How long for autoseeds to sprout to the surface?

During my first grow my germinated seeds made their way to the surface of my soil in 2-3days.

On my second grow now… It’s been 4 days and no sign of life yet.

Seeds were germinated in cups of water for both situations. During the first grow I did wait until all but one seed tails, and I didn’t saturate my soil before planting, I just watered after they were planted. During this second grow, no seeds had tails, but all seeds had started to open up when I planted them. I also saturated the soil with a ton of water until there was a bit of run off. I thought I made a mistake by not doing this last time. Now I’m wondering if I shouldn’t have done so.

How long have you all waited to see a seed make its way to the surface? I’m wondering if I should just start germinating a new batch of seeds yet?

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It can take up to a week sometimes. The more of a tail they have, the faster they tend to sprout.

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Are you keeping them warm?

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The temps were much higher my first go round(70-80s), this time low 60s-low 70s. This is largely out of my control unfortunately

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The heat mat’s worked good to get seedlings up and going when it’s a little cooler.

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There’s your problem. A heat mat or just putting them on the cable box would help. I have a plastic bin with a light that I use for mine, pretty cheap and keeps them around 78-82 depending. They can still pop up but the low temps slow them down

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@New2GrowNot2Weed

I actually bought a 2 pack of heat mats and wrapped her pot in them to keep her warm and happy and now have just one underneath her pot

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This will drown and rot seeds. Soil should be a little damp but not soaked when sprouting seeds.

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See that’s what I thought, but I saw a ton of recommendations to dump a ton of water into the soil several hours before planting. Odd

Thanks. I guess I didn’t think of heat mats. Although I’m pretty much done with buying extra tools at this stage. If needed I’ll just wait until the warmer months again. Thanks for the input!

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I hear ya. What about on top of the fridge? There’s usually a warm spot up there…

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I water the soil then squeeze out as much as possible and then stir it up to loosen it up.
I did an experiment to see how long it could go before watering. So I soaked a seed 24hrs, placed it in that soil and went 21 days before it wilted badly. Overwatering kills a lot of seeds.

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You do know I am referring to seeds that are already planted in soil right? I’m sure you know better than I, but I’m hesitant to think that would actually warm up my 16L pots to the top 1/2in of soil where the seeds are, but :man_shrugging:t3:

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Yeah I knew they were planted but not the 4 gallon pot part… I usually start mine in solo cups and do 1 transplant once they’re ready

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Gotcha! The temp the first day or two was lower as I mentioned. Although every check the past two days has been higher. Current temp is 77 with RH in the 50s and this just appeared in one pot

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Be careful when using heat mats that you have something like a paper plate in between them. Mine gets warmer than I think necessary with just a ziplock and wet paper towels on it. Probably meant to warm up small containers actually.

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Good point, I don’t use the heat mats too much but when I do I’ll put them under a dinner plate or tray to keep the direct heat down a bit

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I just had an auto i thought dead…or a photo cant tell yet. Had a few fail…pop its little head out of a pot i dumped the solos in. I thought all dead…dumped in a pot and planted another. 3 weeks and she said hi dude i live.

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On my second water soak method i let the seed ssit until i was happy with tail length (3-4days). I then planted them and then soaked the soil with spray bottle after that it took about 2-3 days for them to sprout through soil. I kept humidity 80 and temp 75+

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This is ILGM Do si do seed auto that I soaked for 12 hours in plain tap water. Tapped the seed and in sunk. I planted straight into a solo cup with moist soil and I did use a dome. This is 36 hours later.