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I think we can all agree options are good- but give us too many options to choose from and we can easily feel overwhelmed. And as a result we may find ourselves failing to make any sort of decision at all&#;

This is at least how I felt when I was just getting started growing flowers and was trying to decide on which seed starting trays to purchase.

I mean, no one wants to spend money only to find out later that they invested in the &#;wrong&#; trays&#;am I right?!

And so today, I&#;m hoping to put your mind at ease. In this blog, specifically-  I thought we&#;d discuss the pro&#;s and con&#;s to some of the different seed trays out there on the market.  I&#;m also going to share with you some of my favorite trays to use; and even give you some considerations to think about when you&#;re selecting your own trays.

So if you&#;re wanting to learn more- let&#;s go!

(Psst.. Want to skip the explanation and get right to the good stuff?! I got you covered, this tray is my absolute favorite for starting seeds; and truth be told, it&#;s the one tray I use most on my small flower farm)

Understanding Seed Trays:

Now in general, all seed trays serve the same sort of purpose- they hold your soil in place so that you can grow healthy transplants for your flower garden. 

By planting your seeds in a single tray, it makes it easier to treat your seedlings all the same as they&#;re in the same container. You can water the entire tray at once. You can transport your seedlings at once- you know, when it&#;s time to plant you just have to handle a single tray and bring it out to the garden with you.

For the most part, all of the seed trays that you will encounter, they have the same overall length and width. And they can typically all fit inside a standard bottom watering tray. 

The biggest difference among trays is really found with the number of cells they contain.

The Importance of Cell Size in Seed Starting Trays:

Cell counts vary widely in trays and you can commonly find trays that have 32-cells, 50, 72, all the way up to 128, 288 and beyond.

Now, the more cells in a single tray- the smaller each individual cell will be. So for example, the cells of a 50 cell tray will be larger than those in this 72 cell tray.

Choosing which cell count to use is based partly on preference and how much room you have available to seed start. And then it&#;s based partly on the needs of the seeds you&#;re growing.

You see, the size of a cell limits the growth of a seedling. Smaller cells leave less space for seedlings to grow.

Ideally we want to give the seedling as much room as it needs to expand its roots and put on top growth so that it really thrives before we put it out in our garden.

During the growing process, if your seedling runs out of room to grow, generally, what happens is that the seedling becomes root bound. When this happens, the roots of your seedling become so entangled that they have a hard time absorbing nutrients from the soil.

Now some seedlings can bounce back after becoming root bound but it&#;s better if we can prevent this altogether as root bound plants can experience stunted growth, delayed flowering, or in extreme conditions, they can just flat out not survive.

Understand that the purpose of seed starting is to produce a robust plant start. So giving our seedling the proper amount of room to grow is important. 

Like I said, in an ideal situation we&#;d give our plants as much room as possible. But for a lot of us who grow seedlings on any kind of scale, the problem is that we often don&#;t have unlimited space.

I have a number of wired shelves where I grow all my plant starts. The shelves are 4 feet wide and so on one shelf I can fit 4 trays. 

If I&#;m growing my seedlings in 32 cell trays that means one shelf can hold a grand total of 128  seedlings. You know, 4 trays times 32 cells.

Now compare that to if I were growing my seedlings in 72 cell trays. Suddenly that same amount of real estate on my wire shelf is enough to grow 288 seedlings- more than doubling the amount of seedlings I&#;m able to grow in the same amount of space.

Can you see how it&#;s a fine balance between maximizing the space you have available so that you can grow as many seedlings as possible with also doing what&#;s best for the health of your seedling?

Best Seed Tray Recommendation for Flower Farmers:

For me, the 72 cell tray (with a few exceptions) is sort of the compromise between these two factors that I just mentioned. The reason that I often encourage new growers to start with the 72 cell tray is that for most flower varieties, the 72 cell is sufficient space for a seed to grow into a large and bulky enough plant start without requiring you to repot it before it&#;s time to to transplant into the garden.

And if I&#;m being really specific, my absolute favorite seed starting tray is the 72 cell seed tray that comes from Bootstrap Farmer. I believe that I&#;ve shared in past YouTube videos how I stumbled across the Bootstrap Farmer brand- but 5 seasons into growing flowers, I can honestly say that I haven&#;t found a tray that compares in strength and quality to this tray.

