Hi Mandi,

" My heat mat doesn't have a temp control "

Wow! That's like a car without an accelerator pedal. Use the fan for the present and take the precautions you mentioned. I also use small fans on my seedlings.

But if you aren't monitoring the situation closely, a fan can increase the drying rate and become part of the problem. So, without a sensor for positive temperature control, your heat mat is sort of "labor intensive." Good luck.

ZM

I do not use lights or heat at all so am no help regarding your query...however, I will echo what has been said on here - zinnias need heat...and like to be grown fast, without a check. I do grow zinnias most years, but I start them outdoors and sow direct. The big seeds are easy to sow, fast and reliable to germinate and will be growing away in a matter of weeks. Consequently, I get the best out of mine by delaying sowing until the first coupla weeks in May (or thereabouts). Can have cuttable plants in 10 weeks or so.

I totally understand why you would use lights and heat, in a chilly Z5. I used heat mats when I grew onions and peppers because in a mild Z8/9, peppers especially appreciated the longer growing season, after getting off to an early start. , Zinnias, though, are one of the easiest I grow from later sowing in warm soil - growing into robust plants with very little effort. So reliable and stress-free. Do save a few seeds for a later sowing too.

Now I am thinking on it, I always took plants off the heating mats as soon as I saw germination, but may have thrown the odd bits of fleece over at night, if temperatures required intervention.

Congrats on your sprouts!

I personally don’t use a heat mat. I have a wire shelving unit with LEDs suspended from the bottom of each shelf. even LEDs create surprising amount of warmth. I do have a reflective cover on the top and three sides of the shelf that retains the warmth. The top shelf is always warmest and as soon as zinnias have second set of true leaves, I move them to the bottom shelf. If I were using a heat mat, I would probably take it away once there were two sets if leaves so the zinnias don’t outgrow the space!

i also don’t use a fan. I would consider that optional unless you are having a specific issue without one.

Over the years, I have used many ProMix bales and have never seen anything but mix. I have seen a housefly on rare occasions, but I am pretty sure it came in the door and had nothing to do with the mix. I guess Canada will have to survive without you.

Sorry mxk3, I meant to say fungus gnats. Coffee hadnt kicked in. I better brew some more Lol. 😴☕️😳

^^ I deleted that comment, it wasn't meant toward you, Jay, but I can see how you might have felt it was.

Hi, four,

"Are these plants recognizably triploid?"

They look like specimens of Zinnia peruviana (Peruvian Zinnia).

I am not even close to being able to detect ploidy from a photo. I might be able to detect tetraploidy from a microscopic view of leaf hairs (twice as "fat" as diploid leaf hairs) or stomata (leaf-breathing pores that appear as "fat lips.") I have zero expertise in detecting a Zinnia triploid visually or from a photograph. I am way out of my area of expertise here, but those look like diploid non-hybridized specimens of Peruvian Zinnia.

As they say, I could be wrong. Do you have any other zinnias growing? I have yet to purchase a microscope to detect Zinnia ploidy. This photo represents my current indoor zinnia blooms. They have tubular petals, but they are not great specimens.

ZM

www.houzz.com/discussions/6346156/it-can-be-fun-to-breed-your-own-zinnias-part-57

> " However, my best zinnia plants were the triploids."

Hello again, four,

That photo of mine showed umpteen blooms and umpteen branches, and if your photo had been anything like that, I would have at least suspected triploidy. But your photo looks nothing like that and, like I said above, looks like Peruvian Zinnias. There is nothing in your photo to give a clue about ploidy. The absence of multiple branching could suggest non-triploidy.

I plan to produce more triploid zinnias in the future. I am growing some tetraploids (three different varieties) and some diploids indoors.

ZM

Hi mxk3,

"-- all but one rotted."

That should not have happened. Did you have anything in the rooting mix to combat the rotting bacteria? There should be something to kill the organisms that feed on the plant material to rot it and something to stimulate root growth. I like Dip-n-Gro to stimulate rooting, and I use a little Physan to sterilize my growing media.

ZM (not associated with any product or vendor mentioned or linked)

Oh no! Sorry this happened to you. I was watching a YouTube video where she had tried this new geranium overwintering method in paper bags, and it was an epic fail. The only thing I generally try to overwinter are my alocasias and colocasias, which I just leave in their pots in the basement. It’s quite dry and warm down there, so I’ve had a few dry out - but I’ve honestly got so many going on down there it comes as a relief to lose some.

I had one cutting take, but it's very small -- it will grow but not to a meaningful size this year. I've overwintered geraniums dormant for a long time, occasionally have some losses but not the whole lot of it. IDK what happened this year, only thing I can think of is I waited too long to pot them up and they dried out but I really don't know. Sigh.