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Tomato Seed Starting Instructions

Hi Sq Footers,
I'll be sending out the tomato seeds to all who sent SASE this week.  Look
for them in your mailbox by next weekend.  Many of you wrote notes asking
for seed starting instructions.  Here they are:
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  To grow a sturdy, healthy tomato transplant from seed, you need three
things--heat, 14 hours of light daily and fertilizer.  
  Seeds germinate best when the soil in flats or pots is 75-80 degrees.
After plants have their first set of true leaves (which are serrated), lower
night temperatures to 55 degrees for three weeks.  Then increase the
temperature to 65 degrees for maximum growth.  
  One way to achieve the warm soil needed for germination is to invest in a
$9 heating cable, available through mail order seed catalogs or from garden
centers.  Some gardeners use heating pads to germinate seeds.  Others place
flats on top of the refrigerator where it's warm.
  Transplants can be grown with natural light--on south-facing windowsills
or outdoors in greenhouses.  But, they will be leggy, or spindly.  The
stockiest ones are grown with 14 hours of light daily.  
  An inexpensive fluorescent shop light (under $10 at Wal-Mart) will do the
job.  Hang it so that the fixture is four inches above seed flats.  Raise it
as plants grow, so that the light source is always four inches above plants.
                                Fertilizing
  If you start with a standard, bagged potting soil or special seed starting
mix, there is enough nutrition in it to get plants started.  After tomatoes
have their first set of true leaves, begin feeding with a diluted liquid
fertilizer once a week.
  Miracle Gro, Peters or any store brand with the
nitrogen-phosphorous-potash ratio of 15-30-15 or greater is perfect.  For
organic gardeners, fish meal emulsion or liquid kelp is a good choice.  I
alternate Miracle Gro one week and liquid kelp the next week. 
Whatever fertilizer you use, it should be diluted to 25 percent of the
recommended rate.
                                Potting Up
  Plants started in flats, Jiffy-7's or in small cell packs will need
repotting when there are two sets of true leaves.  In fact, every tomato
transplant benefits from repotting. Increasing the container size stimulates
root systems, and they grow larger.
  I usually start my seeds in flats, prick them out when they have two sets
of leaves and pot them in four-inch containers.  I save all the nursery pots
from flowers and plants I buy throughout the year.  A quick wash in a
diluted bleach solution (1 tablespoon bleach to a gallon of hot water) will
insure that no disease is transferred.
  After transplants reach five inches tall, I repot again--this time moving
up the tomatoes to six inch pots.  I strip the two bottom sets of leaves off
the plants and bury them in soil up to the third set of leaves.  Plants take
off with rapid growth after this last potting, and
huge, sturdy transplants are ready to plant in the garden by the end of the
seventh week.
  One other suggestion--place a small oscillating fan in the growing area to
keep air moving around plants during the day or when lights are on.  Moving
air not only keeps fungal diseases, especially damping off, at bay, but
studies have proven that tomato stems that vibrate in the wind produce
enzymes that cause the stems to grow thicker. 

Hope this is a help to all.
Doreen Howard

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