Even full of soil the Bootstrap Farmer trays don&#;t buckle- they&#;re a really durable tray and for me, it&#;s worth it to spend the extra dollar or two per tray because I know that I won&#;t need to replace them near as often.

So let&#;s discuss some instances when I would choose to use a different tray.

Seed Starting Trays for Specific Circumstances:

128-Cell (and smaller) Seed Starting Tray

If you&#;re struggling with germination with some of your seeds- tools like heat mats and humidity domes can be useful in helping you achieve those ideal situations for your seeds to germinate.

While I look at my equipment as a necessary investment in my business- sometimes you just don&#;t have the extra money to spend so that every tray has its own heat mat and humidity dome.

And so one of the ways around this may be to use a smaller-cell tray to start with. A 128 cell tray is great because you can start a good number of seeds in a small space- and this single tray fits nicely on heat mat.

In my experience, you just have to be careful that you&#;re monitoring your 128 and smaller cell trays to make sure that they have enough space for your seedlings to grow until they&#;re ready for transplant. You may find that you&#;ll need to bump up your seedlings into a larger tray so that they can continue to grow until it&#;s time to plant them outside.

50-Cell Seed Starting Tray

Speaking of more room, if there&#;s one flower variety I definitely recommend you give plenty of room to it&#;s sweet peas. Sweet peas are known for their large root system and for that reason I always use a 50 cell tray when starting my sweet pea seeds. 

In recent years, I&#;ve actually switched to using these 50 cell extra deep trays for my sweet peas as it allows for more root development.

We actually use these deep 50 cell trays for an increasing number of our crops- we start our ranunculus and anemone corms in these and I even pot up my paperwhites bulbs in these trays 

All of these varieties that I just mentioned are flowers that can benefit from a little extra space for their roots.

Now before you go crazy and grow all sorts of flowers in these extra deep trays- I will caution you, in my experience these trays are little more difficult when it comes to regulating moisture. Personally I feel like these trays don&#;t wick up moisture from their bottom drain holes as well and so I often find myself overhead watering when I&#;m using these trays verses bottom watering. And I just find it a little more difficult to actually gauge the amount of moisture at the very bottom of these deep cells. 

I think it&#;s much easier to maintain a consistent amount of moisture in any of these other more standard trays that are just 2 to 3 inches deep. 

20 Row Channel Tray

This next tray that I want to share with you is a little unique- it&#;s a 20 row channel tray. This is something I&#;d recommend if you are someone that hates sowing small seeds.

We all know the struggle that comes when you&#;re trying to sow something like snapdragons or herbs like oregano- the seeds are just so tiny it can be difficult to even decipher what&#;s a seed vs just a speck of dirt. I&#;ll admit, some seasons I have the patience to sit at my seed starting station I&#;ll use a moist toothpick to pick up each individual seed and put it into its own individual cell within my cell tray.

But other seasons, I find myself in a hurry or I just don&#;t want to bother with the especially tiny seeds. And in these instances, I will pull out my channel trays.

The purpose of this tray is that you&#;ll fill each channel with soil, you&#;ll indent your soil to create a small &#;channel&#; for seeds to be poured into. Unlike a cell tray where you&#;re placing one seed into each cell. With this tray you&#;re simply pouring seeds the length of your channel. Usually a single one-hundred seed packet is enough for one channel. As you can imagine this is a huge timesaver for getting seeds started.

Now I&#;ll treat my channel tray like any other seed tray- and I can fill more channels if I&#;d like- but I&#;ll usually put this on a heat mat and place a humidity dome over time. Once the seeds have germinated and my seedlings have put on just a little growth- I&#;ll pop these out of their channel and pot them up in my favorite 72-cell trays where they&#;ll continue to grow until I&#;ll plant them out in my garden.

For a lot of people, having to handle these baby seedlings is much easier than having to deal with the eye strain that can come from trying to separate tiny seeds into individual cells. 

A channel tray is a two-step process instead of just one like when you&#;re seeding directly into a cell tray- so you may have to do a little trial-and-error to see if this process works for you, but it is a great work around especially if you&#;re someone that struggles with planting small seeds. 

I&#;ll also use a channel tray if I have a flower variety that doesn&#;t have great germination. By planting lots of seeds in a single channel and then only bumping up the seeds that actually germinated I can avoid those instances where I have trays that have lots of empty spaces because the seeds I planted there simply didn&#;t germinate.

