Consolidation and Replanting

It's time to reflect and re-evaluate. Things are not going well.

Given that there is only one seedling remains from three weeks ago, the chances of success are not good. I decided to re-evaluate current sequoia seedling growing process and here is what came out of it.

First, the soil and watering are clearly having a major impact on seedlings. With little understanding how to differentiate between over- and under-watering I decided to investigate that further and to change the soil and methods of its watering for most of the seedlings.

Second, I began to suspect that the light probably is having an effect on the older, 2-3 week seedlings. Green needles shoot out of soil (if they shoot at all) very fast, typically at least half an inch in one day. Then a seedling grows for another half an inch over one-two weeks and then stops. Overwhelming majority die at that point. The lonely stand-out that did nto die, but did not grow either over last week was #4.

I went back to Earl May to get a few more things. I got Vermiculite, and a growing light. At home, I poured contents of several white tubes into a plastic pan, mixed their contents thoroughly, that is heavy black top soil and the brown grow mix. Then I added a cup of vermiculite to the soil mix and stirred it more. The resulting mix if much more uniform and clearly has more air inside. I filled white tubes with this new concoction to about 3 inches below top.

Based on more online research it appears that peat-moss-based seedling grow mix needs to be prepared with a generous dose of water so that it starts to look and feel like a damp sponge. Watering of the medium after it's already placed in a container did not seem to have desired effect.

I poured content of a few brown pots into a plastic pan and kept sprinkling it with water while mixing it vigorously until it started to resemble damp sponge consistency. I filled the top 2 inches of the white tubes with the damp peat moss.

Then I used a teaspoon to scoop seedlings from the brown pots and transported them into the white tubes. Notice the distint color difference in the damp and the dry peat moss:

Replanting November 17th, 2012

Finally, I added more damp peat moss and a bit more water to make the remaining dry soil same consistency:

I repeated same procedure for all five brown patch seedling and also for the #8.

#8? Was it not pronounced dead this morning? Well, it's most likely is going to die, but there was one noticeable difference between #8 and other seedling that did not make it. The difference was in the  appearance of the needles. Although the stem was bent and almost touching the ground, the needles were still green on top. The underside of the needles was turning clearly brown, but overall shape of the plant was more preserved than in previous cases. Other seedling became very thin very quickly. #8 leaning towards ground was still substantially thick. So, I decided to move it and see what happens. 

Since I now know what the wet peat moss is supposed to look like, I will attempt to keep it that color as it keeps drying up.

That's all for soil and watering changes.