SEED COMPOST

[moonraker]

Morning slug haters, Well it is time to start the seed's off in the green house,
Ive already give the house a good clean inside the glass and all pots have been washed to within an inch of their life,
Even the tube light have been cleaned and the fridge topped up with Larger (we humans need a drink in the hot weather)
Now to the compost,
Again this is aimed at those new to gardening
SEED COMPOST
Whats this all about ?
Why do we use seed compost ?
Well if you think about it the seed covering is the protection of whats inside this covering and the seeds food supply until it comes away from the covering and then the seed life should begin,
But a few things to think about here, what did we say plants need ? One was water !! and the other light, warmth,
Water gathers around the seed pod (covering) and if the normal compost or soil sticks to the pod, the seed can rot very quickly and no plants arrive,
Seed compost is very light and has no feed in it, The seed's food was in the shell/pod/covering
But the seed now needs warmth and light to progress on lives journey ,
This seed once its out of the covering needs to get up through the light compost and to the day light without being drowned by heavier compost making it hard for the seed to get through and if the normal compost is damp it becomes heavy ,
Once the seed has made it through and can been seen and grows a little more it is then time to grow the seed on in the normal compost with feed being applied as the seed roots grow And when the seed is large enough to pot on ,
And this is the advantage of using seed compost,
A tried & tested way to grow your seeds,

 

[Mike Allen]

Here we go again.

 

[Tetters]

Here we go again.

Who rattled your cot then Mike? Do you remember something from another forum by any chance?

 

[redback]

It happens that I have piled wheelbarrow loads of carob beans on my compost heap. The carob seeds in their bean pods are like steel but they are shooting because they laid on the ground in the shade of the tree for a long while before I composted them.
When I turn the compost heap all the sprouts will die (I think) but they should be nutritious.
If you plant out the seedlings that grow you won't have seed compost. The idea of growing tomatoes and pumpkins from the compost heap is a natural and I have done it opportunistically.

 

[Tetters]

Yep, we had some nice opportunistic potatoes from our compost bags this past year.

 

[Mr_Yan]

I buried some old pumpkins in a Hugelkulture style filled raised bed and had to fight pumpkin seedlings in my peppers all season. Those pumpkins were the base layer of the bed call it 400 mm deep... Must have been the light that those seeds needed.

 

[Meadowlark]

Who rattled your cot then Mike?

Translation needed . @Tetters

Would that be the trig function cotangent

, or a small bed, or a Computer Operated Terminal, or perhaps the Middle English dwelling of a rural laborer, bedchamber, or

Here we go again.

ZZZZZZZzzzzzzzzzzzz

 

[Oliver Buckle]

But the seed now needs warmth and light to progress on lives journey ,

Slight nit here, 'lives' means 'is living' as in 'Joe lives in a city, but Mary lives in a village'. The word you want is Life's, the apostrophe is possessive, meaning it is the journey belonging to life, overall much more coherent.
Note, plants need light for photosynthesis, some seeds need light to germinate, but most don't.