Mold in my Light Warrior

[reebus]

This is my second year growing chilies and I'm still looking for new and better ways to germinate seeds. I decided to do something new and germ some seeds in small dixie cups with some FF Light Warrior seed starting mix. After soaking a few different varieties of seeds for 24 hrs in diluted h202 water solution, I sowed them into the moist mix and then placed the dixie cups into a humidity dome with a heating pad underneath. After a day or so, a thin layer of mold formed on the top with some fuzz, but quickly disappeared after misting. Another few days went by and the mold got thicker and it turned a crust (moist) with white spots.
 
Although some seeds did germ, abeit just fair %, I'm just wondering if this mold is bad for seedlings. I know that some fungus is beneficial but my resulting germination didn't show that it really did anything good. I still have a full bag of the stuff but didn't want to waste any more seeds in it. (lost all Jay's Peach Ghost Scorpion). The stuff is a little expensive and have had much better results other ways.
 
This bag of Light Warrior was recently bought and opened by me just before using it. Also, just after opening, I did a little inspecting and found some yellowish fungal matter on the surface. It looked like chunks of yellow mushrooms that broke up easily in my hand. I was a little sketchy but have seen mushroom-like materials in media before so I used it anyways.
 
Maybe it was stored wrong? Maybe I'm just paranoid.

 

[juanitos]

i let my seeds germinate out of soil (ziploc + paper towel) once they get a 1cm or so root coming out i stick them in cup with soil and water them in.  I have no fear letting paper towel(or coffee filter) sit damp because it's food grade, sterilized, and packaged. I don't want the soil to ever be super moist (like with your humidity dome) for an extended period of time because you never know how long its sat there or where its been, and there are less checks then on food grade stuff.
 
If your soil was sterilized and stored correctly it shouldn't be growing that stuff, but i don't even take the risk of giving mold / whatever optimal conditions to grow.

 
 

 

[McGuiver]

I have tried to no end sprouting seeds in peat moss. I always get mold or algae growth with bad results. I do pre-soak my seeds in salt peter and have gotten good result in sprouting this way. I now only sprout mine in wet paper towels in ziplock bags. I only use Reverse Osmosis water to eliminate algae and other bad things in the water.

I have had on average about 75 % germination rate this way. Once the seeds get their tails, they go into the peat moss potting soil.

1. Soak seeds for 24 hours in Salt Peter. 1 teaspoon Salt Peter per quart of water. (RO water only)
2. Place soaked and washed seeds in wet paper towel and ziplock bag. (RO water only)
3. Place on heat mat at 83 deg F and wait for seed tails.
4. Once tails sprout, place seed in Sunshine #4 potting mix. Water with RO water and CalMag+.
5. Place sprouting seed with container on heat mat at 83 deg F.

After much trial and error, this has yielded my best results.
Hope this helps.

I have had mold takeover seeds sprouting, and the seeds died.

 

[reebus]

 
 
If your soil was sterilized and stored correctly it shouldn't be growing that stuff, but i don't even take the risk of giving mold / whatever optimal conditions to grow.

 
I'll admit that I don't practice the most sterile methods of seed germination, but I was under the impression that this mix was ready-to-go. Wouldn't sterilizing the soil kill all of the beneficial fungi as well? Would it be a waste to buy it and then sterilize it? Or just better to just try a different, sterile way of germination. I'm just confused why they would call it "Seed Starting Mix" then.

 

[mrgrowguy]

I use peat/perlite 50/50 mix and have usually have very good success. Of course I germinate first in a sandwich bag with damp paper towel over a heat mat, but once the tails sprout, I move them to the 50/50 mix, and the two that died on me the last run died because I think I broke the root as I was burying them.
 
