IS ANYONE ELSE HAVING TROUBLE GROWING SPROUTS & VEGETABLES FOR SOME STRANGE REASON?

I am. Every time I try to till the soil we get another 20 inches of snow. I'm all tuckered out. Between the snow and the sub-zero temperatures, it's tough to get these veggies to sprout. Maybe I'm doing something wrong.

Well i am in the UK so my experience may not be the same as yours.

I had a very poor year but it was down to blight and insects.

Hopefully the really good cold snap will have killed off a lot of these diseases and critters.

As a VERY VERY long term gardener I know things go in cycles. Some good for tomatoes and bad for salad veg.

WOULD say. Each year STERILISE your planters. It can make a HUGE difference.

My stuff sprouts just fine. Sterilize your propagation trays and keep a warming mat underneath. I also do cloning and I'm now getting roots in 4 to 7 days, as opposed to 10 to 15 days previously. Proper temperature, humidity and cleanliness works for me.

I learned here that wireless routers can harm plants, so I moved mine and things are going better, it seems.

This year the only thing that did well was the cayenne peppers and the corn. The corn, strangely, got fried in the sun one week in July, but was perfect for seeds. We planted with the timing off on purpose so as not to cross with gmo, and it worked.

We had a pretty good zucchini run, but the tomatoes sucked this year and last.

Typically we get assloads of turnips and mustard greens in the fall/ Dec, but this year bugs ate the hell out of the greens. Never had that happen before.

I am in Louisiana, don't know if the spill played a part or not. A lot of farmers had a bad year in our area, but few of them are doing it without pesticides etc like we are.

I must admit I have stopped using warming mats etc. I just learned to accept that I have a certain growing season in my country. (excepting indoor sprouting beans etc)

I used to get over eager planting outside too soon. Damp and cold just caused seeds to rot. In Yorkshire I now start my seed sowing on april 1st (yes april fools day) Its a later start but I get a better germination rate.

You don't say where you are, but I'll let you know I am having no issues whatever....I have a couple dozen flats started, no problems at all.

However, I use NEW cell packs every season, as well as a sterilized starting media.

I start many 1000s of veggies every year with basically no problems other than the normal "started indoors under lights and stuff is too crowded" challenges.

Gardening was iffy for almost everywhere in the US last year, due to weather patterns. People were complaining all over, so you weren't alone.

For example, we had a very cool, cloudy summer compared to previous years. First time I ever had broccoli heads literally have "rot spots" from rain before, lost those. I had plenty of most everything else though, although many area gardeners had dismal luck.

The first year I planted a garden here, everything went to shit. No tomatoes off of 20 plants, no eggplants, there was some squash, but the taste was just horrible. No cucumbers... it was miserable. Not only did we get hit with blight, but we had like 28 days of rain consecutive for the entire month of July... so between blight, too much water, and too little sun, I had nothing :-(

Brought the garden inside last year. Started everything new, from seed, all indoors. So far, much better. I've actually gotten some tomatoes we could eat, we had a whole tray of lettuce... some small issues but I'm working them out.

Being inside though, I have control over what is in the soil, what is in the water, and how much light they get. Its still an experiment, this completely indoor garden thing... but so far I am pleased with the outcome. I think that my outside plants for the summer will be only the ones I cannot get to pollinate inside - the eggplant, squash, cucumbers... everything else is thriving indoors!

Thats interesting.

Sprouting beans etc is not that big a thing in the uk so I cant speak with any authority on the subject.

But just a thought. Do you know if the seeds were GM ?

I think a lot of failure is brought in by genetically modified stuff. Can you buy non GM stuff ?

All seeds are marked here in the uk, not sure if it is the same for you ?

Could this be part of the problem ?

I'm in So Cal.

I have Non-GMO, Non-hybrid seeds, which did well before, except last yr. Last yr was horrible, I got 5 squash, 4 zuchinni, couple of lettuce, and everything else only grew to about 20%-30% it's size then started rotting.

I use no chemicals of any kind, and it's 90% soil (dirt) and 10% organic fertilizer.

The strange thing about all this was that the leaves were getting burnt... in 65-70F degree weather.

Don't be a smart ass or ignorant. Maybe they are sprouting indoors.

May have been those things, but what kind of seeds did you plant? You should get heirloom or open pollinated. I want to build a huge greenhouse for this years garden. Hubby is not "aware" and he is a little hard to convince. But he is coming along some. But I need his help with that greenhouse. I am going to add a beehive as well.

But check what kind of seeds. Hubby and neighbor planted tomato plants from the store. I planted mine from heirloom seeds, only mine made.

Sorry OP can I ask WHERE are you ?

I am sure better advice can come from people in the same climate zone as yourself.

I've been growing wheatgrass for years. I grow it on trays inside by a window.
I haven't noticed anything different.

I've been growing wheatgrass for years. I grow it on trays inside by a window.
I haven't noticed anything different.

My starter trays are doing fine. 90% of everything has sprouted.

My rhubarb is growing nicely.

I had trouble last year with my maters going bad, I attributed it to oppressive Houston summer sun with no shade. I got about 25 lbs of tomatoes I was expecting 3 times as much.

You know how many people in the world have to starve because you are eating sprouts? They are nothing more than germinated seed that could have actually produced a REAL crop.You know the kind that generates MORE seed.

Enjoy those sprouts.Hope you do not mind that you are starving people.

Explain about the wireless router, please. It isn't the plants that I'm worried about it's us people and our pets!

I sprouted a marijuana seed over the weekend I found in some really good pot I recently bought, it came up like wildfire and in fact has two side sprouts that came up too...

so I may have a bush comin...

Have any of you tried fertilizing with rock dust? I break up lava rocks. They are full of essential elements.

How do you clone plants?

Sorry to say OP but its only our artificial export import structures that have stopped us thinking about growing seasons.

Many countries in this world suffer or flourish depending on mother nature.

One reason i stray away from artificial heat and propogation methods is simply that if they fail.... You starve.

You have to learn how to garden your climate from scratch.