starting seeds indoors

[Frankie]

Hello,

I would like to grow some herbs indoors and I am asking if anyone knows about fluorescent lighting or lamps that I can use to grow plants...

[orchidguy]

Frankie

flourescent lighting is a good and economical light source to start seeds. I have been using L.E.D. lights after much success with them over my marine aquaria. They produce a cool light, so a lot of energy isn't wasted on heat. As far as flourescent, you would only need a double fixture with 2 cool white bulbs.
Plants use the full spectrum on sunlight when grown outside, with red and blue being the most critical. Red stimulates growth and blue regulates plant growth which is great for foliage...not bloom. Cool white bulbs are a good source of the blue and yellow, whereas warm white produces the orange and red. A combination of both will give you a balanced full spectrum that is adeqate for a lot of plants (this is starting to sound like a lecture)
To grow herbs and greenery, use two cool whites at about 12" from the plants and they should do fine till summer, when they can be placed outside

[Eeyore]

Frankie - I've moved this to Plant Talk where it will generate more replies for you.

I've used the Cool White Bulbs to start seeds indoors and they work well. I've also used the Sunlight Bulbs.

[Frankie]

Thank you Dan for the great and helpful information, I now have an idea how it all works.

Thank you Lyn for moving my post to plant talk, tks for the info.

frankie

[Eeyore]

Hmm, I thought you'd get more replies. What type of seeds do you want to start? Some require more heat than others and some need to be started in the dark. There are some excellent germination sites on the net that I can point you too if you are interested.

[Frankie]

Hi Lyn,

Yes, I have quite few:
Tomatoes(yellow pear)
Watermelon
Basil (5 different types)
Clematis
Stock (evening scent)
coleus
achillea
wildflower (catchfy)
I am definitely interested in the website that you want to suggest.

If you are interested in the plants I mentioned above, I can send you a few seeds.

Francesca

[Eeyore]

I've got a few sites bookmarked....

I like this one.

http://webhome.idirect.com/~jehan/Infor ... sseedx.htm

http://www.backyardgardener.com/tm.html

http://www.theseedsite.co.uk/index.html

Tomatoes are easy to start but they like warm soil so bottom heat is good.
Basil will start just about anywhere. I THINK evening scented stocks can be direct sown. The rest I don't know about.
You'll probably want to purchase some "Damp Off" to keep your seedlings from "damping off".
At the moment I'm not looking for any seeds but thank you for the offer.

Good Luck!