Welcome to the weekly oh nènè microgreens update, where we talk about the latest information on our microgreens journey. We started experimenting with microgreens in March 2021 and found the process fascinating. As we discover the wonderful world of microgreens, we feel inclined to share with you our progress.
Getting new seeds
This week, we started using a new batch of seeds in our production, and we are noticing how we need to adapt to them and not the other way around. Every time we get new seeds, we need to take the time to understand them, make tests and see what works best for that specific batch. Once you think you got it all figured out, it happens that you need to readjust everything again.
New sunflower seeds mean new methods
One of our new batches was Sunflower seeds. We are used to growing Sunflower microgreens, so we didn’t expect any issues whatsoever. Unfortunately, we miserably failed once we started our standard process to produce them. We usually soak our seeds for 12 hours before draining them and putting them on the tray for germination. After four days, they push through the top tray, and after five more days, we harvest. No issues.
We have been doing this method for months without issues, and now most of the seeds don’t germinate. After 12 hours of soak and four days during germination, we saw many seeds that moulded and didn’t germinate at all. We were so confused! We need to change something in our process.
Sprouting sunflower seeds
One trick we learned a while ago was to sprout our Sunflower seeds before putting them on any medium to grow our microgreens. We decided to test by soaking the seeds again for 12 hours, sprouting them for about three days, and then putting them on a medium. We will see if this method works to get our Sunflower microgreens.
Different soaking times
We will also try different soaking times for the seeds to understand the sweet spot of soaking time. We already know 12 hours doesn’t work, so we will try 8, 4 and 2 hours soaking. We will also do a test with no soaking. To avoid losing a bunch of seeds in the process, we will use one tray and spread the seeds from all the soaking times and separate them with a stick. Hence, all the seeds will be on the same tray, and we will measure at the end of the growing cycle what worked best.
Adapting the number of seeds per tray
We have been conservative about the number of seeds we use per tray to avoid overcrowded microgreens and have a better environment that avoids mould on our trays. However, we’ve noticed that some microgreens tend to have a very low density when they grow. The problem with a low density in our microgreens is that they need each other to stay straight and stand upright, and when we have low density, they tend to bend and fall more than required, so when we harvest, we lose a part of the stems to this problem.
A solution to our low-density problem is to add more seeds when sowing them. We will tweak up the number of grams that we use on some of our varieties and see if we can improve and increase the density of our mature microgreens. For example, we used 20g of Red Mizuna seeds, and now we will try sowing 22g instead. If we still see low density, we increase again, and so on, until we find the perfect number for us.
Thank you for your time, and until next week!
