Mastering Microgreens Germination
If you germinate your microgreens seeds well, then you're 90% of the way there to growing a consistent, abundant and stress free crop. So it's important to get this bit right.
If you don't already know, germination just describes the process of a dorment seed springing into life by starting to split and grow it's roots and shoots for the first time. It's magical!
As commercial microgreens growers, we ideally need each of our crop shoots to grow at the same rate as each other so when it comes to harvest time, they’ll all be the same height resulting in a consistent size and be much easier and faster to cut on harvest day. This stuff doesn’t matter so much when you’re growing one or two trays, but when you get to a 100 trays, harvest speed matters!
Here are 4 ways you can maximise your chance of getting perfect germinating seeds every time:
1. Quality seed is an absolute must! Reputable microgreens seed suppliers will have sent their seed batches off for germination tests and these come back as a percentage. You want these to be as close to 100% as possible. Unless suppliers are willing to tell you, you probably won’t be able to find out that percentage. So the second best option is to buy from recommended, tried and tested suppliers. And even recommended seed batches from recommended suppliers! The majority of my seed now comes from Grow Sow Greener, based down in Devon in the UK. Their customer service and communication is excellent and they’re some of the best seed quailites I’ve ever used.
If you join the Farm Microgreens UK Facebook community, then you can also ask in there for current seed batch recommendations :)
Top tip - If you ever receive seed that doesn’t germinate well, then get back to your supplier about it and ask for a refund or to try a different seed batch.
2. Hydrate your seed well to start with. The germination process is kick-started when seed absorbs enough water. To achieve this, larger seeds should be soaked overnight, such as pea, sunflower, nasturtium, corn, beetroot, and chard. Seeds smaller than these can just be sprayed well with water on the grow medium.
3. Stack your trays and add weights on top evenly to help force even germination - see pic below of my excessive use of block pavers on my germination shelves!
4. Don’t let your seed dry out. Particularly during the hotter months, check your seed daily whilst it’s in germination. Make sure no part of the tray has dried out. This tends to happen around the edges first, so just give them a quick spray of water each day if you think this is happening. See the photo below to see what my sunflower shoots looked like when the seed around the edge of my tray in germination dried out for too long this week! Uneven germination AND lots of seed hulls still clinging on. Nightmare.
After using quality seed, keeping it all well hydrated and evenly weighted, your trays of seed will soon be ready to take out of germination and left to grow on your shelving under lights. You’ll know they’re ready when (ideally!) every seed has grown a little shoot and are around 1 - 2cm tall depending on variety. The trays below show perfect germination and make me do a happy dance when I take their covers off and see them looking like this. This is what you want!
Micro Coriander splits (left) - fully germinated in 7 days Micro Leek (right) - fully germinated in 6 days
Ultimately - it’s not the end of the world if your microgreens seed don’t germinate perfectly every time. Mine don’t always, and I’ve been doing it continuously for years! If you are getting problems though, I hope these tips and reminders will help you to mitigate them as much as possible.
A well germinated tray of microgreens seed will honestly make you extremely happy!
If you’re keen to learn more about getting your own microgreens business up and running, then here’s my
FREE UK Microgreens Business Starter Guide
Download now to get it sent straight to your inbox!
In your guide, you’ll get:
5 great reasons for starting a microgreens business in the UK right now
A basic equipment list
A step-by-step guide to growing and harvesting radish shoots and pea shoots, including UK pricing suggestions and profit margins.
A how-to guide to selling your microgreens to your local community.