily tell what is weed and what is celery.
Now I will go out there and pull up the weeds and tidy up my garden.

It sure did take a long time for them to come up.
I think it was about 2 weeks for them to show..but they are definitely coming up.

The pictures above in this posting helped me to definitely identify the seedlings....thanks to you all...

Jesse jr.

i also have had trouble with celery....trying again for the 2012 garden....any advice on when to start the seeds? Sounds like early is better?

do they prefer cool or hotter temps?

t-bird,

Growing celery is a daunting task.

It requires temperature between 58 and 80 degrees and does not tolerate any frost.

The Seedlings take from 9 to 21 days to come up and

The seeds are best if used when they are 2 to 3 years old.

One needs to place the seeds on top of the soil which is lightly watered.. Seedlings require frequent watering. They do not tolerate drought very well.

When the seedlings come up they will be tiny and look like frail parsley....yet those are the early seedlings of celery.

I like using direct sowing into cow or horse manure. Some people say that will burn roots but I have had so much success with these methods I no longer listen to the nay-sayers. I do throw in a little top soil for safety. I got excellent results in all the 8 different gardens I made this year across the USA. Horse manure is best....

for good reading on all this read here:
http://www.no-dig-vegetablegarden.com/growing-celery.html

Good gardening !
Jesse jr.

Thank you so much Jesse! I have tried 3 years in a row, and never even got a sprout, lol! Maybe up to 4 varieties.....new seeds each time.

I have had trouble with horse manure.....put 6-8" on my beds-well composted-not great results, so thinking that was too much.

Will give celery another try.....

I grew my tomatoes and squash in straight horse manure last year. No wood shavings, no dirt, no time to compost. Just three the manure in the ground, put the plants in. The pile got a bit warm for a week or two but the heat was below where the tiny plant roots were at that point and had cooled off by the time the plants got bigger.
I had an amazing tomato crop until it hit 115 degrees. My first and second tier of fruits was loaded. Marglobe must have produced 40 pounds on one tomato!

Good info tracydr....the manure I got was just swept out of the stalls, and had a lot of hay and wood shavings and so on, although it had composted for nearly a year....but perhaps the wood was the issue and not the manure...

Hopefully - this year the beds will be on target......that that stuff has broken down sufficiently....

And - it wasn't a *bad* year - just not really much improved....

Im using weak chicken manure tea every 7-14 days.Seems to be really helping, although right now my celery is mostly in shade.

I've grown it before (same zone as you) and they look like weeds until they get taller. You can pinch a leaf off and see if it smells like celery. I had some self-seed last year and was quite surprised at that.

T-bird -

I see you are in the same state as me - but different climate since I am in central Illinois.

This year was the first year growing celery - and there are many tricks of doing it.

As indicated by another poster, I found that the seed needs to be placed right on the top surface of the soil - NOT buried at all. And, it needs to be constantly moist.

In order to keep the celery seed moist while it lies on the surface of the soil, I would highly recommend that you get one of those black plastic flats with a clear lid over the top.

If you look at my blog post here - you will see in the second picture - one of the containers with a clear lid over it:

seed starting container

In the bottom of the container, put maybe 1/4 inch of water. The soil in the your seed trays will pull up the moisture and keep everything moist.

Around this same time last year, I got some celery seed out and started it - just to see if it would produce. I managed to keep the plants going until I set them out in mid-April. I started others later as well - and they did produce, but they didn't seem to be fully developed by the time it got very hot and the celery started going bad.

I use the Ventura celery variety and it seems to work pretty well here in this area.

I even had a couple of celery plants that made it throughout the entire summer and really took off in the fall - but I didn't get it picked in time before the stalks became pure ice from the freezing temperatures.

Here are a few links on my blog where I write about celery and my experience with it.

Sprouting Celery Seeds

Celery Seedlings

Affordable Website Design

If you live in a frost free zone, you can keep celery re-seeding every year for free. My last seed sowing was almost 5 years ago.

I just let a few plants go to seed - mainly because I like the seeds especially for cooking. Many of them re-seed on their own.

Unfortunately, last year many plants started showing signs of rust - very distressing. I've tried to control it by picking off the leaves whenever it occurs - but perhaps it is time to start another kind.

The original seeding - about 5 or so years ago - was with Utah something or other - don't remember exactly.

Bejay

BeJay,

I plant my celery where it gets alot of sun and do not do any over head watering. I plant them in rows and away from any other taller vegetables like Broccoli or Corn and Tomatoes.

This year I have used Utah Tall (open-pollinated) seeds and after my initial doubts the seedlings came up and I weeded my garden. If the temps fall to the 40's or lower I cover the celery but they seem to do well when I harden them off to a little cold exposure.