Seed Trays We&#;re Trialing this Year:

Now the last tray that I want to share with you today is a new tray that I&#;m trialing this season. And I&#;m honestly pretty excited about these.

So far in this post, I&#;ve shared with you the different types of trays that I use for my own seed starting practice. Realize however, that there is another method of seed starting that eliminates the need for any sort of tray at all.

This practice is what we call soil-blocking. Instead of planting your seeds into soil held in place by a tray, you plant your seed into a cube of soil.

There&#;s some great benefits to soil blocking- the biggest one being that it prevents your seedlings from becoming root bound. 

In a cell tray, when your seedling&#;s roots hit the side of the cell, they&#;re forced to grow downward in a spiral, and left in the tray too long they&#;ll often circle the bottom of the cell becoming root-bound as they tangle together.

Soil blocking, however, avoids this problem. When your seedling&#;s roots reach the outer edge of the soil block and actually come in contact with the outside air, they experience what we call &#;air-pruning&#;.  What this means is that root- it dries out and stops outward growth and signals secondary root development within the soil block. Overall you get a more developed, fuller root system for your seedling.

Despite these amazing benefits, I just don&#;t have the patience myself to plant my seeds into soil blocks- it can sometimes be a finicky process and I just much prefer the convenience of seed trays.

Air prune trays are sort of a hybrid method of seed starting that allows you to experience the benefits of soil blocking because the trays are designed in such a way that your seedlings can air prune themselves- but they have the added convenience of a tray.

I&#;ll be curious to see if my seedlings that grow in this tray are in fact healthier than those grown in my more standard trays. For this season, I&#;ve only purchased a handful of these air pruned trays so that I could get a feel for how they perform for me.

My plan is to use them on flower varieties that are particularly sensitive to root disturbance. My thoughts are that if I can grow a more robust root system on those sort of plants, they&#;ll likely transplant into my garden much more smoothly and overall perform better as they&#;ll have less chance of transplant shock &#; that&#;s at least my theory.

If you want to learn more, please visit our website Leak-Proof Seedling Trays.

I will say that these trays are an investment. Still, they are incredibly well-made trays so I have no doubt that I&#;ll be able to use them for many seasons and in that sense, I&#;m not worrying about getting my money&#;s worth out of them.

But I&#;ll definitely keep you updated on how these perform for me as the season progresses.

Conclusion:

So there you have it- an inside peek into the different seed trays that I use in a season. I hope this blog post gives you some things to consider when you&#;re deciding on which trays you&#;d like to use in growing your own flower starts. 

Be sure to let me know in the comments below what you decide on as I&#;m always curious as to what other growers use!

P.S. Want to see all these trays mentioned in action?! Be sure to check out this YouTube video where I show you even more about my favorite seed starting trays!

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The Journey to the Perfect Garden: Choosing the Right Propagation Tray

Raymond Meijer | January 10,

The Start of Your Seedlings

It might seem obvious, you plant a seed and then you harvest, right? If you&#;ve tried it before, you know that this is certainly not always the case. Most vegetables and flowers have special needs before they yield a lot of harvest. Besides enough water, the right amount of sun, and the perfect sowing moment, they also like certain space.

A good example of this is the difference between lettuce and tomatoes. A lettuce plant prefers to start in a small space, and a tomato wants space otherwise it stops growing, but why?

Why Do Plants Have Different Requirements?

A seed is a seed, a plant is a plant. They all want to grow. So why is there a preference for the size of the pot in which they start?

There are many reasons, for example, the amount of compost, thus nutrition, the amount of water a plant needs, and how deep or wide the plant prefers to root.

A lettuce plant roots slowly and shallowly, which means it cannot form a nice root ball in a large pot. This also leaves too much water in the soil, leading to seed and root rot. Tomato roots shallowly as well, but much wider. And, a tomato stops growing if there isn&#;t enough space. Because we prefer to start tomatoes in March before the frost is over.

The tomato needs a large pot to develop well and not limit its growth. On the other hand, you also have cabbages and legumes. These root deeply, not widely. So in a shallow pot, the main root grows right out of the bottom.

Thus, each plant has its preference!

The Basics: What Are Propagation Trays and Why Are They Important?

