The February seedlings have sprouted! Some seed germination was far better than others, which is to be expected. At this two-week mark, I adjusted by eating sprouts, transplanting others and re-seeedling no-shows.

Notice that I have added boxes underneath the trays to move them closer to the grow lights. The boxes allowed me flexibility with individual trays since some crops grow faster than others.

I believe 100% of my very old pepper seeds germinated! That meant I had far too many starts to plant in my limited outside growing space.

I could have potted-up the near 80 starts to sell or donate, but that would’ve required a large investment of time, space, pots, soil, and grow light energy since they cannot be planted outdoors until June. I opted to keep only a variety of 12 healthy pepper seedlings and transplanted them to individual pots.

When seedlings are this close together, rather than damage root systems by tearing them apart, I cut one of the seedlings off at its base. Its roots will decompose as the other thrives from those nutrients.

Freshly watered and divided, these babies are ready for another week of growing. To accommodate the new growth, I’ve added inverted seed trays and removed some high boxes. I try to keep the seedlings within 4-6 inches of the grow light and leave the lights on for 14 hours per day.