It's hard to tell from your photo just how close the lights are, but you can and should put them about two to three inches from the tops of the plants. I see a humidifier in there - good idea!

Okay, they are much further than two or three inches. They are probably three feet away, I will have to figure out how to lower my bed or raise the plants!

Looks like you have way too many plants for these 2 shoplights. The ones that are directly under lights - are more or less OK, the ones on a side - just no good.

You can raise the trays closer to the lights if you put something under them and remove gradually when they will start reaching the bulbs. You can add more shoplights and mount them across the bed instead of along it. Or you can get a shelving unit from Sams club and grow them there - but I do not think you can grow more then 4 20 inches trays under 1 shoplight, better would be 2 shoplights per 4 trays.

By the way - how many tomatoes you need? Pumpkins and cucumbers do better if you seed the soaked seeds directly to the soil, the same is with sunflowers - they hate transplanting. If you have a window that is not directly to the North - you can move tomatoes there. Pot them up in a styrofoam cups trying to bury as much stem as you can - they develop the additional roots on the buried stem - and keep them on the window.

Good Luck

Irina

Easy way to raise the plants is to prop the trays on piles of books (you should have a lot of those around but you probably need to use them for your studies), or sturdy boxes, shelves, cinderblocks, whatever is handy. Or hang the lights on some cheap chains with S hooks and adjust the lights as needed.

I agree with Irina on the number of trays per shop light, assuming a 4 foot shop light. I've done lots of seeds and her numbers are accurate.

Good luck and have fun! Where do you live now and do you have a permanent place for the plants when spring and summer roll around?

What you could probably do is get some small chain from the hardware store and some "S" hooks and suspend the lights from the chain with the "S" hooks under the loft. This way you can raise/lower the lights as needed.

And the lights definantly need to be within a few inches from the plants. Even if the the plant touches the light there will be no problem, the lights are cool.

I use cool white tubes in my setup.

I put three trays side by side under 2 shoplights side by side (4 tubes total). The shop lights are spaced about 3 to 4 inches apart.

Regards,
sd

The chains are a great idea. You might consider, since space is at a premium, some "dwarf" varieties....It's going to be hard to have a decent harvest of vegies indoors w/ only these lights. Are you planning to transplant outdoors when the weather warms up....?

Thanks for the help everyone

Right now I am in probably the most northern portion of Michigan you can be in. Late April I will be taking myself and all these plants down state for summer vacation and will plant them into the family garden.

I picked up some extra chains for a couple dollars and dropped the lights down so they are only a few inches above the plants. Since about 1/2 my original seeds have made it to this point I am going to try and consolidate what I have growing into the minimum number of containers as possible. With my room facing east towards a snow covered hill a fair ammount of light enters the window, so I will be trying to move those tomatoes into the window later this week when I get some free time.

I will be adding more pictures tomorrow afternoon when I have some free time. Thanks again for the tips and advice so far!

Your college ends in late April? Lucky you. Can you plant outdoors in late April in Michigan without risking a frost? Here in Maryland that would be iffy.

Frost safe, I think, is around May 15th. Though I have heard from a few people the warming climate we are having should allow for things to be planted outside a week earlier than what is typical, I will probably use that week or two to harden my plants off so they transition from indoors to outdoors with less troubles. At night when they may frost I will be bringing them back inside.

We carry fluorescent grow lights designed for use in a shop light, or alternately higher powered compact fluorescents that use a special fixture. These lights are designed to more closely mimic the light of the sun. Check out our one stop indoor growing web site.

Here is a link that might be useful: thegrowstore.com