When to start your seeds in a greenhouse
Seed Starting in greenhouses
March 8 2011 this is another installment
of edible acres we're at a set of
greenhouses out here in Truman's burg
New York that will be another video to
give a proper introduction to them what
I wanted to show today was first round a
seed starting it's the first week of
March second week of March I guess and
in here it's starting to get upwards to
60 70 80 x 90 degrees during the day
when it's sunny out depending how cold
it is even if it's like 20 25 degrees
outside on a sunny day it's getting
really warm in here so I thought it's
time to start some seeds let's see so
these are all salvaged seed starts or
seed starting trays I should say these
greenhouses were abandoned a couple
years ago and what was left was all over
the place there were pots and things
related to a seed starting business that
was here before so we've accumulated and
built some shelves to store them inside
and are using them again for starting
our own seeds and let's see novel idea
here you can see the the tags or the
markers for each of these are actually
made out of split bamboo so variety I
found down them along the Delaware River
in New Jersey I cut up a bunch and
brought back here and I cut them to
length and split them with a little buck
knife and so these are biodegradable and
should be pretty sturdy just use a
graphite pencil on them so if it breaks
down the soil it's not a big deal you
can see I got the date and here's a flat
of anise hyssop there's some right next
to it as well you can see the two look
different because this is a normal seed
starting mix on the right and same on
the left here but a friend of mine runs
a flower mill right next to here called
farmer ground flower you should look
them up online if you're in the if ethic
our Finger Lakes area anyway he has a
hmm whole bunch of buckwheat hulls and
so he's got this huge bag of them they
dropped off here and I'm trialing them
as a mulch for seed starting so that's
what's happening here you can see along
all through here and here's an example
of arugula and arugula but the one on
the left has all that buckwheat hull
just to see if that improves germination
or improves water retention and all that
speaking of water you can see at the
very back the northwest corner of the
greenhouse is a 1500 gallon cistern
which is a huge benefit to us to have
here and there's a black tube that goes
into the top of it you can see right
there and that runs all the way along
here back along hits a tee in the corner
sorry it's a mess over there goes
outside we have a segment that's out
right now that goes all the way down
connects up in series down to that pond
over there in which there is a sump pump
that's submerged in a five-gallon bucket
with holes punched in it so silt doesn't
clog it we plug in that sump pump you
can see there's an extension line here
obviously it's not in service in the
winter but that sump pump goes on slowly
but surely fills this half inch diameter
black inflexible tubing up through here
and all along this are tiny tiny
pinprick holes that have been drilled so
as its as its filling it's shooting
little arcs of water to water all these
other garden beds which we'll look at it
another time goes in there fills that up
and then from there there's a delivery
at the bottom I can open up that brings
to a hose all along the south edge right
now I'm using the hose to kind of define
the edge of the pathway off to the left
here is direct seeded cilantro and mush
and kale and kohlrabi and all the like
and some raspberries being propagated so
the hose keeps us in line so we know to
stay out to the right of it anyway use
the hose fill these little guys up and
then use that to fill the watering can
and then start watering seems cumbersome
but this way we don't actually have to
have a well here and we just use a
standard half horsepower sump pump you
know once a month
once every other week something like
that to keep this whole area watered and
also in the theme of keeping things
watered I just hung these huge sheets
there's an off roll of Egyptian cotton
that was donated to some friends of mine
and so I cut these lengths hung them on
really heavy gauge electric wire
stainless steel electric fencing wire in
between these trellises and then just
stapled them along the top with a
standard staple do to do it right down
the line
so these huge sheets are hanging here
facing or just south of all these flats
so and they're kind of aligned right now
so that midday Sun is blocked from
hitting these flats until these things
germinate I really don't want them to
get overwhelmed with Sun heat and the
drying power of the Sun so these sheets
kind of help that and then once they
germinate they can slide back kind of
like curtains to let more light into
here once these guys are established
enough they'll get transplanted into
these garden beds and then out into the
field as appropriate and in here we've
got showed the anise hyssop
there's arugula a couple varieties of
red Russian kale and red boar kale whole
bunch of flats of giant thick leaf
spinach there's a couple flats of dill a
bunch of flats of leeks down there on
the far end some phenols that we're
trying out just to see what they do and
then you can see down here is a
continuation these are more leeks into a
lot of weeks this year they're stinging
nettle and a couple of time and this is
actually almost raw kind of a middle
unfinished compost in here a bunch of
hay Belle's coffee grinds and then
mulched with straw so hopefully these
will create a like vague sense of
radiative heat moisture into the bottom
of the trays that sit on here you can
see we can actually load this up so
there's two here repeat that all the way
down this whole line
to that far compost bin should be able
get 400 200 maybe even 300 flats of
seedlings in here going at once the
beauty part is all this snow load a huge
snowstorm the other night is up against
the plastic as that melts it hits the
soil right underneath here so it keeps
all these beds really moist so to be
warm moist stuff coming up through the
flats and then I can tap water them as
needed so this is the first round of
seed starting in here hoping to do many
thousands of seedlings this year ideally
ten thousand plants come out of these
greenhouses this year so we'll see what
comes to that and we'll keep you abreast
as we go along thanks for watching this
whole thing
