Hi Daniel and a warm welcome to the forum, I'm sure you will get some good info from here.

Congrats on the baby! I'm surprised you got just the one, I would have thought septuplets or maybe an even greater multiple birth would have occured? Are the seeds still intact, or have they rotted? Maybe worth a gentle poke around in the planting pot just to see whats going on. Where were your seeds from if you don't mind me asking? Pity about the other, wasn't it salvageable then?

I'm not able to give any specific feeding info as despite hearing Foliage Pro's praises on here many times, being from the UK, it's not available to us so I can't comment on it's dosage rates. I'm sure someone from the US will come in and help.

Your seedling appears to be growing good and strong, so I can only assume you must be doing things right! Hope you stick around...have you any more DR's?
Gill UK

Hey Gill thanks for the warm welcome. I have already learned a ton from gardenweb, the adenium forum included. Been lurking for a while. I think this particular forum (adenium), has more baby pictures than any other. In fact, I was never really inspired to grow anything from seed until I saw how cool it was to see these plants develop by reading this forum. I guess, based on the number of people growing from seed in this forum, I'm not the only one :)

As to my abysmal germination rate, well, its likely my fault and not the seed stock, there's a long list of things I've since realized I did wrong. Some of the seeds were indeed rotted, some had sprouted but were unable to break the "crust" of turface I put above them (while fines, they weren't very fine, and I made the layer too thick). And some just looked like seeds. The seeds came from adenium-wa.com, via Ebay - they are in australia. I have since got some more seeds from Mr. Ko, and am going to use a small humidity dome/propagator with bottom heat this time around in hopes of increasing my success rate.

I couldn't rescue the guy I knocked over because I literally couldn't find it. I looked again this morning and finally found it sitting on the surface of another pot, I must have missed it before. I threw it in some gritty mix, and maybe it'll recover and thrive. It was probably sitting bare rooted for about a week, maybe more. Here are the two brothers. Pretty obvious which one had the problem, heh. He came up about a week after the bigger one, and was always smaller, btw.

{{gwi:354011}}

I do have one other Adenium, since you asked, that I got from the wonderful Durham Botanicals about 6 weeks ago. It's an Arabicum, had no leaves when I got it. Seems to be doing well, living under lights for the winter - Chris said it would be OK to skip dormancy.

{{gwi:354012}}

I'm still interested in any specifics on feeding seedlings. It doesn't have to be in terms of Foliage Pro dosages, but can be based on whatever anyone uses, as long as NPK and dosage is specified, it would be interesting to me. In the end it comes to down to PPM of macro and micro nutrients in the final solution. I think the most relevant thing is PPM of N, followed by the relationship of other macros and micros to that.

Daniel

Hi Daniel,
Nice to have a new face come to this forum.
Your plant from Chris is quite a wonderful specimen. He is highly regarded among the Adenium growers.
As for Foliage Pro. I have just purchased. I am using it at 1/4 the recommended strength with the more frequent watering than what I would do on older seedling.
Most of my seedlings are in a free draining mix and most of the nutrients they will receive is from my watering/fertilizing management.
With them growing under lights will keep them growing and using the feeding.
Up until this batch of seeds. I had always used 2-7-7 or 24-8-6 at 1/4 strength every watering.
Rick

Daniel, nice Arabicum! I'll have my fingers crossed for little brother seedling, I bet he makes it! Funny, I sowed some of my very first Adenium seeds in a gritty fines mix with turface fine over and I think the same thing happened to many of those with the hard crust thing. I think I didn't keep them misted/moist enough for that mix. I use Foliage Pro on my 6 and 7 month old seedlings at whatever the weekly strength that the bottle says but I've only been doing it maybe a month. They are growing leaves but I can't really tell if the fertilizing is making a difference vs not fertilizing.

-Heather

Welcome to the forum, Daniel!

Congratulations dad!

Feeding seedlings can be done early at a reduced rate like Rick mentioned. I believe some even start at the second set of new leaves.

Congratulations on saving the little guy that dropped.. I really think it will be fine and will catch up soon with its brother!

Watering and feeding these little guys is different to many growers and some like to reduce and some eliminate feeding during the winter months. I personally like to feed them during the winter months while they are growing under lights. I also feed the dormant ones once a month ( reduced FP) with a light watering . I like 1/4 tsp per gallon in the winter and move up in dosage In The spring and then again during the summer to full strength when they are outside and in full sun. I will then fertilize once every 10 days at full strength and water in between to allow a natural flush.

You have mentioned that you water the babies every other day.. The Gritty Mix allows wonderful drainage and I'm sure they are doing well. I don't water mine as much. I usually water ( seedlings under lights) once every 4-5 days and allow them to dry out just a bit. It seems like your seedlings are doing great, so continue to do what you are doing because they look so healthy.

I hope I answered your questions.. Everyone has a different watering system and fertilizing schedule. Using the FP is easy but I will admit ( sometimes) I don't use it at every watering. My trees are fertilized In the winter about the same... Every 10 days because I like to use plain rain water in between feelings. Or tap water that I let sit overnight.

Good luck with your babies and I also like your new Adenium from Chris!!

You are doing a great job!!!

Your Gritty Mix looks awesome by the way... ;-)

Take care,

Laura