First time with mustard greens, the 1020 ecotone mats and alternative mediums in general. I have read in other posts, the little white hairs in the roots should go away if they get wet if it’s not mold and these ‘hairs’ did not. Does this look like mold on the side of these mustard greens?
Started germination of these on Friday or sat and had them covered w humidity dome (ventilation open) and blacked out under towels. Checked this AM and they’re growing mold and I have no idea why. Kept humidity dome on till today bc they havent grown stems yet, but should I remove as soon as seed breaks open?? Don’t know what to do differently
Can anyone recommend the best place to buy seeds in bulk in Canada? I grow about three 1020's of radish microgreens a week for a cafe at our non-profit. I ordered from West Coast Seeds last time and it was a good product, but just want to see what else is out there. Thanks for any leads!
Which one would you choose ? I will mount them on a rack, which will have 4x 1020 trays per shelf
Barrina T8 42W LED Grow Lights 4FT 5000K | Full Spectrum, Reflectors & Linkable | QL42
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Hey everyone, I wanted to share a hanging planter/lamp combo I engineered for my kitchen.
The best feature is the adjustable tray—you slide it all the way up to block the light for a dark, humid germination chamber, then lower it when the greens need the bulb's light and ambient heat. I'm using coconut coir to keep the hanging weight down.
It’s just for small-scale personal use, but it's a super fun way to integrate growing into home decor. I made a video of the build and my first harvests if you want to see the mechanics!
I’ve always been into electronics, and when I got into growing microgreens indoors, I started thinking that why spend a fortune on commercial systems when I could just build my own? and that’s basically how this project started and ended up becoming a bit of an obsession for a while.
So here’s what I ended up building:
It’s a fully automated indoor microgreens setup that monitors and controls pH, EC, temperature, humidity, and watering. Everything is accessible through a custom web dashboard over WiFi, so I can check in and adjust things remotely whenever I want.
Hardware-wise, it’s built around an ESP32 with a handful of low-cost but reliable sensors. The whole point was to keep it affordable, and I managed to bring the cost way down compared to anything similar commercially available.
Why PVC for the frame?
I went with PVC piping because it just made sense to me and my budget as it’s lightweight, super easy to move around, and you can assemble or reconfigure the whole rack without any tools. No welding, no heavy metal frames, no permanent setup. If I want to shift things or redesign the layout, it takes minutes.
Lighting setup:
If you’ve ever tried growing microgreens indoors, you know lighting is everything. A lot of people have decent outdoor light, but the temperature swings make it unusable. Indoors solves that, but then you have to replace the sun. The LED grow lights on the rack made a huge difference and basically made the whole system viable.
Where I’m at now:
First stage was basically just empty trays getting everything wired and running. Second stage is where it actually came to life, multiple varieties growing at different stages, everything stable and running automatically. i use AI ro improvisethe second picture so dont make me feel bad for it.
I’m happy to answer questions about the build, sensors, or the dashboard side of things. If there’s interest, I might put together a proper parts list or full breakdown.
For anyone who’s built something similar thing by themselves, what would you improve or change in a setup like this? Always looking to push it further.
Previous thread got deleted because I linked to specific products with questions about them, so I won't be direct this time.
I've got a shelf picked out, I've got trays and seeds at the ready, but I'm hung up on lights. I'm not going to drope $100/light for 4 lights.
Can anyone recommend me some budget lights that work and won't burn my house down? (I've been looking at lights on Temu and Amazon and a lot of them look the same and reviews indicate that there are soldering concerns with the wiring on some products.)
Vevor brand is also selling a set up for $85 on Amazon that includes a 4-rack shelf, 3 lights, and spill guards. I figure if I'm looking at $50-100/light, I may as well get the whole shebang for less than that.
Thanks for any direction in how to do this without overspending.
I’ve been growing microgreens at home in seed starting soil using plastic containers from blueberries or tomatoes (that have holes on the bottom) and a steel baking pan to hold the container and water from the bottom.
