Starting Seedlings

Five days ago I planted seeds in a starting tray as you can see on the right. I planted a variety of tomato seeds, a couple peppers, and artichokes. Of course all of the seeds say they will take two weeks to germinate, but many of my tomatoes only took three days! This was a bit of a problem because I hadn't figured out yet how I was going to provide enough light for them. On day three there were just a few barely poking up out of the soil, and when I came home from work on day four they were already all long and spindly due to a lack of light.

Today I am trying to get more light to them, but I only have a single compact fluorescent grow light. We do get some sun through our windows, but we don't really have any windows that get sun all day.

Yesterday I was looking at grow lights online, and was surprised that the entire low-cost industry appears to cater to home marijuana growers. All of the websites brag about "discreet packaging," have disclaimers that "our products are only intended for legal uses," and all eBay auctions are private so that others cannot see who is bidding. When I did a Google search for reviews of one of the lights, every single "reviewer" was from one cannabis growing forum or another.

It seems weird to contemplate buying lights from a company that so willingly supplies drug growers, but when they are half the price of any of the "normal" gardening stores, I may just go for it.

Yes, I could just buy transplants and not have to spend money on starting supplies or lights, but this is half the fun. By growing my own transplants I can grow any variety of plant I want, instead of what the nursery decides I should grow, and with transplants now costing $2-$3 each, it shouldn't take long to pay back the investment.