PS: I generally prefer using rockwool cubes, but when I have a LOT of seeds germinating, the cubes can get expensive. So I throw a few into the 50/50 mix and those are the ones I give out to friends. I had so may successes, I had to kill off a few dozen last run just by tossing them in the trash. see this post about the cubes - http://thehotpepper.com/topic/45358-when-to-water-no-harm-in-letting-it-wilt-a-smidge/?p=953861
 
I do have algae growth on the top soil on about 5% of the plants with the peat mix, but a spritz of h202 dilute can help with that. And the top soil can be removed and replaced easily. This only seems to occur when I sprout plants in the window, the ones in my grow rooms have never grown algae.. .not really sure why though

 

[rebelgrower3]

Light Warrior has beneficial microbes in it maybe this is what your seeing on top of the medium. I'm using Happy Frog and it gets a white crust look to the top and I'm almost positive it's just the beneficial microbes in it.

 

[Mallory]

This is my second year growing chilies and I'm still looking for new and better ways to germinate seeds. I decided to do something new and germ some seeds in small dixie cups with some FF Light Warrior seed starting mix.

 
Same story here, used those 3oz dixie cups this year and had much lower germ rates than usual. I did some invesigating and found my problem was that the seeds were migrating deeper into the cup even with careful watering with a spray bottle. I planted them at 4mm deep and they were ending up 1" deep. They were rotting. The reason the seeds wouldn't stay put, is because seed starting mix is light, and the cups were too deep (2").
 
Don't know if this is your problem. You said you lost the Peach Ghosts, did they sprout and then die? In that case it could be a damping off issue.
 
I fixed it by planting a second round of seeds, except this time I only filled the dixie cups 1/2 way with soil, and I used fox farm ocean forest soil because it is dense. Worked great. I have to up-pot sooner but really not an issue since they are being transplanted into the same potting soil they sprouted in.
 
If you can get ocean forest or happy frog, mix it 50/50 with your light warrior and you will have plenty of good soil for seed starting and up-potting. I don't think there is any need to throw it out.
 

Light Warrior has beneficial microbes in it maybe this is what your seeing on top of the medium. I'm using Happy Frog and it gets a white crust look to the top and I'm almost positive it's just the beneficial microbes in it.

 
+1 on this, my ocean forest had a white fuzzy mold for a few days on the surface, I think I was over watering. I also do not think it was a harmful mold. Now a couple of containers have a neon green algae looking growth but the plants seem happy. I'm glad fox farms doesn't sterilize their soil.

 

[reebus]

 

PS: I generally prefer using rockwool cubes, but when I have a LOT of seeds germinating, the cubes can get expensive. So I throw a few into the 50/50 mix and those are the ones I give out to friends. I had so may successes, I had to kill off a few dozen last run just by tossing them in the trash. see this post about the cubes - http://thehotpepper.com/topic/45358-when-to-water-no-harm-in-letting-it-wilt-a-smidge/?p=953861
 
I do have algae growth on the top soil on about 5% of the plants with the peat mix, but a spritz of h202 dilute can help with that. And the top soil can be removed and replaced easily. This only seems to occur when I sprout plants in the window, the ones in my grow rooms have never grown algae.. .not really sure why though

 
I use the cubes as well with excellent results. I was just experimenting with different methods to see what works best.
 
I love a good h202 solution. I put that stuff on everything.
 

 

 
Don't know if this is your problem. You said you lost the Peach Ghosts, did they sprout and then die? In that case it could be a damping off issue.

 
At first they didnt sprout at all, although some other varieties did just fine. But recently I did some digging around in the dixie cup and I found that 1/3 seeds actually poked out a tail. The other 2/3 I couldn't find so who knows, maybe they'll shoot up in time. This is great news since that was the last of that variety that I had.
 
 

Light Warrior has beneficial microbes in it maybe this is what your seeing on top of the medium. I'm using Happy Frog and it gets a white crust look to the top and I'm almost positive it's just the beneficial microbes in it.

 
Yea that is what I'm seeing in these cups... I didn't know if this was normal or not. I just didn't want to keep doing this if it were harmful to my very young seedlings. So I'm guessing that this is OK due to the fact that these soil mixes contain these beneficials in it. I also use FFOF in my regular potting mix along with coir and verm.
 
Thank you all for the help!!!