How To Start Seeds Indoors _ Our Indoor Seed Starting Set Up

Hey, I'm Maggie from the blog BackToTheLandLiving.com and in today's video I want to share with you our seed starting set up. So this year we decided to start our seeds indoors for the first time and so I thought I'd share with you how we have it set up, our materials, what seeds we're starting and just how to do it yourself if you're looking to start some seeds indoors this year. So thanks so much for being here and let's get into the video. So to start your own seeds you're going to need the seeds themselves, you're going to need soil, some trays or something to start them in, a light source and a source of heat. So when you think about planting your garden and you think about what vegetables you want to have in the garden, to know if they need to be started indoors or not you can just look on the back of your seed package and they'll tell you how soon to start them indoors. So indoors we have started all of our tomatoes and our peppers and then we've started our onions and our leeks and then we've also started things like cabbage, brussel sprouts, broccoli, our flowers, our watermelon and things like that. So I'll leave a complete list on the blog and below of all the seeds that we have started here in our setup. So we decided to use this metal shelf to set up our seeds on but you could use whatever you have, you can set them on a table, whatever space you have available. And then the next thing you need to consider and that we bought were lighting and so you can either go with LED lighting or fluorescent lighting and so we went with both. Initially we bought three of these LED lights and we went with them because they're more energy saving and we plan to go off-grid in the future so we decided to buy those now. But we found we had one light on each shelf and we found that was not enough and so they were stretching to the light and so we decided to double up on top here with our cabbage and watermelon and things like that. And then we still kept one on our leeks and our onions just because we were going with cost savings and thought we'd try this out and we thought that it would be better for the leeks to get a bit laggy and the onions than for things that are growing fruit above the ground. And then we used this fluorescent light because we had it in our barn, it's just a shop light and we needed more light and we didn't want to go to the store so we decided to use this and it's actually working fairly well. So you can use LED or fluorescent as long as you have enough light for your vegetables. So often people want to put them in just a bright window and that is helpful so usually we have this shelf over under that window there and the natural light is assisting the artificial light but if we just had them in a bright window it wouldn't be enough. So if you have a really bright spot in your house it could be helpful to put them there but you probably will need artificial light to supplement that or your plants will get laggy and then when they move outdoors they won't do as well. So you want to make sure you have enough light for your plants. So these cost about $25 for us each and so we've decided to invest a bit now and then that will work out for us in the long term. Another thing you need to think about for your plants is the heat. So we live up here in the barn loft and it's usually pretty cool but since we started our seeds we've been keeping it above 22 to 24 degrees Celsius and so your plants need to be warm enough in order for them to germinate and also to be able to grow. And so you can buy heating mats and often for things like tomatoes and peppers people recommend that but we actually couldn't find one in our local area and so we just decided to try it without them and they have germinated. They took a little bit longer than the other plants but still within pretty much a week they have germinated and they're starting to grow and so we haven't needed a heating mat. After you have your setup and your lights the next thing to think about is what you're going to plant your seeds in and so we have three different setups that we've tried. You can use whatever you have available as long as you have drainage which is really important and you have enough space for the roots to grow. So we have up here is just a seed tray that's a plastic seed tray and it's sitting inside of another tray that holds the water and the tray that the seeds are directly in have a hole in the bottom and so that the water can drain out. So for our onions and our leeks we decided just put them in one big tray, fill it with soil that has holes in the bottom of the tray and set it inside another tray that does not have holes in it and we thought we've tried this method out for our onions and for our leeks. And then down here for our peppers and our tomatoes we just put them in individual little pods that are made out of a cardboard type thing and they have a hole in the bottom for drainage and so we thought we'd try all three of these methods. They're all working well. The nice part about having a slightly larger one is that we can wait a little longer to pot them up whereas this they'll need to be potted up sooner. So for planting your seeds you also are going to need some soil and we just used a seed starting mix. It's called Pro-Mix. It's an organic seed starting mix and we just bought it because it said it was for seed starting just to keep things simple since it's our first time doing it indoors. But you could just buy general soil too if that's all you have available. Just make sure that it's a nice and light soil. It's important for them to also be a well draining soil so you don't get the roots too wet. So once you have all your supplies you can start planting your seeds. So the first thing that I do is wet my soil in the bag because usually the bag of soil is pretty dry and it's nice to have a nice moist soil for planting. So I wet the soil right in that bag and then put the soil into your trays or whatever you're using to plant your seeds in and make sure not to pack it in too hard. You don't want it to be a compact soil so just lightly fill up all of your cells. Then you can put in a little hole and on the back of your seed pack it'll tell you how deep you should be planting them. So follow the instructions for each of the seeds and you put a little hole in and drop your seed in and then dust a little bit more soil on top. So at this point it's important to label each of your seed rows. It can be easy to think that you're going to remember but you probably won't. I know, at least I won't remember. So use whatever you have and just label your seeds with what they are so that you know through the season what you're growing. So after you have your seeds all planted you can mist them