Temperature in a propagator

purplebean · « **on:** April 02, 2008, 11:35 »

As my aubergines germinated in 3 days (all 7 Calliope that we sowed) I thought I would check the heat in the electric propagator. It seems to be holding at 6C above the room temperature. As that window is south west facing it can get a lot of sun and the room gets up to 30C even at this time of year. I'm thinking that 36C in the propagator would be too much. What do you think the best solution would be

Shade the propagator
Take the lid off on sunny days (not always possible unless I just do it before leaving the house)
Move it to a different room

Any other suggestions

compostqueen · « **Reply #1 on:** April 02, 2008, 11:52 »

once they're germinated they don't need much heat so you could switch the thing off or take the lid off. They'll need shading from hot sun so you could move them. It's called musical seed trays in our house

DD. · « **Reply #2 on:** April 02, 2008, 13:32 »

I would venture to say that once germinated you MUST take the lid off, that is unless you actually want drawn & leggy plants.

Get then out of the propagator, & put some aluminium foil behind them. This will effectively give them more light & help prevent them getting drawn, (if it's not too late!).

purplebean · « **Reply #3 on:** April 03, 2008, 11:34 »

Quote from: "DD."

I would venture to say that once germinated you MUST take the lid off, that is unless you actually want drawn & leggy plants.

Get then out of the propagator, & put some aluminium foil behind them. This will effectively give them more light & help prevent them getting drawn, (if it's not too late!).

That is exactly what I normally do but it's a bit hard this time becase as all of the seeds said 14 - 21 days germination I did them in my new plug plant tray and it is hard to take out those that have germinated :oops: I won't do it again. For now I have turned the propagator off. The other aubergines are through this morning so I am going to give them a day or two and then very carefully remove them and repot. Then I will turn the propagator on again for the peppers. I now know that I need to put all of the same type in the plug plant trays and won't make the same mistake again.

compostqueen · « **Reply #4 on:** April 03, 2008, 11:36 »

it is a balancing act it really is and it gets worse towards the end of the month when all the beans and courgettes etc get sown

So many seedlings, so little space. They can take over the entire house

Temperature advice please! Started by Elaine G on Grow Your Own	1 Replies 1318 Views	March 30, 2010, 12:13 by noshed
soil temperature Started by Grubbypaws on Grow Your Own	8 Replies 3414 Views	May 29, 2013, 16:34 by Grubbypaws
Greenhouse Temperature Started by willnbirdie on Grow Your Own	2 Replies 2061 Views	June 09, 2008, 21:56 by noshed
Soil temperature Started by noshed on Grow Your Own	5 Replies 2417 Views	February 08, 2010, 15:58 by arugula