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No sprouts yet?

I planted my yellow habs and serranos a week ago today and still no sprouts out of almost 200 seeds. Should I be worried? Did I do something wrong? I used the soil plugs that came in one of those plastic mini greenhouses, watered them, let them expand, and then put the seeds in the soil about a quarter inch deep, and put the cover on. And nothing. Did I blow it already lol?
 
Well im keeping them at room temperature which is about 68 degrees in my house. However, they are in the sunniest window I have so taking the sun into account they are probably at about 70 degrees. As a guesstimate lol
 
A week is fine. They take a few days to sprout, then a few more to establish the tap root. This is before they even break the soil. You should see your serranos breaking soil sometime in the second week and the habs will follow shortly after.
 
You should see some sprouts within a week but I wouldn't panick yet. Personally I'd find some sort of bottom heat to help speed germination?
 
I too am experiencing low sprout rates in comparison to past years, with the exception of some Fresno that I tossed in some soil in Dec and now have 8 Fresno about 7", lots of leaves and I am pinching tiny sprouts.
With that success I followed up some habanero in Jan and 1 sprouted out of 10-15 seeds and has stopped growing. I planted 6 serano and only 1 sprouted. 4 Bulgarian Carrot 2 sprouted. 4 Fatalii 2 sprouted both with seed still stuck on, I got one seed off successfully the other not. 4 Bishops Caps 2 sprouted only 1 pushed through the soil when transplanted. 6 golden habs not one has sprouted. This year I am doing the paper towel and ziploc bag laying on the hot pad - temperature says 90F (all were planted mid March). This morning I found my peat pellets and am thinking of giving that a try, 2 seeds per pod laying on the heat pad. Yesterday, I even tried a mix of fulvic acid that someone gave me a free sample - starting to get nervous.

HPIM1753.jpg


Left is hab that hasn't moved in 2 months, centre is Fatalli planted mid March, right is Bishop's Cap planted mid March.
 
Not sure it's a good idea to put them in the sun. The directions I got with my coir plugs said NO DIRECT SUN until they sprout. A higher temp would be recommended also; 68f is marginal at best.
 
Burning Colon said:
This year I am doing the paper towel and ziploc bag laying on the hot pad - temperature says 90F

I think that AJ posted a graph that shows When the temperature gets past around 85F the germination rate starts to drop off. 90F is a little to high.

(AJ should put that graph as a sticky. It definitely shows that you can cook your seeds very easily.)
 
Try to keep your temps (debatable) as close to 80F as possible. For germination keeping them in a "greenhouse" type environment, I've heard of people using tupperware, light doesn't matter, just heat. Or they sell those mini jiffy greenhouses, that happens to be what I'm trying this year, or just wrap your seed squares with plastic wrap(what I did last year and that worked fine).

As SOON as they sprout get them as much light as possible...
Burning Colon
Left is hab that hasn't moved in 2 months, centre is Fatalli planted mid March, right is Bishop's Cap planted mid March.
Just a thought, I had the same problem with some habs last year, even though they were in a window, they were not getting the best light, the MORE light the better. I didn't want to put such small seedlings outside yet, and none of my windows provided ENOUGH light, so I lined a shoebox with tinfoil, bought a $15 "aquarium/plant" florescent light from walmart (may want to research lighting on this forum, but most cheap florescence will get the job done)(you want the light as close to the plants as possible) put my sprouts inside the box, with the light resting on top shining in....I even cut little grooves in the sides of the box just to make the light fit about an inch inside, and put a "lift" under my smaller seedlings to bring them closer to the light. LITERALLY the next day the true leaves had doubled in size, and within a week the plant had tripled in size with a total of 6 leaves...and was well on it's way to being put outside
 
oh, also, some debate over what to line the shoebox in. AFTER i did this way, which did work, it has been said that the spectrum of light that the plants need is better reflected by the "flat white" color instead of the reflective aluminum foil. I have even heard people say a flat white is better than a mirror.....but, tin foil was easy
 
Here's what I did;

MiniGreenHouse-SV-1.jpg


And this morning I've got my first 4 Habanero sprouts after almost 5 months of trying. This is day 5 and there are 16 more seeds to come up. Needless to say I'm overjoyed. The temp here hasn't gone under 80f in 2 weeks with day time at 98 & 99f. Oh, and those are coir plugs. :)
 
i suggest buying a heating pad, it will keep your temps constantly around 80 or above....if you really wanna get hightech, get a thermostat with an extended temperature coil that you can put into the soil

heating pad only $15

thermostat....well, a little bit more, haha

but a heating pad really is great, you'll see a lot faster results, it's about constant temperature
 
I didn't want to hijack Elements post and I am sure his situation is just timing, expecting seeds to sprout in 1 week is just not a realistic time frame and I am sure he will enjoy a fruitful sprouting very soon.

