Steve- THANK YOU, it is great time to talk about seedlings. And seed them at home. I am going to pitch in. A lot of AV lovers who use Physan 20 to keep algae at bay - especially if you use wicks and mats - you can use use Physan to prevent against damping out. I would sterilize the seedling mix - the same way I sterilize the regular violet soil - wet the soil and nuke in a microwave. I nuke a gallon of wet soil for 8 minutes. Usually seedling mix doesn't have very much if at all fertilizer added. Water your seedlings with an AV fertilizer (with Physan added), spray them with it and with a fish emulsion solution. If you do not have a specialised seedling soil mix - the AV soil 1:1:1 works great. You can use the domes if you use them on AV babies, you can keep the tray under AV lights when they hatch - then you need to move them to the brighter light, like sunny window. AV lovers have all the advantages - we already have the setup. Happy growing - peppers should be already hatching. Irina

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

There might be some upcoming plant swaps or trades in your area. You might also be willing to drive to San Antonio or Austin for the ones they are having. Search the Texas gardening forum about it and also post on Craigslist or Freecycle about your wants.

I am in a similar zone to you (Indiana) and this is how I do it. I treat all seeds the same whether from evergreen parents or dormant. I have planted them in late summer and overwintered them in a greenhouse that stays around 60 degrees in the winter (unless it is sunny and then the temperatures go up for a while). I have found no benefit from doing this. They don't grow much; in fact, many will go dormant. At least they quit growing but don't lose their leaves. When they start growing again, the center looks like a daylily coming up in the spring. We have also had a lot of trouble with spider mites in the greenhouse. Furthermore, when it's time to plant the seedlings in the ground, they are no bigger than the ones you waited to plant the following spring. As far as loss of viability is concerned, you do lose some seeds while in storage. I don't worry too much about that because I figure they were not viable in the first place. I dry the seeds for at least a day or two (sometimes longer--just depends on when I get around to putting them away) on paper plates in the living room. I think what's important here is that they are dry when they go into storage. I store them in small plastic bags (the 2 by 3 inch size) in the refrigerator. I don't have any experience with storing in a cool basement. In late January I start the process of germinating the seeds. I have found that I get quicker germination if I use moist stratification. So in late January, I pour a little distilled water in the baggie and put them back in the refrigerator. Many of them will start germinating in the refrigerator, sometimes in even a day or two. Others will stay in the refrigerator for 3 weeks and show no signs of germination. I used to wait until at least one seed in the cross germinated to plant them. Now I don't bother with that. I like them to soak for several days (at least 2 to 3). Then I plant all the cross. I find that germination is much quicker. It used to be before using the moist stratification that some seeds would take months to germinate. Now they all germinate in a week or two. That's important to us because we like to start planting in April if the weather cooperates (this year it didn't and none of the seedlings are in the ground). With this treatment some seeds won't germinate at all in the refrigerator but as soon as you plant them, they germinate quickly. We have been hybridizing for 10 years and it seems that every year we refine our methods. This has worked well for us for the last several years. We have over 3000 seedlings to plant this year. Daylily hybridization has been the most exciting thing we have done with plants. Good luck to you. I hope every seedling you grow is a keeper. Nancy