• potting mix has no nutrients (how did I get this far not knowing
that?)
• don't start any more seeds in egg cartons
Here are pictures of my broccoli, cauliflower, and cabbage seedlings.
The first picture was taken when they were 4 weeks old!! They still
looked 1 week old. They were in egg cartons, potting mix, under lights
and not a trace of true leaves. The cotyledons even started turning
dark purple.
The only online info I could find about cotyledons turning purple
suggested a phosphorus defficiency. I find that confusing since when I
transplanted these the roots were huge for such little seedlings. I
moved them into peat pots filled with my regular garden soil. The
second picture was taken about 5 days later. They're booming! I think
in the past I never even used potting mix. I'm pretty sure I had
always just sown in pots filled with garden soil. I guess that's a no-
no but I think I'm anti-potting mix now.
So I quickly transplanted my tomato and cotton seedlings to the same
soil and they are bursting with true leaves. I also threw out my
peppers because they never even germinated. I've since sown some more.
Which brings me to why i hated the egg cartons. I had high hopes, for
recycling purposes and space efficiency. But they are just so small
that they dry out too fast. I coddled them with a spray bottle but I
couldn't keep up. That's just too much trouble. I suppose if you
transplant them as soon as they've germinated it might work, but I
prefer to sow a couple of seeds per peat pot and just thin later.
My winter sowing bottles had the same lame potting mix so I poured a
little miracle grow bloom booster in them. That was an exciting change
since I never use that kind of fertilizer on my edibles.
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