Backyard Aquaponics
A place to discuss aquaponics

My question is fairly simple. Is it better to sow the seeds directly in the gb medium (gravel) or to sprout the seedlings in another way and transplant them in the gb? Most of the seeds I planted have sprouted with the exception of spinach, tomatoes and peppers. The lettuce sprouts are so small. Any help would be great.

it depends on the plant in question and how lazy you are

Beans don't like getting transplanted so they need direct sowing.

As for the rest, I'm lazy. I just chuck the seeds in the grow beds and the plants come up.

So then there is no problem with doing it that way. I thought I did something wrong by just placing the seeds in the gb.

If the plants are comming up ok, then planting them directly in the grow bed must be working fine. Some seeds/seedlings are really small and might need a little extra attention to get them to sprout and not fall down to the bottom of the bed through the gravel. This can often be taken care of with a little paper towel. A bit of paper towel as a wick can help keep seeds damp enough to germinate in a bed that doesn't flood to near the surface.

Thanks, that was my next question... seeds falling.

Some plants will need to be direct sown. Spinach and Corriander are two that come to mind.

Both can be grown and then transplanted. The problem with that is, when they are transplanted, the stress caused by disturbing their roots will cause them to bolt to seed very quickly.

For me, I will be mostly raising seedlings and transplanting where possible. I have found that when I direct sow I end up with too many plants growing too close to each other. By transplanting seedlings I can control the distance between plants.

Simon

The biggest reason to transplant would be efficiency. If a lettuce or whatever plant is 10 weeks to maturity, starting off the seedings in a different tray will allow you to start your seedlings before the previous crop is harvested. You'll produce 25-30% more (at a guess) produce if you start seedlings outside your GB before the previous crop is moved out.

I haven't built my system yet but this is the same principle that applies to an ordinary veggie patch so no reason why it wouldn't apply to AP.

I'd follow this up with another question though...if your GB medium is gravel what medium would you use for the seedlings? If you buy seedlings they're normally in dirt or vermiculite. Do you stick the vermiculite in your gravel or try to wash it off the roots?

A bit of both... I wash a lot of it off, but try not to disturb the plant's roots TOOOO much... so I do leave a fair bit on... seems to do no harm

Ima root washer too...get most of it off before putting in the GBs

I am?
I'm a?

I find that when one transplants into AP - while the survival rate is very high due to the constantly wet environment, transplant shock slows growth significantly for a period.

Therefore - where possible I sow directly. If you save your own seeds and have an abundance, the efficiency of seed use is not a problem (you potentially get a lower germination rate from small seeds in AP due to them getting stuck under gravel or other medium), sow just use plenty and then thin them out when they staat to grow. With leaf type vegetables particularly (though the same could be done for herbs), I don't hin until they have a bit of size about them and then I eat these small plants :-).

I do understand where monkey is coming from in terms of efficiency of bed use - but transplant shock can also result in some inefficiency particularly in quick growing leaf vegetables.

My wife and I were doing some cleaning in our traditional garden last night and we had a small branch from a cherry tomato break off. Questions is, will this small branch root if I put it in the grow bed. This would really speed up the process of having tomatoes due to the fact that none of the tomato seeds have sprouted.

as far as I know, yes it will sprout. what can it hurt to try

Yes it will grow heres a photo of 2 plants when the parent was 4 ft high a piece broke of i put it in next to the parent and in 2 months it passed the parent plant

In my autopot system my cherry tomatos are third and fourth generation. I keep cutting the off shoot branches and striking them. In the AP system this should make striking faster. I don't know if rooting powder is safe in an AP system but honey works as well.