Your leggy plants seem to be stretching toward the light source. Try to keep you light even all day so the plants don't grow toward the light.

Hi malleeaustralia,

Great work and great fun. I hope it all goes well. I'm no great expert on this, but regarding the Fongarid, that is the stuff to use to prevent or stop so-called "damping off". For just normal fuzzy moulds, I've tried pressure-pack Baycor fungicide with the germinating seeds and small seedlings of a couple of Vrieseas (hieroglyphica and Nova) that got a heap of mould, as well as some Neos, and it worked a treat. It is just so handy to give a quick squirt and I've given them a good drenching without any problems. It might be worth trying it with yours just a little bit first to see how it goes, before going full slather

Hope this helps. Cheers, Paul

On the rare occasion that I have some mold/fungus growing on seeds, I usually just spray with water and expose to fresh air for a day or two. I had to do this on the B. zebrina seeds I sowed in early November. Luckily, they grew so fast and big that I took them out of the zip-loc bag 5 weeks later so I didn't have to worry about the nasty stuff taking over and just did the one "treatment".

The last few weeks have been the coldest I've ever seen in South Florida, although it never dropped to freezing at my house. I had just sown some seeds the week before the weather turned cold so I brought them inside and put them on a north facing window sill and got good germination rates. Since I had some very odd-ball bigenerics involving Orthophytums I wasn't expecting anything to happen without some decent heat but they surprised me. Of course, now I'm worried that they selfed and aren't bigenerics.

Hi Kristan , I personally have never used Fongarid or Baycor,for Algea control i only use Alginox (only on cool days or at night ) Moulds i dont have any problems with ,you have to lift the lid and let some air in at times , fungus ? almost unpreventable if you grow big quantities of seedlings ,but its not a huge problem ,but sometimes i may lose a whole tray,but so what ? there is always some other seed to sow to make up for it. Without being critical , you have to increase the light factor to stop them being leggy ,but make sure there is no real heat built up ,if there is ? open the lids a bit to let heat escape ,First time parents worry about every single seed ,but you will grow out of that ,remember that in nature very few seeds grow to maturity ,and some types are doomed to be temperamental to grow ,Bills and Aech and Neo's are almost bullet proof ( i said almost)after that things go downhill in the Tillandsiodea ,seed growing will teach you infinite patience and perseverance to say the least but your efforts are rewarding you ,its a learning curve we all went thru and still do ,best of luck Mate ,but they need more light , Vrieseas are ok with a bit less ,Jack

cheers folks - is great to get pples advice - Jack, I'm more than open to criticism, I call it good advice.

I've got some Alginox so will mix that up to give them the odd spray. I'm not at all used to using any type of chemicals/pesticides/fungicides etc etc so which is which and whiat does what tends to confuse me but I'm slowly trying to learn. Not so much worried aout losing a few as have killed enough plants in my time to be philosophical about them but trying to make sure Im as organised as possible with these (for once in my life! haha) and also want to make sure that with my eyesight I dont miss problems will they get out of hand.

I'll definetely have to take note of light in the area tomorrow. Since sowing and putting them in that area I have knocked up a few shade 'rooms', with hopefully more to come, so hopefully I'll be able to find some more suitable light for them.

We've just gone through a few super hot days and where they are (under corrugated tin) gets pretty hot which I think has helped start them off but might get a bit too hot now they're growing. I've tried to make sure they've all been exposed to fresh air and kept moist during the heat so so far so good.

Kristan

Hi Kristan,

Well it looks like you're off and running, (another budding hybridist in the making).

I agree with Jack about the light, the plants are telling you they want more light. Now by more light, I don't mean more sun, there is a difference.

First question: What direction is the opening facing, north, south east or west? Where you live, north is best.

If I had my plant containers in your "Hi-Tech growing area", I would try a couple of changes. Obviously the only direction the light is coming from is the front of the enclosure, so the plants in the front are exposed to more light than those at the rear.

The aim is to equalise the exposure to available light for all containers and to accomplish this, I would first of all paint the inside walls as well as the underside of the roof with a light coloured paint to reflect the available light. You will be surprised just what a difference this makes. You could also put some light coloured gravel on the floor to reflect more available light from there as well.

Your enclosure is made from corrugated iron which gets very hot in hot weather and very cold in cold weather and the temperature changes very quickly, so another option would be to line the inside with white polystyrene sheets such as used in packaging. This would give you reflected light as well as more uniform temperature due to the insulation properties.

I would then place your polystyrene boxes at the rear (because they are the highest), and turn your container stand around so that the side and not the end is facing the opening to your enclosure thereby providing a more even share of available light.

At present the containers at the rear would be getting far less light than the ones in the front. To help distribute the light more evenly, try turning your containers around each week.

These are just a few non expensive steps I would trial if your set up was mine. The thing is, we have to try different things to find out what works best for us given the facilities we have available to us.

I hope this helps in some small way, all the best, Nev.

Nev is right, bright reflected light is great. I have my very young seedlings on the south side of my house and they do get some direct very low angle winter sun, which they seem to love, but the rest of year they only get reflected light.

Once they are a year old then I tend to put them out where they will get some direct morning sun all year round.

Cheers again folks - as always, great advice.

Nev - the opening faces North. The seedling area is actually the end of an old bird cage - about 1/3 corrugated iron and the rest is chicken wire with a division down the middle length wise. I have just recently put shade-cloth over the other end of the cage so will eventually be making this whole area my seedling area. Adjacent to the cage are some other shade-clothed rooms where my broms are now happily living. Admittedley there is still some direct sublight coming through the cage at moment where I have to neaten things up but no direct sunlight makes it onto the seedlings themselves (only just).

I didnt have any paint or more polystyrene sheets lying around but did have some Rhino-Wrap so have covered the walls in the growing area with it to reflect the light. Hopefully it may also work as a bit of insulation. Like the rest of the area it still needs some tidying up but am happy to be rough and experimental at this stage before doing a 'final job'. As you can see I still need to cut and nail another piece to fully cover the back area but whilst its out of the pic there is a sheet on the roof above them as well as on the ground to reflect light up and down. While the pic is pretty average you may be able to see that there is area for another little "seedling room" to the right and as mentioned I'll experiment a bit more with them under the different light levels now I have some shade-cloth up.

I've also got to find/make some proper shelving so that as people mentioned, I can orientate the seedlings in a more equal manner. At the moment the poly boxes and old stand just manage to fit, keep the trays off the ground and allow me access! Anyway, whilst again a rough job, hopefully the pic will show your advice is appreciated and being taken.

{{gwi:440038}}

Kristan,

Your seedlings look pretty good, I tried some Noble Descent crosses a while back unfortuately the bloodly toads decided to squash them all.

There are only a couple of crosses on FCBS, I think they could make another sun hardy hybrid if they are anything like Noble Descent.

Cheers,

Rick