Shop Products
Houzz Logo Print
nexev

Cornstarch Gel for small seeds

nexev - Zone 8b
9 years ago

A convenient way to plant small, delicate, pre-germinated seeds is to suspend them in a gel. You can make a gel by blending cornstarch with boiling water to a consistency that is thick enough so the seeds will stay suspended. Be sure to cool thoroughly before use. Place the gel with seedlings in a plastic bag with a hole in it. Squeeze the gel through the hole along a pre-marked garden row. Spacing of seeds is determined by the number of seeds in the gel. If the spacing is too dense, add more gel; if too wide, add more seeds. The gel will keep the germinating seeds moist until they establish themselves in the garden soil.
_________________________________________________

The above is from the UoM linked below, this is in reference to pregerminated seed though I have also seen it mentioned for small seeds in general.

Just wondering if anyone here has tried this for something like carrots or other small seeds or even larger seeds (like radish or bunching onions) that you want to sow many of without ending up with tons of thinning. Is it worth the extra steps preparing? Seems very handy but a search in this 'starting from seeds' forum only turned up two results on 'cornstarch' and neither were talking about this method which leaves me wondering if there is a good reason why no one is talking about it.

Here is a link that might be useful: Plant Propagation

Comments (10)

  • grubby_AZ Tucson Z9
    9 years ago

    There's no reason why the cornstarch thing shouldn't work. I sometimes mix tiny seeds with sand. I figure a couple of finger tip dribbles back and forth will make things pretty even on an average. Seems to work.

    I saw it in a movie, one of Richard Gere's worst, and they were planting tobacco.

  • floral_uk z.8/9 SW UK
    9 years ago

    I've never done it but it is quite a well known technique. Wall paper paste is often recommended, or flour and water paste. Try Googling 'Fluid Sowing' for more info.

  • lazy_gardens
    7 years ago

    I'm trying cornstarch gel for winter green leafy stuff - as a germinating medium, then will transfer to the veggy beds.

    If it works or not, I'll let you know

  • lazy_gardens
    7 years ago

    OK ... I tried it as a germination substrate. Cornstarch gel goes bad quickly - liquefies and gets moldy.

    I don't think it has any advantages over my usual overnight soak before planting.

    It MIGHT work to put the freshly made, cooled gel in the furrow and drop the seeds in it - a water reservoir.

    It also might work as a diluent for tiny seeds, although sand or coffee grounds works just as well.

  • Lynn in Parkton, Maryland
    7 years ago

    I haven't perfected this technique, but one year I glued small seeds to crepe paper with water solvable Elmer's and then planted the crepe paper in the row. With water/rain both the glue and the crepe paper dissolved in the dirt. Plants came up fine and were fairly well spaced. I've never tried cornstarch, but maybe next spring.

  • Campanula UK Z8
    7 years ago

    But why?

  • lazy_gardens
    7 years ago

    Campanula - "But why"' Why plant pregerminated seeds? Because it means I don't have to keep a seed bed properly moist for the entire germination period. In the arid southwestern USA it is not easy.

    It means lower losses to thinning if you can plop them in at the correct intervals.


  • Campanula UK Z8
    7 years ago

    No, it's not the pre-germinating (I often chit seeds myself) but the glueing onto tape which seems like a lot of faff (for someone going under the moniker of 'lazy gardens'...speaking as someone who wrote the book on idling.

  • Egress Jin
    7 years ago

    It's useful because you can plant large amounts of very small objects at a constant rate. If the mixture is homogeneous then you can use the rate that the gel is dispersed to measure how many seeds are sown per length of area. You typically have a tank and a nozzle of some kind with a set flow and the apparatus moves along the field at a specific speed.

Sponsored
Ed Ball Landscape Architecture
Average rating: 4.8 out of 5 stars30 Reviews
Exquisite Landscape Architecture & Design - “Best of Houzz" Winner