Now, for the final piece of our seed germination gear! The humidity dome! This is arguably one of the most important things in our germination kit, the process would be much more difficult without it!
Seedlings are very sensitive to drying out. If you think about it, very young seedlings don’t yet have robust root systems to acquire water. The humidity dome helps increase relative humidity around the seedlings, helping to resist those drying forces.
It does this by reducing transpiration. The real motivation for them is to increase survival rates. If you were to compare seedlings germinated both with and without a humidity dome, you’d note much higher survival rates with higher humidity.
That said, too much humidity isn’t a good thing either. The top of the humidity dome features a dial that can be used to adjust humidity. A fully closed state will increase humidity significantly, whereas opening them will reduce it. If you get green stuff on your soil, that’s a sign you need to dial your humidity down!
You’ll find “tall” and “short” domes out there. We prefer taller domes, just for the flexibility. A short plant can fit in either dome, but a tall plant can only fit in those taller domes. If you ever grow corn, you’ll appreciate those taller domes!
We keep the domes on throughout early germination and plant growth. Once we transplant our seedlings a larger pot size, that’s when the dome comes off. At that point, the plant usually has enough root structure to maintain its water needs.
So, that brings us to the end of our early growing gear! We’ll be bringing in other elements soon enough, discussing them further as we use them!
