Anyone ever work for a place like Bonnie Plants or any of the commercial places that supply vegetable plants to local nurseries for us to buy? I'm talking specifically about tomatoes. Cabbage, Broccolis, etc.

I always start my own plants because I can get interesting varieties. But starting broccoli plants in August where I do is expensive and it's 100 degrees which isn't ideal.

Right now I can go get plants for 1 dollar a piece they have been grown half as long as mine and they are 8x bigger and healthier. It costs me about a dollar a piece between electricity, and care to get mine going and while they grow they don't look amazing until they go in the garden. I do 50-100 plata of each.

How do the growers managed to get plants like this started with such vigor in August? Are their greenhouses air conditioned?

Need to see if MasonB has a video from the Okie school of adventure for a grower tour.

My question is what do you do with 100 heads of broccoli at one time because thats the only suck thing about growing vegetables they all come up at one time

I wish my romaine ,cabbage, cauliflower would come up a two weeks apart and I know about intermittent planting but thats no fun

Sell some of it and vacuum seal the rest for personal consumption. We eat the hell out of it. Cabbage is sold, eaten or turned into 5 gallons of sauerkraut we consume through the year.

I have tried to stagger plant lettuce but where I am it results in various quality levels. Early stuff might get bitter faster, later might not come up at all. My lettuce is not as fickle as carrots but it does give me some trouble. I'm almost to the point where I just want to buy everything. But I have started planting a simple 20-30' row of lettuce, and we simply pick leaves as we want them. It regrows and by the time we get back to the beginning of the row, it's ready. When it starts tasting bitter, it's lopped off and fed to the pigs. We do that wit other plants as well like cabbage if it doesn't make a good head.


Also, I like growing stuff and trying to improve my products and techniques so I'm very curious about starts.

I may cannget you with a grower let me see exactly where there location is

Also i think coop has 6 packs for 448 I will look this week for you

I appreciate it. I'm most interested in HOW the do what the do. Techniques, programs, etc. Not interested in proprietary info just curious on a high level how they start plants that look so amazing by the time they arrive at producers or rainbow gardens or tractor supply.

Producers always has great prices. If it wasn't 3:15 away, I'd buy there. I can't grow 6 packs for 4.50. Lol.

I know what your looking for and let me ask and see if they have tours because I also would like to see how they do it

I have never been able to grow from seeds

Not to derail, but has anyone else noticed Bonnie has cut way back on offering the 6 pack of starts, that are typically just under $5?

It makes zero sense to buy singles for $5, I guess just so you can say you are a gardener? Can't wait till I have my greenhouse built.

Jack Squat 83 said:

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Not to derail, but has anyone else noticed Bonnie has cut way back on offering the 6 pack of starts, that are typically just under $5?

It makes zero sense to buy singles for $5, I guess just so you can say you are a gardener? Can't wait till I have my greenhouse built.

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Yes, that happened during covid with supply chain issue. They couldn't get 6 packs, 9 packs, or 12 packs, so they just shipped out singles.

Personally, my cynical opinion, I think those have a much bigger margin by 70-80% over the multi packs and since people got used to that format with that price, they just kept it up.

I start them in our well shed that's insulated with a mini split. Stays ~78 in the summer time. Have LED grow lights on 16hrs timer during germination to 7/10 days, then decreasing to 12hr. They are very vigorous if you have the lights close to the plants/high intensity.

The Ball Seed RedBook and also Culture Guide are the reference's professionals use. I was just looking at my copy of Ball RedBook today.

Commercial vegetable growers and companies like Bonnie's have germination chambers that precisely control humidity and temperature to get germination rates very high.
The tray filling and seeding automatic systems they use cost $50K+.

A simple trick is to top seed trays with perlite after planting. It helps maintain optimal humidity for germination.

To simply answer your question, yes they have climate controlled grow houses.

Same way folks are able to grow tomatoes in the dead of winter.

I'll leave that to the pros. Way too much mold & dust in that environment.

Jason_Roofer said:

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Sell some of it and vacuum seal the rest for personal consumption. We eat the hell out of it. Cabbage is sold, eaten or turned into 5 gallons of sauerkraut we consume through the year.

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Holy *****

Animal Eight 84 said:

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The Ball Seed RedBook and also Culture Guide are the reference's professionals use. I was just looking at my copy of Ball RedBook today.

Commercial vegetable growers and companies like Bonnie's have germination chambers that precisely control humidity and temperature to get germination rates very high.
The tray filling and seeding automatic systems they use cost $50K+.

A simple trick is to top seed trays with perlite after planting. It helps maintain optimal humidity for germination.

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Thanks for the info. I'll see if I can get those and take a peek.

I figured they had a **** ton of money in making perfect plants. Mostly I curious because I like learning about that kind of stuff and how they make it happen.

A trick I learned that has really helped is to foliar feed a mild mixture of Agro thrive every day before watering. Wait until seedlings get their first set of true leaves.

Hehateme1 said:

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A trick I learned that has really helped is to foliar feed a mild mixture of Agro thrive every day before watering. Wait until seedlings get their first set of true leaves.

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Excellent advice, I do the same. Weak fertilizer solution feeding daily.