I've had good luck with Black Gold potting mix. I used to use Whitney Farms organic mix, but it got hard to find around here and a bit expensive. Tried their seed starting mix one year and had the same sort of experience Sandy did. I have much better luck just using the plain potting mix and the Black Gold has a nice texture and doesn't get too soggy.

@DavidLMO
@Dairyl
@Weedwhacker
@Woofie
I very much appreciate all your experience. I will never use that seed starter mix again. I plan to use Miracle Grow potting soil in my next 72 cell. I also have a 36 cell tray I might try with Miracle Grow also. I really don't need this many vegetables and flowers but I am anticipating that some of them won't germinate or survive. If I get extras that I don't need I can always give them away or try to sell them at Farmer's markets. I will keep you all posted on my results. I am anxious to see how my winter sown jugs turn out. Some things have already started growing but I failed to bring them inside or cover them last night and the temp got down to around 25 F.

I use Espoma Organic Seed Starter Premium Potting Mix. I think it is excellent. It comes in a blue bag in various sizes.

Here are a few pictures of my garage setup. I have my seed trays and seedlings in the greenhouse. These other plants are ones that were in my raised beds that I moved from the beds to pots and put under lights. Most of these are purple dwarf Iris. One has just bloomed. In your opinion will these plants be okay in these same pots for another 5 weeks? I'm sure they will get root bound. If our weather would ever warm up, I would set them outside where they would get morning sun. Any suggestions on what I could do?

Nice set up.

Thanks Rita. Here is a picture of Mt dwarf Iris.

When I used brown, powdery "brand name" bags of mix, I saw the same thing you did: dry peat doesn't like to absorb water.

Then, once you do get it wet, it holds TOO MUCH water. In combination with the finely divided nature of the peat, that meant too little air in the mix. That helped my seeds to rot - or, said another way, it made my tendency to over-water even more lethal.

I hate that cheap stuff! But some people can make it work for them.

Now I use GOOD potting mix (a local knock-off of ProMix) plus screened bark shreds to open up the mix even more. That might make it wick poorly, for bottom-watering, but I add a little top-spraying and that works out OK.

Here's how I bottom water my 1020 trays: lay some cotton flannel or toweling in the tray.
http://garden.org/ideas/view/R...




The other way I tried to bottom-water just got clogged my bathtub's drain with potting mix.