I am grateful for the help I have received on this forum. I have learned alot about celery...and read even more so that I can supply my own hints and short experience with others.

I do recommend direct sowing in Cow manure or horse manure. It has always worked for me ..and the rest of my garden is booming right in the middle of a South Texas winter. If I knew how to post pictures I could prove it...
Jesse Jr.
(SoftGuitar)

Jesse,

1) celery does very well in shade, you do not need to place it away from taller vegetables. In fact, I think it does best with cardoon, another vegetable that needs a lot of moisture, and that will overshadow anything else
2) although it is rumored to be not hardy, it will take 30F without dying at the end of the season

Thanks bsn - very informative!

I also start around the new year, just cuz I'm off work and can't stop myself, lol!!!

On the 19 or 20th... I planted up toms, peppers, and eggplants...and various herbs....nearly all toms and half the basil are up, winter savory and I managed to mangle the poor rosemary sprout with the lid...... :(

Have order some new seed trays, and will be looking at celery, chives, lettuces and cabbages, etc...need to go through my books and seed packs to work out what exactly....

No sign yet of peppers and egplants, but it's only been less than a week, lol!

good info Jesse, maybe I will try some into the manure (which is even older this year ;)....try some both ways and see if any difference....

Looking forward to the best garden ever in 2012!

More veggies!
More fruits!
More flowers!!

More more more!!!

oh yeah - lot more work too. :)

t-bird - you say you planted tomatoes and peppers already? How soon will you be having enough heat to ripen them? Not sure about your particular climate, but it seems a bit soon for those heat-loving summer plants. Although you didn't mention whether you had a green house -so probably I'm speaking too soon.

Our Mediterranean climate - mild summers, mild winters - finds it difficult to get the heat loving veggies to ripen, and sometimes they wait until late August/September - but then will hang on until the dampness kills them. I've tried a lot of different strategies to keep them happy, but I guess I'll have to settle for having some great cool weather crops.

Right now, I'm enjoying the most beautiful sowings of Bibb lettuce along with mesclun. The Chinese cabbage, bok choy, broccoli all looking great. Garlic standing nice and tall in front and along sides of my planters - but not bulbing yet. Even the artichokes seem to be enjoying our 40-50's temps without showing signs of wilt. I planted a few potatoes that were sprouting, and a few that had little taters, are coming up strong.

There are 2 or 3 ancho-type peppers still hanging on - which finally turned red. I harvested a lot of small "christmas tree light" types - about an inch or so long, hotter than hades - but dried and ground them for substitute cayenne peppers - which didn't thrive as well.

So - guess I can't complain from this part of the world --

Merry Christmas everybody - and thanks for all of your support over the years - your really great!

Bejay

good points bejay....yes I'm pushing it for sure, experimenting with indoor lights and season extenders....a green house is certainly in the future, but how far out, not sure...

Will also be potting up some parthenogenetic cukes soon - going to try for some diva cukes and grape tomatoes indoors for early salads with outdoor lettuces.....peppers and eggplants will be container grown with an aim to eventually take them outside when temps allow...but remain in containers....

As I said, just experimenting...I have no sucess in this arena thus far....

And MERRY MERRY! HO HO HO!

t-bird,

If you are thinking of indoor vegetable growing over the Winter, you might want to consider building a few of these:

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Picture on the left was taken Dec 17, on the right Dec 24. Eight inches of growth on Victorian Dwarf during the 7 days:

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Raybo

Here is a link that might be useful: InnTainer Construction Guide

@ Glib .... I know celery will grow in shade but I try to plant most of my veggies with full sun to avoid fungal diseases and rust which seem to be promoted by over head watering and shade. Someone had mentioned rust. A certain corner of my garden does have shade and it is that corner that gives me the rust, fungal diseases and even mushroom growth.

@ be-jay ..... I too have planted tomatoes (Roma) and peppers (Jalapeno) down here in South Texas. While the tomatoes are growing their progression is slow but certain. The seedlings are yet to come up but those in the main garden are progressing though not as rapidly as they would with 80+ degree temps. The winter so far int he Rio Grande valley has been sufficiently warm enough to grow alot of the heat loving veggies like peppers and other things but they are slow.

@ t-bird ... I have found that growing veggies indoors under lights gives me leggy seedlings..... is there some special technique you use that keeps them from getting leggy ?

@ rnewst .... excellent indoor garden. It looks as if you get enough light in your green room. It also looks like everything is temperature regulated as well. I have tried to post pictures but the usual copy and paste does not allow me to. Otherwise, I would show everyone the growth of my winter vegetables.

Jesse Jr
(SoftGuitar)

A lot of veggies catch fungal diseases, but not celery, which is a swamp plant. If you have a shady corner, use it for celery. Other veggies will do worse there.