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Entry Date
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Location
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Saturday, March 27, 2010
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shazzy
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Joliet, IL
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Entry 9 of 267 |
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soaking my giant tomato seeds this morning and will put them into some 85 degree heated seed starter mix in 2" peat pots. the small germination room is all set up again in the basement with a space heater set at 85 degrees to get the room temp up as well as the propagation mat set at 85 with a probe in a center pot at seed level. you can see the cord in the pic to the left in center. the plastic trays with tall humidity domes sit on rack over the propagation mat. when sprouts emerge, they are removed from the domes and placed in a tray under a different flourescent light 2" above the plants with a small fan indirectly blowing near them. when all have sprouted, the space heater will be turned off and that room will stay about 65 and the fans slowly turned more directly on the sprouts over a coarse of a few days and slightly rotating the pots daily for stockiness. this lower heat will help make them more stocky in the small sprout development stage as far as i have read. they will receive a light seaweed mix feeding while growing intially in the 2" pots and i will wet down and carefully remove the peat pots and transplant them into 5' peat pots with patch soil as soon as the root systems call for it. these will stay downstairs for a couple weeks after trasnplanting into 5" pots under flourescent before shifting into the shazzydome greenhouse in the patch for acclimation before going into the ground after the last frost or freeze about 5-15. all seeds came from treetop for the gtg and i will hopefully grow 2 of the 5.58 x self plants, one brutus maximas, one gordan graham, and one big zac f2. the strongest will be mine and the rest go to friends and we are having a Bobby's Tap Giant Tomato Contest. its mostly just for bar bragging rights, but i am sure wagering of some sort will ensue. my largest tomato will hopefully coincide with a weigh off, but otherwise, i will bring it to my geotechnical lab and weigh it on a certified scale.
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