Looks like my sprout has some neighbors to hang out with. I took a good look and counted ...
Fourteen sprouts!
I'm sure I'll have more than enough contenders for the prize. And incidentally, I've got a couple green onion sprouts showing in the top grow pan, too!
And now that I'm seeing some green, it's time to switch on the combined 120 watts of growlight power of the Mater-Matic. Each is color balanced to 5500K and provides full-spectrum light ... a TON of it too!
Viva Las Vegas!
When you read the comments on Amazon about these lights, they are overwhelmingly positive. I especially like the one where the person said his plants grew a half inch a day :)))
I'm going to set them to run 15 hours a day. They produce hardly any heat, but what little they produce will add to the overall coziness of the Mater-Matic, so their 'day' will be at night to help counter the cold.
I've also decided that I'm going to stick with the 'bottom up' approach to watering. While I didn't know this when I started out, there is a name for it - capillary action. And while this can be done with a wick (a piece of cotton or nylon twine), it can also be done with soil. As long as soil touches the the water, it will draw up just the amount of moisture needed to keep the soil above it moist, but not saturated. Based on both DIY and commercial setups that I've researched, I believe I'm on the right track. And after checking the moisture content on the surface many times over this week, it seems to be working quite well for me. The only modification I did over the original setup was to run three pieces of straight plastic (cut from the bottom of some kiddie clothes hangers) in between the rows on the underside of each flat, so that the flats would sit atop the reservoirs and not in them. This gives me about an inch of clearance between the flat and reservoir bottoms, and about a quarter inch of clearance between the flat bottom and the overflow drain, so that's all the deeper my flats go into the water. It also gives me more water in the reservoir to act as a heat sink, which I believe will contribute to temperature regulation and cut back on heat lamp cycles.
Rock on, Mater-Matic!
Passing the smack around. You're next! Since I had to go easy on Dad today with his under the weather seedling and under the weather-"weather", I'm giving you a double dose.
ReplyDeleteLet me know if you find any "Dummies" books on "How to Count Sprouts" cause all I see is seven; and that's on the generous side. Ask Dad if you can borrow some worm poop for the three on the right. They're really tough to look at. Eeesh, it's like looking at dead squirrel...
Okay that was so mean, but I'm falling out of my chair laughing right now. I'm so glad you and Dad taught me how to blog. Aren't you??