In my situation the temperature says 90F but that is the thermometer directly on the plastic tub, under is plastic tub, on the heat pad are two CD liners and on top of that are some card board spacers to help keep the temperature stablized, my guess of the true temperature is somewhere between 75-85F, as you have to remember the existing plants are in their container separated by soil. The germination bag is on a cardboard spacer and not directly on the plastic. What you don't see is a GE grow light above the plants, in the day I leave the cover off the mini green house and at night, like right know at 10:00pm I turn the light off and put the cover over the green house for night time humidity and heat. In the day, I remove the cover to allow the soil to dry. The grow light sits approximately 1" above the plants. The light is a floresent GE Bright Stik, Gro & Sho meant for plants, it is 2ft long. For germination, I soaked my seed overnight in a solution of half water & hydrogen peroxide. Then, placed them on the moistened paper towel and put them into the ziploc bag. I have the bag folded so the seam lies directly under the seedlings, then the bag is on top of a cardboard spacer so no direct heat from the heat pad touches the germination bag. If I touch the bag it is warm but not hot. If I touch the soil of the plants it is slightly warm but again not hot. I am not sure, maybe just having a shitty luck year for seedlings. The soil that the existing seedlings are in is Shultz seedling mixture and I thought this might be what has stunted the slow growth of the seedlings. I did get some germination in the ziploc just not with the golden habanero.

My only real concern is the Fatalii as I have never grown them before and want to be successful, I have 50 seeds just incase of such an episode of having a poor growing season but my season is so short that even 1 month for me can mean disaster. All my seeds are new from an online company with a retail operation. Since I have had some success, I am not questioning the seeds but my technique, again first time doing the ziploc thing. Only the golden habanero haven't sprouted with this technique and the fatalii and bishop caps both experienced seeds holding onto the first leaves. The tail sprouts where a good 1/4" when I bedded them.

Since I am a stay at home dad, the plants get full-time attention. I keep the inside house temperature at approximately 68F but that shouldn't effect the mini green house. During the day, the plants do get hit by direct sunlight through a window for a short period of time. Outside is not an option for me as my daytime highs are still in the 5C zone/ 37F. (not that this has anything to due with the seedlings).

My over wintered plants are doing extremely well and I am enjoying various pods right now and many more are producing; they are in the same room as the seedlings but are lined up on an 8 foot window ledge facing south. My ceyenne has several long pods and my super chili is loaded with fruit.
 
Where can I get a heating pad for only 15 bucks? The only ones ive found are about 30 and im not looking to spend that much lol
 
Burning Colon said:
I didn't want to hijack Elements post and I am sure his situation is just timing, expecting seeds to sprout in 1 week is just not a realistic time frame and I am sure he will enjoy a fruitful sprouting very soon.

In my situation the temperature says 90F but that is the thermometer directly on the plastic tub, under is plastic tub, on the heat pad are two CD liners and on top of that are some card board spacers to help keep the temperature stablized, my guess of the true temperature is somewhere between 75-85F, as you have to remember the existing plants are in their container separated by soil. The germination bag is on a cardboard spacer and not directly on the plastic. What you don't see is a GE grow light above the plants, in the day I leave the cover off the mini green house and at night, like right know at 10:00pm I turn the light off and put the cover over the green house for night time humidity and heat. In the day, I remove the cover to allow the soil to dry. The grow light sits approximately 1" above the plants. The light is a floresent GE Bright Stik, Gro & Sho meant for plants, it is 2ft long. For germination, I soaked my seed overnight in a solution of half water & hydrogen peroxide. Then, placed them on the moistened paper towel and put them into the ziploc bag. I have the bag folded so the seam lies directly under the seedlings, then the bag is on top of a cardboard spacer so no direct heat from the heat pad touches the germination bag. If I touch the bag it is warm but not hot. If I touch the soil of the plants it is slightly warm but again not hot. I am not sure, maybe just having a shitty luck year for seedlings. The soil that the existing seedlings are in is Shultz seedling mixture and I thought this might be what has stunted the slow growth of the seedlings. I did get some germination in the ziploc just not with the golden habanero.

My only real concern is the Fatalii as I have never grown them before and want to be successful, I have 50 seeds just incase of such an episode of having a poor growing season but my season is so short that even 1 month for me can mean disaster. All my seeds are new from an online company with a retail operation. Since I have had some success, I am not questioning the seeds but my technique, again first time doing the ziploc thing. Only the golden habanero haven't sprouted with this technique and the fatalii and bishop caps both experienced seeds holding onto the first leaves. The tail sprouts where a good 1/4" when I bedded them.

Since I am a stay at home dad, the plants get full-time attention. I keep the inside house temperature at approximately 68F but that shouldn't effect the mini green house. During the day, the plants do get hit by direct sunlight through a window for a short period of time. Outside is not an option for me as my daytime highs are still in the 5C zone/ 37F. (not that this has anything to due with the seedlings).

My over wintered plants are doing extremely well and I am enjoying various pods right now and many more are producing; they are in the same room as the seedlings but are lined up on an 8 foot window ledge facing south. My ceyenne has several long pods and my super chili is loaded with fruit.

for germinating i personally would leave the cover on 24/7 until they sprout, light doesn't matter, just consistent heat and moisture

for new baby sprouts, i would completely separate from the "greenhouse effect" all together for now. And heat isn't too important as long as they stay at least at 70F. And I would give them light 1"away 24/7 until they start getting significantly bigger

Element said:
Where can I get a heating pad for only 15 bucks? The only ones ive found are about 30 and im not looking to spend that much lol
sh!t, i dunno, i found mine at a ma and pa hippy plant place.....but still $30 for something that will speed up your germination rate significantly and you can use year after year after year...not bad
 
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