Before we delve into the details, let&#;s take a moment to understand the basics. Propagation trays are not just containers; they are the start of your successful garden. But how do they work?

Now that you know each plant has its preferences, you understand why the size of the pot is important, but why propagation trays? The handy thing about a propagation tray is that you can sow multiple plants in one container but still give each plant its own space.

Imagine a whole windowsill filled with 40 plant pots or one propagation tray with 40 cells. The advantage is also that the cell sizes of propagation trays can be smaller than most pots, so you can start more in the same space and use less compost.

Another significant advantage of the right propagation trays is that they are developed to prevent certain growth problems. Think, for example, of root binding, where the roots endlessly twirl around each other. This can lead to transplant shock, where the plant struggles to continue growing when you put it in the garden. Or think of overwatering, which causes root and seed rot. Many growth problems can be prevented with the right trays.

Why Are There So Many Different Sizes, and Do You Need Them All?

There&#;s something for everyone, as they say. We have a wide range of sturdy propagation trays, each with different enthusiasts. The main thing to mention is that everyone grows in their way. Some have a very specific need to keep plants in a propagation tray for a very long time and choose very large cells.

Others want to get into the garden as quickly as possible and choose a small cell size. One is not better than the other, so personal preference plays a role. We advise based on the most optimal environment for certain plants, but if you want to start your tomato in the smallest tray and then put it outside, of course, you can!

So, the ultimate advice &#; try out what works for you and what fits your gardening style.

Your Role as a Gardener: Why the Choice of a Propagation Tray Is So Important

The success of your garden thus depends on the strength of your plants. The choice of the pot, therefore, affects everything: from root growth to leaf formation and the size of the harvest. How do you determine the right pot for your plant? Fortunately, we have endlessly tested to find out what your plants need. To make this clear, we have divided the plants into a few simple-to-remember categories.

• Leafy Greens:

   

  endive, lettuce, spinach, lamb&#;s lettuce
• Root, Onion, and Tuberous Vegetables:

   

  beetroot, radish, onions, leek
• Cabbage & Legumes:

   

  white cabbage, red cabbage, savoy cabbage & peas, chickpeas, snap peas, green beans
• Fruit Vegetables:

   

  zucchini, cucumber, bell pepper, tomatoes
• Stem Vegetables:

   

  celery, fennel, asparagus, artichoke
• Herbs:

   

  basil, thyme, lavender, sage
• Flowers with Small Seeds:

   

  asters, rudbeckia, snapdragons
• Flowers without Deep Roots:

   

  calendula, didiscus, phlox, tagetes (marigolds), geum, Limonium (sea lavender), strawflower
• Fast-Growing Flowers:

   

  cosmos, zinnia, dianthus (carnations), scabiosa, lupins, poppy, digitalis (foxglove)

For the complete list, you can look here. Search what you want to grow and get a seed tray advice or select the tray and see what will grow well in them.

Which cell size is handy for which plant and why?

Vegetable Seeds

Leafy Greens

Leafy greens like lettuce, endive, and spinach need relatively little space to start. If you choose a large pot or propagation tray, you&#;ll find that the seeds come up poorly. This is often because the compost is too wet and remains so because the water is not used. And when it&#;s time to move them out of the pot, you&#;ll find that the roots haven&#;t filled the pot yet. This makes it difficult to transplant the plant without damaging the root ball.

Therefore, we recommend the Charles Dowding 60-cell or 77-cell low propagation trays. A cell volume of 20cm³ to 35cm³ or a cell size of 2.5 to 3cm. These can also be found in the small Charles Dowding 15 & 30-cell trays.

Root, Onion, and Tuberous Vegetables

Root, onion, and tuberous vegetables like beetroot, radish, onions, and leek prefer a bit more space. This is especially the case if you choose multi-sowing, where you sow more seeds per cell. It&#;s important to note that carrots and parsnips are not ideal for pre-sowing; they thrive best when sown directly where they will ultimately grow. This has to do with the taproot, which prefers not to be disturbed.

For these, you can choose the 40-cell low or 28-cell low propagation trays. A cell volume of 70cm³ to 115cm³ or a cell size of 4 to 5cm.

Cabbage and Legumes

Cabbage plants like white cabbage, red cabbage, broccoli & cauliflower are in the same category as legumes like peas, sugar snaps, and green beans. These crops often root a bit deeper. Therefore, it&#;s better to choose a deeper propagation tray. They don&#;t necessarily have to root very wide, so a narrow high tray is fine.

