January is an excellent time to get set up, whereas the actual sowing should be postponed until March or April in most parts of North America. Contrary to popular belief, no special propagation equipment is needed and the few items you must have costs less than USD $50 at garden centers and hardware stores. Most of it can be reused year after year. In this part 1 we will deal with the equipment needs. In the subsequent articles we detail the growing process itself.
Light Requirement.
Seedlings require bright light immediately after germination and a source of artificial light gives best results. If you grow plants without artificial light, a sunny south facing window is required, but cold drafts, short days, and uneven light can be a problem.
Light bulbs.
Incandescent light bulbs are not good plant lights as they produce too much heat for most plants and, if used, must be located far from the plants, thus reducing the intensity of the light. Also they are poor in the blue color of light which is very important for plants.
Fluorescent tubes are one of the best artificial light sources available for home growers. They are compact, cheap, and provide three times more light energy compare to incandescent. They stay pretty cool to the touch even if the plants grow up to and touch the bulbs.
The best fluorescent bulbs are the regular fluorescents bulbs also called "cool whites". The standard is 48" long 40-watts bulbs or 24" 25-watts bulbs. Contrary to common belief you do not need any special plant grow bulbs. If you are trying to get plants to flower indoors you can instead exchange one of the cool white bulbs for one warm white (e.g. kitchen/bathroom) bulb which has more light in the red spectrum. In most cases two cool white bulbs are all you need.
Light Fixtures.
The cheapest option is to buy a so-called "shop light" or "work room light" fixture at home improvement stores. The standard is a 48" long two-bulb fixture which will cost USD $10-20. They are hung from chains using supplied S-hooks which make for easy height adjustment. One fixture is sufficient to get started, but a very good setup is two light fixtures suspended side by side 5" apart (a total of 4 bulbs). This will give great illumination of a 4' x 2' work area. If space is an issue you can use the 24" light fixtures.
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