and this is a good way to water them before they germinate is just use a little spritzer and mist them so that way you don't disturb the soil. If you pour water directly onto your seeds it can disrupt them so if you just give them a light misting and keep them wet that way until they germinate. After they're all misted and they're ready to go you want to make like a little greenhouse over them with some type of plastic and so this year I used this greenhouse dome for one of the trays that it came with and that worked pretty well but I didn't have it for my other tray so I just used a piece of plastic. This is just a Ziploc baggie that I cut down the sides and I lay this over it and it actually worked really well. So I kept this on until they started to germinate. So once I saw some green popping up I took this off so they could grow up and I wasn't smothering them or anything but for the dome you could leave it on a little bit longer and I kept misting them every day so that they stayed moist and they were able to germinate and it will depend on the seed how long it takes to germinate but while they're germinating you don't need to have a light on so until you start seeing green you don't need to have your light on. We didn't do it and it worked fine. So after they've germinated we take off the plastic except for the taller dome we can leave that on for a little while and we start turning the lights on and so we leave our lights on for about 12 hours a day. We turn them on around 8 and turn them off around 8 and then we also have this rack closer to the window and that helps just for a bit more light as well and we make sure the light is a few inches above the plants so that they don't burn the plants. You don't want them too close so they don't burn them but you also don't want them too far away because if the light is too far away then they'll be growing towards the light and your plant will become laggy which just means they get a really long stem and then they won't be as strong when they are planted outdoors. And then we change the method of watering also when they start to grow because if you spritz them from the top it can cause a condition called dampening off which is when the base of the plant where it meets the soil will get really thin and then it will just fall over and your plant dies and so we try to avoid that by watering them from below and so watering them from below is just we just lift up our tray and put water in the bottom tray. We just put about a quarter inch or less and we don't want them to be sitting in water so we put it in there and then after about an hour if we check it and if there's still water we take our turkey baster and just pull out the extra water because you don't want the roots to be sitting in water. But by watering them from below it helps avoid dampening off and it also avoids any mold that would come. It also encourages your roots to grow deep since the water is down below and they're growing towards the water and they'll be a healthier plant when you put them outdoors. We are also going to be keeping an eye on them and as they get bigger we'll be transplanting them up so they have more space. So we'll wait until they have true leaves. So the first leaves that come out they're the ones with the smooth edges. The true leaves you'll notice they have a bit more of a serrated edge depending on the plant and after it has about two or three of the true leaves sets and it's getting a bit bigger that's when I'll transplant them to a larger container and I'll just use whatever I have that I can either put holes in the bottom or that have holes in the bottom so there's good drainage and so we want to make sure that there's enough room for the plants to grow and not be root bound. And also as they get more leaves so after they have about two or three of their true leaves I will start fertilizing them a little bit just with whatever fertilizer I have on hand. If you want them to be organic you can use an organic fertilizer but that will make sure that they have enough food and they're not depleting the soil completely. So we're going to be keeping them growing in here and making sure they have enough light and water and eventually fertilizer until it's time to put them outdoors and that will be after the last hard frost that we have which probably won't be until around the beginning of June here in New Brunswick. That's what it was last year and so we'll see what the weather is but that's why we've started our seeds about two months before our last frost. So once our last frost date comes we'll be moving them outdoors and before we move them outdoors completely we'll be hardening them off so that's taking them outdoors for a little bit the first day, maybe a quarter of a day, then the next day a half day and then a full day and that gets them used to being outdoors and hardens them off. Also one thing we're going to be giving them in here and we have been giving them is some wind. And so we have a fan that we've been moving around to each shelf and just giving them a bit of a light breeze. They're a little bit small right now but as they grow we'll be giving them some more wind and so if you have a fan it's really important to give them some airflow and so if your plant doesn't have any airflow it can mold or it can make it weak so the airflow helps strengthen the stem and makes them more successful when you plant them outdoors. And if you don't have any source of wind or a fan you can just take your hand and go like this every now and then and that also helps just build their strength but the fan is good for also keeping down any molds and things like that. So this is the way we're at now with our plants. Eventually I'll be thinning these out and just keeping one plant per cell so they're not competing for resources and then the next phase will be to pop them up and then eventually to harden them off and take them outside to our garden. And so as the growing season goes on I'll be sharing with you our process and so if you have any questions about growing vegetables indoors I'd love to hear them. Let us know in the comments and I'll try my best to answer your questions. If you have ever started your seeds indoors and you have some good information to share with us we'd love to hear it. This is our first experience and it's just based off the research that we have done and what we have seen working for us so far. So if you have any great info definitely share it with us we'd love to hear it. Thank you so much for watching. I hope that you'll start some seeds even just a few this year to try to grow some of your own food. If you like this video and you want to see how our garden grows this year please subscribe we'd love to have you along. Thanks so much for being here and I'll see you on the next one.