Friday, September 28, 2012

Seed Germination, Field Seeding and Transplanting

September 18 - 21, 2012.
This time we learned about seed structure: Dicot vegetables have two cotyledons which are most vegetables. Then monocot vegetables have one cotyledon which types of crops are leek, onion, garlic, chive, sweet corn, and asparagus according to our lecture. Furthermore, we discussed what seeds need to germinate. They need water, favorable temperature, oxygen, and light. Before I went to check on my  plot during the time we covered seed germination,  I was seriously wondering if I didn't provide my plants with any of their basic needs for the seeds to germinate properly. Then two days later I visited my plot to see some results, I noticed that the plants were too small and had barely grown. But before thinking that I wasn't doing a good job, I realized that I planted most of my seeds very deep in  the soil, which is way they haven't grown as much as I would have wanted them to. Also I remembered the professor saying something related to the time it would take for the plants to grow if the seeds were planted too deep, which made me feel better. Further, we learned about transplanting during that week. Transplanting is transition of a potted plant from its container and its growing environment into your garden. Transplants are used for earliness, uniformity and consistency, land use efficiency, cost saving on expensive seeds and other production input. I decided to do some eggplant transplanting because the class offered some extra plants for us to use. Also, I wanted to compare the growth of the crops that I planted by using their seeds versus the new transplanted eggplants. If the crops that I planted by using their seeds don't grow bigger than the transplanted eggplants next time I check my plot, I will prove to myself that the transplanting works faster than direct seeding. Finally, we briefly spoke about crops that can be vegetatively propagated, which are, asparagus, potatoes, sweet potatoes, and garlic. I planted a potato offered to us in class because it was growing tubers and it was ready to be vegetatively propagated. Similar to this picture:


 

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