The advice for cabbage and legumes is the 40-cell deep propagation tray. It&#;s important with these types of crops that they don&#;t like to stay in the propagation tray for too long. The cells get filled with roots, and then it&#;s time to transplant or plant them out.

Fruit Vegetables

Courgettes, cucumbers, bell peppers, and tomatoes need plenty of space. Especially courgettes and cucumbers grow quickly and widely. The bell peppers and tomatoes do not necessarily quickly but do grow wide. And, they also need to stay in the propagation tray for a long time.

The ideal propagation tray for fruit vegetables is the low 15-cell. With a cell size of about 7cm and a cell volume of 310cm³, this provides the ideal growing environment for your plants. Knowing this, if you only grow a few of them, feel free to use P7 or P9 pots!

Stem Vegetables

Then, of course, we have the stem vegetables like celery, fennel, asparagus, and artichoke. These grow a bit like the tuberous vegetables. They like some space but do not need too much.

For these, you can also choose the 40-cell low or 28-cell low propagation trays. A cell volume of 70cm³ to 115cm³ or a cell size of 4 to 5cm.

Herbs

Herbs like basil, thyme, lavender, and sage grow quite slowly and are sensitive to too much water in the compost. To prevent this from happening, we choose a small cell.

Therefore, we recommend the Charles Dowding 60-cell or 77-cell low propagation trays. A cell volume of 20cm³ to 35cm³ or a cell size of 2.5 to 3cm. These can also be found in the small Charles Dowding 15 & 30-cell trays.

Flower Seeds

Flowers with Small Seeds

Flower seeds like asters, rudbeckia, and snapdragons are very small, so it takes more time for them to grow. To prevent them from having too much space, we choose a small cell size. It&#;s important to note that you may need to transplant the plants into a 40-cell deep tray after they have filled the small cell but cannot yet go outside.

Therefore, we recommend the Charles Dowding 60-cell or 77-cell low propagation trays. A cell volume of 20cm³ to 35cm³ or a cell size of 2.5 to 3cm.

Flowers without Deep Roots

We also have flower varieties with normal-sized seeds that don&#;t necessarily need to root deeply, such as calendula, didiscus, phlox, and strawflower. They grow a bit faster than the small seeds and therefore like a bit more space. For these, use a slightly larger cell size.

For these, you can choose the 40-cell low or 28-cell low propagation trays. A cell volume of 70cm³ to 115cm³ or a cell size of 4 to 5cm.

Fast-Growing Flowers

Last but not least, the fast-growing flowers like cosmos, zinnia, lupines, poppy, digitalis (foxglove). Because they grow quickly, they are best started directly in a larger tray. This way, you don&#;t have to keep transplanting them.

We choose a deep 40-cell propagation tray for this. With a cell size of 4cm and a volume of around 115cm³, it&#;s ideal for your flower garden!

The Different Types of Propagation Trays: Why not all of them?

There is a part of the propagation trays that I have not advised so far, why not? You will notice on your propagation adventure that it is not a one-size-fits-all situation. Sometimes you are specifically looking for a particular cell size or just a small tray that fits perfectly on your windowsill.

That&#;s why there is a wide range of propagation trays that I haven&#;t mentioned yet. Some gardeners prefer very deep large propagation trays like the 15-cell deep, 77-cell deep and 28-cell deep trays. These can be very handy for, for example, corn and the cultivation of trees and shrubs. But because they use so much compost, we generally do not recommend them to someone who is still searching for what is ideal for them.

So the advice is, go out and explore. Try out the standard sizes and discover what works for you!

See all trays

Practical Tips and Tricks

Besides choosing the right tray, some techniques and tips can increase the success of your garden. To help with this, I have created a free online sowing course. In this course, I explain step by step what you need to pay attention to when pre-sowing and how to guarantee success. You can sign up here and start immediately!

Your Garden, Your Story

It&#;s time for your best gardening season ever. And it all starts with sowing the first seed. This year, the garden is once again a canvas that can be filled with vegetables and flowers. A new year, a new garden. Try out your sturdy propagation trays now!

Wishing you lots of growing pleasure!

Contact us to discuss your requirements of cheap seed starting trays. Our experienced sales team can help you identify the options that best suit your needs.