I germinated 3 seeds (paper towel method). After they cracked and the tap root was exposed I planted them 1/4 inch deep in Jiffy Organic Seed Starting Mix. I first planted them yesterday around 4:00. Today I decided to put a plastic Baggie over the tops of two of them. I taped the baggie to the cups and misted it. I also made quit a few holes in the Baggie with a knife. I also put a heat pad under the two with the baggies over them. It isn't a digital one so I have it on the lowest setting. My question is do you think the extra humidity and heat will make them sprout faster? Did I even do the humidity dome thing correctly? This is an experiment that's why I didn't do it to the third. My lights are 4 cfl's 67 actual watts total and I mist them at least once a day. How long until they sprout?
heat mats are cool but if they get one degree to hot you cook the roots......i dont use them anymore......i just make sure the room is 65-75....oh and once you see leaves.....no humidity.......the plant needs to evaporate water out of the leaves
personally ive never used heat pads but the temp and humidity does matter. what i do is take 2 black plastic food containers (cuz it attracts heat) and germinate them in paper towels. i wrap the plastic container in fleece and place it on the highest part of my house (which is top floor top shelf) in about a day it pops. really effective this way. i remember i was germinating and air conditioning was on and it took about 2-3 days for them to pop. so definitely watch ur temps.
Simple answer: Yes, extra heat and humidity will help a seedling sprout and shed it's shell. Once the seedlings have shed their shell, remove the baggies, as they need to breathe. Do not mist them, especially since you're using CFLs. Your soil will already take days to dry out, and you want complete wet and dry cycles. They're sensitive when they're small, but over-caring can be as big of a problem as not watering at all. Once they have a tap-root, I throw my seedlings into Solo cups with a light soil / perlite mix (Happy Frog). When I used smaller jiffy pellet sized things, they were always either too wet or too dry.