Seed Starting Containers

14 years ago

I'm now using only Ziploc (or equivalent) bags for starting seeds. I started out with food containers and tried all kinds of things, including the liter soda bottle and I'm sold on Ziploc bags. A few weeks ago somebody told me that there was a new Ziploc bag that has a flat bottom and that sounded like a perfect bag for me. I bought some of those bags today and they are nice but I forgot to notice the "Easy Zipper" feature which means that I can't hang them! They can't be hung as there is no place to insert a hook without puncturing the part of the bag that holds the air. All the other Ziploc type bags have a nice bit of plastic at the top that can be used to hold a hook so you can hang them. Hanging is important because if you don't hang the bag then if the bag loses air the top will collapse down onto the seedlings. If they are hung with care then the loss of air isn't a big deal.

I usually stick a clear plastic food container in the Ziploc. Sometimes I use that to grow the seeds and other times I use a 4 or 5 inch pot and then put that into the food container. The new "Expandable Bottom" Ziploc bags are flat on the bottom and would make it a lot easier to stick a container or a pot in the bag but I'll have to wait to see if they come out with a version that can be hung before I give it a try. Is anybody else using Ziplock bags?

Here is a picture of my seed starting shelf that is on the south side of my house and is under cover. This area gets quite a bit of light in the winter (right now) and has worked well for me.

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Comments (2)

splinter1804
14 years ago
Hi everyone,

Bromadams, I have a very similar set-up to you with similar plastic containers but I only fill them to one third with growing media, and then put on the lid. This doesn't get opened again until they are ready for pricking out or inspecting. As our temperatures never get really cold this is usually sufficient to get an acceptable result.

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At about six months they are large enough to thin out.

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At this size I sort them into into two groups of 35 each and they then are planted into the same type of containers but this time with drainage holes in the bottom and the lid removed. It's hard to do, but the remainder are usually discarded.

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They grow in these until they are large enough to be planted in groups of six or seven into community pots.

They remain in these until they reach a suitable size for individual pots.

All the best, Nev.
bromadams
Original Author
14 years ago
Nev, you grow much bigger grexes than I do. I'm getting to the point that I'm happy with 3-8 plants for hybrids and 5-12 for species. Now that I've got a bunch of seedlings that are 1-2 years old in individual pots I can see that I have to slow down the input into the pipeline. The species I can give away so that's no problem, but the hybrids need to be grown out for quite a while.

If I was just growing Neos I wouldn't have to wait so long before culling, but with all these goofy bigeneric crosses, I'm thinking I'd better wait until they flower before I give up on something with marginal foliage. I finally got some Florel and I'm going to start pushing some of these bi's to flower.

I've also been saving seeds from most every grex so that I can grow more if I feel the need but I'm hoping that never happens.
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