Zac's Seedlings 2024

[zpeckler]

Just an update... Drying things out and keeping the trays outside has worked wonders! Here's a before and after of two pots of Echinocereus polycephalus that were covered in the fungus/mold. Now I can barely see it on any of the pots!

Echinocactus-polycephalus-mold-before.jpg (179.7 KiB) Viewed 248 times

Echinocactus-polycephalus-mold-after.jpg (155.98 KiB) Viewed 248 times

Overall I'm getting a lot of germination in most of my species. Pretty happy and very relieved. I don't think I'm totally out of the woods yet, though. I can still see some scant, thin residual fungus/mold on the pots that were the worst infected, but the heat, light, and dryness seem to be keeping things in check.

[Lolavy]

Congrats!! I’m super inspired by the turn around you’re seeing in those afflicted pots! I’ve had very bad/sporadic luck recovering from a fungal/mold infection. If you get a chance, I’d love to hear exactly what you did to get this turnaround.

[zpeckler]

Congrats!! I’m super inspired by the turn around you’re seeing in those afflicted pots! I’ve had very bad/sporadic luck recovering from a fungal/mold infection. If you get a chance, I’d love to hear exactly what you did to get this turnaround.

I wish I had some magic bullet, but I just put them outside with the vents open and let them dry out some per Keith's advice. They've been outside (under dense shade cloth) ever since and I've been misting then every day to keep them from getting too dry. I tried spraying them with hydrogen peroxide, Physan 20, chinosol, and copper fungicide, but none of those made any difference at all. This is my third year sowing seeds so I feel more like the recovery was luck and good advice than any reflection on skill on my part.

Things still feel pretty tenuous because I can still see thin whispy fungus/mold strands on the top of my top dressing, but they're obviously significantly improved. A lot of the seeds have germinated at this point and the little plants are just kinda doing their thing regardless of the strands so far. Keep crossing your fingers, though. I really don't feel like I'm out of the woods.

[C And D]

I haven't followed along completely with this thread

But I can tell you this, a spray of Chinosol ot Physan 20 would kill all that fungus instantly

It's really quite simple,
if you cover your seedlings, everything needs to start out sterile, and stay sterile until you open them up and keep them open
But you can also grow seeds with open containers that don't need to be sterile, like Kieth.

I have open beds in my greenhouse that I throw extra seeds in, and some of them grow like crazy, but it doesn't work for some types of plants
So for those, I used sterile covered seed pots

[zpeckler]

Well things seem to be going along ok. I've gotten great germination rates on most of the easier species, and rates ranging from "meh" to "pretty good" on the more difficult ones. The fungus/mold that was initially causing all the problems is completely gone, thankfully. I've been keeping the three trays outside with the humidity domes on but the vents all the way open. They're in an area covered with 40% shade cloth with some other plants I'm still working on getting acclimatized to stronger sun, and the trays are also covered with a 30% shade cloth folded into two layers. I got a little temp/humidity monitor from SensorPush that's working out really well. It's sitting in one of the trays, and I've been able to keep the temps in the domes pretty consistently in the 80's. I'm misting the trays in the morning to keep things moist.

Most of the seeds that have germinated are starting to show their first spines, like these Echinomastus johnsonii here.

E-johnsonii-seedlings.jpg (173.71 KiB) Viewed 18 times

So now that the seedlings are getting their spines, would it be time to fertilize them? I use MikeInOz/Steve Johnson's fertilizer regimen so the nitrogen in that is already really reasonable (<50ppm), but I could do an even more dilute feeding if necessary.

There's another thing I'm wondering about. I've had several seedlings get what looks like rust fungus on them and within a couple days rot and die. It's primarily been my Echinocactus polycephalus which I know from bitter experience just how hard these can be to grow. This is probably just par for the course, but I'm wondering if this is something that might be fixed with letting the trays dry out even more? I don't know. I know seedlings need a moist environment, but how moist is too moist? Clearly in the beginning of this batch of seedlings I was way too most, so what do I know. As it stands I'm misting the seedlings in the morning, and 24hrs later the DG top dressing on most of the pots is dry to the touch so I actually thought I wasn't keeping things moist enough.

Thanks to everyone's help while I muddle through this.

[keith]

As it stands I'm misting the seedlings in the morning, and 24hrs later the DG top dressing on most of the pots is dry to the touch so I actually thought I wasn't keeping things moist enough. "

That's what I do and probably your soil is moist right under the top dressing this you don't want to dry out yet. The difficult species IDK they are difficult outside of the desert.