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Post by Deleted on Mar 14, 2020 9:56:25 GMT -5
i thought I'd posted this yesterday, but apparently I did not get it done.
I have been using ordinary heating pads from the drug store to start plants, bottom heat. I had two, lost one. Went looking, none in any of the thrift store and new ones, even the cheapest, have automatic two-hour cut off switches. NO GOOD, I want 24-hour heat.
So, I lost my head and ordered a genuine built-for-this, plant starting heat mat. I was about to buy one 20 inches x 20 inches, but found that a 20 x 48 was only $7 more, so that is what I ordered. My plants are on a 20 x 34 old computer desk in front of a window, so I will put a 48 x 20 piece of plywood on that.
Now; do you use heat mats? Real built-for-plants mats, or did you do as I did, and cheat with the el-cheapo drug-store heat mats? Are they good for starting cuttings? Anything besides starting seeds?
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Post by ahntjudy on Mar 14, 2020 10:53:05 GMT -5
Good morning @oxankle2 ...
I use plant specific heat mats...vintage Hydrofarm brand...12" x 20"... I got 5 of them them probably back in the early 80's when I grew some stuff from seed back then... Then I got to buying plant starts for a bunch of years and the mats just went back on the shelf... I resurrected them several years ago, they are just like new and work greatly... The only difference between them and new ones is the cost!...I can't believe the current higher price of plant heat mats and know certainly that I would not have paid that price way back then!...
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Post by paulf on Mar 14, 2020 10:57:14 GMT -5
I have been using heating pads for many years. They seem to help with both germination and growth. In the beginning I also used inexpensive heating pads but then discovered that the new ones were made to keep us safe from ourselves. Too many lawsuits, I guess. The relatively inexpensive made for plant heat mats without thermostats work OK for most seedlings. The temperature only goes ten degrees above ambient. Even the thermostated pads only get to around eighty degrees.
That is OK for tomatoes and other seeds that don't require much heat. Peppers need higher temps from beginning to end. For some reason I kept the heater from my son's waterbed. It has a thermostat and will take the temperature up to 120F. If you don't watch out it will melt the plastic trays and 6 pak pots into a mess. I do have a thermometer in the mix just to be able to control the heat. I have not looked for old waterbed stuff but I bet it is available and cheap.
I think it would be better to invest a little more for the plant mats since the cheapest ones seem to last a couple of years before they quit heating. The old heating pads were a danger if they got wet so care had to be taken.
I put a heat mat under all the seeds I plant and since I have six or eight that is enough for me. No experience with cuttings and once the seedlings are in the outside garden the mats go in a drawer to wait for the next year.
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Post by carolyn on Mar 14, 2020 13:47:26 GMT -5
I use plant heat mats. I start too many seeds and take too many cuttings to use regular heating pads. some I have on a thermostat others are just the plug them in kind.
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Post by paquebot on Mar 14, 2020 14:23:05 GMT -5
I've used them the past 5 or 6 years for peppers since they are so slow to germinate. Tomatoes have been only in the cold frame for 15 years but over heat mats to jump-start them the past couple years. To me, too expensive from a garden supply but found some on Craigslist for $5. Otherwise I probably would have continued with a light bulb in a box.
Martin
The truth is more important than the facts.
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Post by Deleted on Mar 14, 2020 16:47:56 GMT -5
Thanks to you all, and greetings as well. I have tomatoes up after three days!!!! I wil not even get the big mat until next week, but if it works as well as this old drugstore mat I'll not lose any time. I had not thought of craigslist as the nearest is Fayetteville, some 90 miles away but we go there at least monthly. I have a cold frame, but I NEED A GREENHOUSE. My friend with the hydroponics setup needs to get on this site's hydro forum---I did not even realize there was such until a few days ago. LOL, I have been buying women bulbs in a vase each Spring since shortly after puberty--I did not realize that was hydroponics.
PS; cold and rainy; as nasty a day as we've had,. except not as cold. Three days of sunshine forecast for NEXT weekend.
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Post by paquebot on Mar 15, 2020 7:30:39 GMT -5
Have not checked what most heat mats are set at for temperature but the ones I have are about 82º. Don't know if that's a pre-set figure or 20º above ambient. Fresh tomato seeds will indeed emerge in about 4 days at that. Mine will go on heat today after a friend and I get the seeds into 4-packs.
Martin
The truth is more important than the facts.
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Post by Deleted on Mar 15, 2020 17:12:59 GMT -5
And now I have this friend who does hydroponics, an old classmate. At our age we are looking into the Kratsky method. There will come a time when digging into the dirt will be more than we can handle.
LOL; today he accidentally turned over his hydroponics rack and spilled all his plants. He put them all back, but he is not sure now which is which. Time will tell.
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Post by Laura_in_FL on Mar 15, 2020 18:23:20 GMT -5
I can definitely attest that heating mats speed both germination and growth.
This was my first year using them. My tomatoes grew faster than I expected, and were also kind of leggy. Tomato seedlings grow stockier if it is a little on the cool side, and my house is already warm enough for them without the heating mat. With the heating mat it was too warm, promoting legginess. On the other hand, pepper germination and growth was faster but the peppers stayed nice and stocky.
So in my conditions, the heating mat is good for the peppers, but not ideal for tomatoes. The only reason I would want to use a heating mat under my tomatoes is if I sowed late and needed to play catch-up. But my house is probably warmer in the winter than most of yours.
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Post by pepperhead212 on Mar 15, 2020 20:17:24 GMT -5
I put the tomato and eggplant seeds on the mat, but I take the tomatoes off, once they are all growing. Peppers I start on the griddle, which is even warmer, but I put the seedlings on the mat, keeping them there for a while, since they don't get overgrown, like the tomatoes. I only keep it at around 78° for the longer term growing, a little higher to start the tomatoes and eggplants. The griddle stays around 88-90°, which is good for peppers.
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Post by Deleted on Mar 17, 2020 8:19:36 GMT -5
SO; Yesterday I decided that I'd take some spindly tomatoes off the heating pad and put them in a S. window, where I had placed a tin pan with seeds of chives, basil and cilantro. I had simply put a plastic bag around that tin pan and put it in the window---no heat.
I wanted to peek at the tin, so I opened the bag---to my surprise it was full of plants and looked better than the tomatoes off the hot pad. Go figure.
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Post by Laura_in_FL on Mar 17, 2020 11:55:08 GMT -5
The plastic bag around the tin pan made a mini-greenhouse. You do have to be careful not to cook your seedlings or get fungal diseases from the humidity in a setup like that.
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Post by paquebot on Mar 19, 2020 0:44:58 GMT -5
This will be an experimental one for the heat mats. Instead of starting the tomatoes inside, the heating mats are in the cold frame. I guess that we have to call it a "warm frame". Advantage will be that there will be natural light to prevent the seedlings from becoming leggy. May have the best of both heat and light.
Martin
The truth is more important than the facts.
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Post by Deleted on Mar 19, 2020 10:30:56 GMT -5
It will work fine, Martin. Remember that the old folk used to bury manure under the cold frame for bottom heat.
LOL; A friend's father, WWI combat vet, reported that in France he would put his sleeping gear atop manure piles for the extra warmth. It seems that over there the cattle were confined and the barns had a manure pile outside every stall. Since the cattle were all gone and the barns empty or destroyed the manure piles were there but weathered and could easily be flattened for a place to sleep. To an old country boy that made sense.
Now you have given me an idea; My leggy plants will go in the cold frame to harden off and shape up.
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