The Truth about Starting Seeds in Eggshells

You should start your seeds indoors! There are so many benefits such as the satisfaction of raising a plant from the very beginning, the huge amount of money you will save, and the fun you’ll have putting together cutesy little containers for you seedlings! It makes so much sense, right?

That is certainly what I thought when I purchased all kinds of pretty seed packets from the grocery store. I gathered them together, researched the times to plant, and, yes, pinned all kinds of adorable organic seed starting containers. I’d settled on eggshells because they are free and supposedly decomposed well once transplanted in your garden. If you read this post, you’ll see, I went through a lot of steps to do it all right to give my little seedlings the best possible start. I was so excited because they held so much promise of beautiful plants and delicious vegetables.

Well, since then, I’ve waited….and waited….and waited for the sprouts to shoot up. But, alas, they never came. Being extremely new to this whole gardening thing, I had no idea what went wrong! Pinterest had so many promises of this being the perfect idea for seed starting.

Here is the truth about starting seeds in eggshells. It might shock you to find out the reality of this Pinterest idea.

Contamination

I had no idea that plants need a sterile, clean environment to grow in. To me, whatever organic material was in the soil (i.e. egg remnants) would only nourish the plant. I could not have been more wrong. Egg or food remnants cause bacteria and fungus to develop which infect your plants and choke out their chance at survival. Not using sterile seed starting soil can also cause this contamination as it brings in insects and bacteria that carry disease.

Now, I actually did try to clean out eggshells by boiling them in water, but couldn’t get all the egg stuff out because they are EGGSHELLS! They are too weak to really scrub away at. This, I think, is the main reason why my plants didn’t grow.

Watering

I used saran wrap as a greenhouse, but after a few days noticed mold growing on the top of the soil. That didn’t look good, so I took the wrap off and decided to just spray mist over them often to keep the soil moist. Well, life happened and I let the dirt and seeds dry out too much.

One method of avoiding drying out is by bottom watering. This is where you put some water in a shallow dish and place your plant pots into that. The water is then absorbed into the soil through a hole at the bottom of the pot at an appropriate rate. This would be a great method to use…if I hadn’t put my seeds in eggshells which can’t absorb water.

Too Cool

I can’t blame egg shells on this one. It was totally my mistake. I placed the egg cartons on the window sill. Well, I love open windows, even if it’s a bit cool outside. The chilly breeze swept over my seed starting dirt drying it out and freezing the seeds.

Planting Depth

I’m still a little confused on how you get your seeds exactly 1/4 of an inch into the soil. Instead of paying attention to the specific depth each type of seed needed I just shoved them all down into the bottom of the shell. Apparently certain types of plants only need to be slightly under the surface of the dirt, or not buried at all.

Not Paying Attention

It seemed so easy! Just stick the seeds in, water a little, and wait for nature to take it’s course, right? I guess it doesn’t happen that way. Like a child or pet, these little seed babies need to be nurtured and cared for diligently, something I totally neglected to do. I was not anticipating spending a lot of time with them and, therefore they kind of slipped from my mind for a few days a week or two.

So, what was the lesson learned here today? That starting seeds in eggshells may seem like a fun and easy way to begin your garden; it’s actually a little harder than you’re led to believe. The shells have to be cleaned to avoid contamination, the plants have to be placed at the right depth, watered correctly, and nurtured a lot in order to grow thriving plants. Had I known all this, I would have skipped right to buying the already started plants from a nursery and saved myself the time and money wasted with this method.

The positive is that the lesson has been learned and there still is time in this season to plant nursery plants and next year, I’ll know a little more about what’s involve in starting seeds in eggshells.