Ballplayer, Sure looks like you keep trying. I'm not sure what the problem is but I can tell you how I do mine. I usually start 500-600 seeds a year, FWIW. First, I get one of those plastic to-go trays with a lid from a restaurant. Drill small holes in the bottom of it. I like Ferti-lome Ultimate Potting Mix though every once in a while, I find a small piece of bark or a twig that needs to be remove. I add about 1.5" of this, then use a tweezers to place each seed individually, just barely in the mix. Cover that with a thin layer of potting mix, maybe 1/4". Set the entire thing in a tub of either rain water or aerated (for 24 hours or more) tap water. Let it sit until the mix is sopping wet. Remove it, put the lid on the tray and either place it on a heat mat set to 85 degrees or during summer, just on a bench. I do not water it again, at least not for a week or more. Usually within 3-5 days, the first seeds germinate. As soon as they do, I put them under CFL bulbs, as close as I can after removing the lid. When the mix is almost dry, I set the container back in the tub but usually add a very small amount or Tomato-tone fertilizer. This is lower in nitrogen but high in other ferts plants need to develop good roots. Put it back under the lights, then repeat as necessary. Once the seedlings develop at least one good set of leaves but usually two, I prepare nursery trays. Fill with potting mix, set in that tub of water and compact the mix, then refill and compact again. Let it sit, usually for an hour or more - however long it takes to throughly soak the mix. Remove it from the tub, set it aside for the evening. By the next day, excess moisture has drained off. Using my finger, I poke a hole in the mix. I gently remove the seedling (it helps to have that mix damp, but not wet) and place it in the hole until just the leaves are showing, then tamp the mix around it. When I finish a tray (6-36 plants) I put it under lights, again as close as I can. Then, I let the plants grow, watering them only when the mix gets dry (usually the plants will start to wilt a bit). Once the plants get 8-10" tall, I transplant them into 5-7 gallon pots. That's for my dirt plants. Next is the hydro ones. HTH, Mike

Calshep, In a nutshell, the big advantage of starting cuttings from current plants is that it gives you a larger plant earlier and it is a faster process. From the time you take the cutting until you can put the cutting-raised plants in the ground can take only a couple of weeks depending on how long you hold the cutting in the shade so it can make roots without fighting the heat and sunlight at the same time. The disadvantage is that if the plant has any disease or pest issues, they may develop on/in the cutting raised plant too. With seed-raised plants, the advantage is that there are not any pre-existing diseases on the plants (assuming the seed is not infected). At this time of year, you can go from seed to transplant size in 4 or 5 weeks quite easily if you raise the seedlings outdoors so they are exposed to the heat. Otherwise, if raised indoors, you need another week to harden them off when it is time to move them outdoors. I usually start from seed because I am planting different varieties for fall. I did start a couple of varieties for fall from seed even though I have those same varieties in the ground right now and could have used cuttings instead of seed. My plan is to take cuttings from those varieties a couple of weeks from now, root them, and then plant the seed-raised plants right beside cutting-grown plants of the same variety so I can see if there is a difference in the way they grow and perform. Another reason I tend to start from seed for fall tomatoes is that most of my spring-planted tomato plants are mid-season or late-season varieties that take 70-90 days to produce ripe fruit. For fall, in order to get a good harvest from the fall plants, I choose varieties with shorter estimated days-to-maturity (59 to about 75 or 80). There's nothing worse in fall than having half-ripe green tomatoes all over the plants when the cold weather arrives, so plants with shorter DTMs can help you avoid that. Dawn

Awesome pics!!! are they eggs of eastern blue birds? Eastern bluebirds are our regular guests since 2008, they are seems to busy in building nests. I have five bird houses in the backyard garden for them. This time house sparrow have taken two of their homes before bluebirds arrived. Indeed they have been fighting for the home since then. We have another unwanted but regular visitor to our front porch are the barn swallows. They build their buddy nest just above the main door entrance. I tried them to build on windows or other places around the house, but every year they are not listening to me. This year I destroyed their unfinished nest tree times, but but no luck. They build it again so fast and laid eggs before I noticed. So I have wait for them to make their babies and leave. Same thing happened last year. I need to find better way to make them to move to other place next year. Hummers are back, but visiting feeder not frequently. I hardly I see couple times last weekend. I guess they might have plenty of natural food around. I am sure they will swarm out feeder in late summer through fall. -Chandra

Sorry, I wasn't ignoring you. After looking at Diane's blog photos of the new chicken coop, I forgot to respond to your questions. I get really excited when I see a nice chicken coop! (Maybe because it took us a while to get our "final" predator-proof chicken coop built....six years after we moved here, and it was our third attempt. The first was too close to the woods and we couldn't keep snakes, ring-tailed cats and racoons out. The second was very good but really not large enough, but the third one is just right. So I know Diane is happy to have their coop finished too.) With fall seedlings, I get germination rates that are just as good as I get indoors in the late winter and sometimes better germination rates. Growth of the seedlings also is quicker since they are in natural sunlight from "Day One". The key, though, is to never, ever miss a watering or you'll lose them because the summer heat and sun can be very unforgiving. If I am going to be gone all day long and they are sitting in full sun on a hot day, I'll pause as I'm leaving the house, give them water if they need it, and move them into a morning sun/afternoon shade kind of place so I don't come home to wilted babies. I do tend to pot up into larger cups as they grow because the larger cups hold more soil and more moisture. I wish I lived close enough to go to Lisa Merrell's place, but for me that would be a drive almost completely across the state! : ) Hope the garden season is rocking along well and that you get loads of yummy tomatoes. Dawn