Now I’d like a more sturdy setup, with plastic I can easily clean. Also the baking pan would get very hot when I put it outside to green up the microgreens.
Looks like the trays from bootstrap farmers are great but they are pretty big and also sold in large quantities.
What trays or kits do people recommend for a small setup for occasional growers ( not looking to start a business). I want to continue to use soil as I’ve read the greens are more nutritious and so far I’ve been very successful with this soil.
Thanks!
...is a bit of a gamble. You never know how they are going to react. I harvested a tray of spicey mixed microgreens and made a salad of microgreens, sauteed young red ripper cowpeas, lime basil, burrata cheese and a homemade vinaigrette. One guest was blown away, said it was the best and most interesting salad they have ever had. Another guest just pushed the food around on the plate and asked, "where is the lettuce", LOL.
Hello lovely plant people, I'm having issues with my first time growing sunflower shoots. Germination is sporadic, so some shoots are tall(er) while others are still germing.
These are High Mowing sunflower shoot seeds, growing in 100% peat moss in a greenhouse at 60F minimum (75 plus during the day). I soaked seed for 5 hours. I did start them completely blacked out, but they were spots of mold so I uncovered all trays. I have successfully grown radish and many many pea greens with this exact process. Soak seeds longer? Mix peat with potting soil?
The fiery hot pink color just blows my mind.
I'm in the process of making sunflower microgreens. Im following a good timeline but also tailoring it to the progress, using grow trays, weights, covers, lights/lots of sunlight when its time, spraying morning and night with conditioned water and prophylactic spray, and theyre doung pretty good!
BUT
I had soaked way too many seeds, so I put some in a sprouting jar (dark then moved to light, rinsed morning and night) and they grew a bit faster than my microgreens. No sign of mold. They're currently dried and in an airtight jar, I've been eating them for the last few days and they're delicious. Picking a bit of my microgreens, they taste the same (like nutty carrots.)
ALSO and this one is frusturating- I still had WAY too many seeds so I put a few inches of soil in a large pot, piled the rest of the seeds on much more densely, covered with a thin layer of soil, watered it with the hose, and left in a spot that gets a lot of sun but is also quite shaded due to the seeds being well into a deep pot. Then I forgot about it for a few days. I saw some yellow bits, so I watered it quite heavily. Left it for a few days again and watered with the hose again.
These two sunflower sprouts are the same age and taste the same. But the pot ones are way taller, darker green, much more dense, and are already working on their first true leaves. Moreover, I see no sign of mold.
Are all these extra steps propaganda by Big Seed Tray and Big 15lb Brick?
Fully formed like the rest of the tray but looks like it's never seen light.
Not an issue or anything just wondering if anyone seen this before? 😊
Hi all,
First time growing up and I had decided to grow some Broccoli (20g/1020 tray) and Radish (35g/1020 tray), does anyone knows why they are much tall than normal and look more distributed other than "crowded/dense"?
I had seed then on Saturday 9th, let them in blackout with weights for 3.5 days (until Wednesday morning), then turned the lights in the afternoon (they are currently at day 6 after seeding)
Using a 70% Coco Mix + 20% Perlite + 10% Vermiculite mixture.
They were already a bit tall after germination phase, and not very well distributed already. The lights are around 30 cm above tray level.
Mesclun mix. My first time trying to grow micro greens,I'm very happy! How does everyone else wash them, they are so delicate.
I've just gotten into sprouting and decided to try for microgreens as well. A cursory search here seems to say these are past the sprout stage.
Would you eat them? Thanks!
No soil or medium at all. The germination is still not perfectly even, but I think over time it'll average out as they mature. I've standardized almost every step, I just need to get precise mass measurements which I'll do with the next run I'm starting today. Managing water level and misting is critical, but still not really labor intensive, mostly enjoyable.
Any tips or suggestions from what you see are much appreciated, thanks for viewing!