Germinating seeds, how warm water to use and do you keep them in dark?

Blossom21

Blossom21

Active Member
Just two fast questions about germinating seeds, i'm planning to use the soaking in water -> paper towel method (unless someone knows better methods ofc).

How warm water should i use to do this, and should i keep the glass of water/paper towel thing in dark or light? I read that you should maintain ambient temperature between 68-78f (20-25c) when doing this.

How you guys do it and what's the success rate? Cheers.
 
I use very warm water and a splash of peroxide (to kill any fungus or bacteria that may be on the seed)
I only soak for 12 hours tho and keep it somewhere warm around 70 degrees.
I then put them in a paper towel and once again keep them warm.
Usually sprouts withing 24 to 48 hours after that.
The only time I've ever had an issue with seeds not sprouting was two strains, and I believe it was the breeders fault and not of my own since others had the same issue. (Maybe the seeds were too fresh or too old..idk)
 
ganga gurl420 said:
I use very warm water and a splash of peroxide (to kill any fungus or bacteria that may be on the seed)
I only soak for 12 hours tho and keep it somewhere warm around 70 degrees.
I then put them in a paper towel and once again keep them warm.
Usually sprouts withing 24 to 48 hours after that.
The only time I've ever had an issue with seeds not sprouting was two strains, and I believe it was the breeders fault and not of my own since others had the same issue. (Maybe the seeds were too fresh or too old..idk)
Click to expand...
What would you consider "very warm" water to be, like almost steaming hot or? I wanna be sure before making something stupid haha. 70F doesn't seem to be "that" warm, my room temperature is between 74-77F, that should be okay without any extra warmers?
Aotea Med_Men said:
i use this method never fails me but put the seeds on the hot water cylinder
Click to expand...
Hot water cylinder?
 
I just put them straight into soil, water them in, and leave them alone. I normally get 100% germination. Messing with paper towels and all that is a waste of time. By the time you germinate in paper towels and then plant in what you're growing in a seed that was planted straight into soil is already developing the roots. You can do the paper towel method but it's not necessary.

seedling1.jpg

seedling2.jpg
 
Holy cow... Paper towel, h2o2, water temps, best methods....!

The best method is straight to the medium you are using as by default the most important aspect would be colinization of root from bacteria and fungi.

Once you master this lets talk a 12-24 hour soak as the whole paper towel thing is ameture'ish imo. Im pretty certain once the seed is 100% hydrated it is at 100% max growth, soaking just speeds up hydration and past that i can see no futher benefits to keeping it in a paper towel over its new home.

Some may see different but in all ways the soak and plant is the quickest.

Mj isnt really that temp dependant so any water and any temp so long as its .either too hot or cold. For paper towels natural unbleached type, hemp if ylu think that makes you even more supercool.

I use the soak to get more precise timimgs and suggest there is no rush until you have everything down :-)
 
xtsho said:
I just put them straight into soil, water them in, and leave them alone. I normally get 100% germination. Messing with paper towels and all that is a waste of time. By the time you germinate in paper towels and then plant in what you're growing in a seed that was planted straight into soil is already developing the roots. You can do the paper towel method but it's not necessary.

seedling1.jpg

seedling2.jpg
Click to expand...

Little things like those leaf curls and serrations pointing up or down pissed me off about flourescents and such lights in general. Did i find more light made for less of that idk but felt that way at the time :-)
 
Blossom21 said:
What would you consider "very warm" water to be, like almost steaming hot or? I wanna be sure before making something stupid haha. 70F doesn't seem to be "that" warm, my room temperature is between 74-77F, that should be okay without any extra warmers?

Hot water cylinder?
Click to expand...
The cylinder that holds your hot water just on top of that and 36 hours should be good
 
Kingrow1 said:
Little things like those leaf curls and serrations pointing up or down pissed me off about flourescents and such lights in general. Did i find more light made for less of that idk but felt that way at the time :-)
Click to expand...


I don't even pay attention to a little curling when seedlings are this young. They grow out of it and a week from now you won't even know. Too many people obsess when the plants leaves are not perfect and start trying to fix something that will resolve itself. I just leave them alone and let them grow. I germinate many seeds from many different plants. All of them at times will have weird looking leaves sometimes. In the end they all grow just fine. But that's probably because I don't freak out and start dumping stuff on them, worrying about runoff pH, spraying with CalMag, etc... :bigjoint:

Cannabis is an easy to grow plant. There is absolutely no need to do anything special to get it to grow. I start my seeds the same way I do with tomatoes, peppers, squash, cucumbers, flowers, etc... I put the seed in some dirt and give it a little water. Keep it in a reasonably warm location. No need for paper towels, heat mats, domes, etc... I know you know that. But too many others don't and follow some convoluted process for starting seeds.
 
Well i went and put my seeds in glasses of water and they're sitting at 75-76F temperature cabinet. I'll most likely follow the paper method when the seeds sink in the bottom.

Wish me luck guys :blsmoke:
 
When seeds sink its time to plant not put in paper towels - seriously need to drop the paper towel obssesion :-)
 
Dude, do whatever you are comfortable with. I soak 24hrs in water. Then into paper towels and then into little pots. This is what i do and i get 99% with this method. I never get that % with direct sowing.
 
Blossom21 said:
Yeah it's a little bit confusing when everyone is doing different things. Btw, should i give the seedlings light straight after planting them in soil?
Click to expand...


Give them light as soon as they start to break the surface.

The thing with youtube is most of the video's are infomercials pushing products or some dude that doesn't know what they're talking about and are just seeking some youtube fame and growing their subscribers.
 
xtsho said:
Give them light as soon as they start to break the surface.

The thing with youtube is most of the video's are infomercials pushing products or some dude that doesn't know what they're talking about and are just seeking some youtube fame and growing their subscribers.
Click to expand...
So keep them in dark 'til they start to break the surface, should i put some kind of dome on top of it to keep the humidity up? I don't have a humidifier and RH is around 45% in my house.
 
crimsonecho said:
Dude, do whatever you are comfortable with. I soak 24hrs in water. Then into paper towels and then into little pots. This is what i do and i get 99% with this method. I never get that % with direct sowing.
Click to expand...

Strange as the rest of us get near on 100% germination by direct sowing....

Must be your error not ours because it aint hard :-)
 
Blossom21 said:
So keep them in dark 'til they start to break the surface, should i put some kind of dome on top of it to keep the humidity up? I don't have a humidifier and RH is around 45% in my house.
Click to expand...

It doesn't really matter. They just need light once they start to break the surface. It won't hurt for them to be under light before they break the surface. Just be careful that they don't dry out. I never use a dome when sprouting seeds. They don't need it and excess moisture can lead to dampening off and the loss of your seedling.
 
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