Yesterday, Stan made me a real nice seedling light setup. He put eyebolts in the ceiling and hung shiny new chain. He bought a 4 bulb florescent fixture, hung it from the chains, and we set up the folding table legs and set a 2x4 piece of metal grate on it. Now the plants can get all the light they want, 24 hours a day. It even has full-spectrun plant bulbs in it. The cabbage and broccoli raab babies are really happy with their new digs.
I have some broccoli seed from 1996. I grew it that year, and the variety, Southern Star, was the best broccoli I ever grew. Very nice heads. I hoarded the seeds remaining, and grew some out 3 or 4 years ago. I don't succeed in getting plants started in time every year, have to start them in late January, hence the seeds lasting so many years. Now that I'm playing with plant breeding, I want to take this hybrid and make it open pollinated so I can save seed. The variety was only offered in one catalogue for that one year. Hence my hoarding it.
So I put five seeds in each of 7 rockwool grow cubes. I can see the seeds have swelled up since sowing last night. Now, if they will just please germinate! I know 9 years is a long time for seed to be stored, but here's hoping it's in the nick of time!
