Whether you are a first time grower or someone who has been in the Hamama family for a while now, it’s always helpful to learn a few tried & true tips & tricks! Below you will find some Hamama hacks to help you get the perfect harvest every time, starting with the initial soak!
Hamama Hacks: Initial Soaking & Quilt Resets
Initial Soaking
Getting a good soak is essential for a nice full harvest! Below are a couple hacks we have found to help ensure that you get an evenly and properly saturated quilt.
1. Let’s start with the type of water you use to grow your greens! We recommend using filtered water, as it removes the impurities that might cause some undesirable results with your Seed Quilt. Some water systems have: mold, farm run-off (think herbicides, which will severely harm your seeds), lead, etc. We advise against using distilled water. A good rule of thumb: if it’s good for you to drink, it’s good for the plants to drink!
2. If you feel like your Seed Quilt just isn’t absorbing enough water, you may need to simply add a splash bit more water to your tray for the soak (up to the top of the fill line is fine, but not further)! You can always adjust the water level in your tray so that you get a good soak. The most important thing is that your seeds aren’t ever resting in water afterwards. You can check out more watering tips here!
3. The best indicator of a properly soaked Seed Quilt is the Seed Quilt turning a shade darker from absorbing water. The images below show the color progression as you are soaking!
Seed Quilt 0% soaked:
Seed Quilt 50% soaked:
Seed Quilt 100% Soaked:
4. Take a look at this quick video demonstration of an initial soak. Keep a close eye on the color change of the quilt as the water reaches the seed pods!
5. Fellow grower Vicky from Hamama Friends also shared her own technique for soaking that she calls the “Gentle Bend”. Simply bend the seed quilt slightly inwards so that the middle is the first to touch the water in the tray then gently unbend until the rest of the quilt is in the tray. Voila!
6. A final tip for checking whether your Seed Quilt was immersed successfully is to flick the seed pods of your Seed Quilt afterwards! If they move around, that means the base is still dry and didn’t receive water. Just push down on those pods so the base touches the water!
Seed Quilt Resets
(If you don’t get a good soak, this is what will happen, beware!)
If you weren’t able to get a good soak the first time, no worries! There is still hope to salvage your greens, you just want to catch a poor soak as soon as possible. If there is absolutely no action by day 3, the Seed Quilt was likely either over or under-watered when planting. Here are some Seed Quilt “reset” hacks to get your Seed Quilt back on track!
1. Under-Soaked Reset
a. Before day 3 of growth cycle unpeeled:
Lift seed quilt from coconut mat to expose felt underside and spritz bottom of ungerminated seeds with water. Keep delayed areas covered until they are ready to be peeled.
b. After day 3 of growth cycle unpeeled:
Wait until germinated greens have completed their growth cycle and harvest them. Fill your tray back up to the fill line and soak the ungerminated areas again until they turn a shade darker.
c. Completely peeled seed quilt:
Spritz dry seeds with water and then cover with a moist paper towel. Keep enough water in the tray for the roots to have access to once the seeds have sprouted. If there are germinated greens in your quilt, be sure to harvest to avoid overwatering.
2. Over-soaked reset
1) Remove the entire Seed Quilt and place it on a dry plate or even a colander.
2) Clean the tray - Use soap & rinse very well.
3) Look at your quilt - If the seed sections look well-drained, you're probably ready to move onto the next step! If not, let the quilt sit in the container and drain a bit more. You can also get a fan to help dry the top out.
4) After your top/seeds look pretty well-drained, place the entire quilt back into the clean and dry tray.
5) Gently pour filtered water into the sides of the tray (avoid pouring water directly onto the quilt itself)!! Carefully pour just enough water into the tray so that it reaches the middle of the dark brown coconut mat or below. Make sure to align your top of the quilt (seeds) with the bottom (coconut mat) of the quilt! If you see any edges or corners of the quilt curling or dipping down, gently pull them back up to ensure no over-watering issues.
6) Good airflow! An over-watered quilt needs airflow over the top of the quilt to reduce the standing water in the pockets under the paper.
Reminder! The "Fill Line" is only for the initial soak. You should ignore the Fill Line beyond the first soak. If any seeds are soaking in water , they will drown and eventually die.
As always, reach out to our Customer Support team directly for any additional growing support - we are always here to help! :D
Share Your Love of Microgreens!
10 Responses
Linda Shively
I see now that I overwatered the quilt. My Q is: there is fuzzy pure white strand-like at the bottom of the grown sprouts…is that mold or roots? If it’s mold, can I still harvest above the white? Can I send you a picture?
thanks so much!!
Brittany Hamama
Hello Lisa!
Oh no! I am so very sorry to hear about your growing pains! I just want you to know that we are here for you! Please head to hamama.com/help. We’d love to support your growing! Hope to hear from you soon :)
Lisa Bishop
15 days!!!! after my Energizing Kale was started, I have a harvest of only 5 rectangles! . I have used many sprouting methods before, with great success, but decided to try Hamama for the esthetic beauty of the system as well as the ease to the growing process. The Hearty Broccoli was a great success, but this mat of Kale is a fail:( At the price of these mats, I would expect better results. The container is in the same location as my 1 st crop so the light and water was the same.
Lisa
Do need to DRY OUT THE MAT before placing a new seed quilt?
There was mold on my last seed quilt and 80% didn’t even get past… well…. past anything, they were still seeds.
I was a first time grower and super excited, but it may be the type of tap water I was using, or the cold environment (NY has REALLY liked the snow lately and keeps giving us more of it lol).
I want to make sure that the mat is ready for the new seed quilt and the mold wont re-grow.
I washed in DAWN ultra dishwashing detergent and hot water and let it dry out a day.
Thanks for any advice! Love the whole vibe of everyone being able to communicate and get answers back from you guys! Stellar customer service job!
Allie Hamama
Hi Robin!
You likely already have this part under control, but you will be removing the very top paper from the felt, rather than the felt from the coconut pad where the roots are trying to attach. Does that make sense?
You can also use a sharp pair of scissors or knife to cut carefully into the parchment paper on top to start the process. The paper can be a bit tougher to peel sometimes depending on if the paper ballooned or if the greens ripped it (meaning you need to peel it off in sections). If the paper doesn’t look like either of the images provided in the instructions, it likely is not ready to peel just yet! :)
Robin
Day 4..the daikon radish seeds are ballooning, but I can’t find a place to grab hold of the cover to peel it off. Is there a secret to this?
Allie Hamama
Hi Joan!
The Hamama system is designed to just add water once and harvest in about a week. However, there may be exceptions according to your growing environment. Pre-peel you should never have to add more water. After peeling, the only time you may need to add more water is if you notice that the water has dropped below the tray’s ribs on the bottom. This is not common, however, if you live in a drier climate or have the heat on in your house, then you can add just a bit of water.
Here’s how:
With clean hands lift up the coconut fiber mat to check the level. If the water is still over the top of the ribs, then you’re good to grow! 🙌
If it’s receded a bit, then you’ll just add enough to fill back up to the top of the ribs, making sure that you never pour water directly on top of the greens/seed quilt itself. Pour the water into the side/corner of the tray. If water is added directly on top of the Seed Quilt, this could drown the greens, cause the seeds to become water-logged and also encourage growth of mold.
Hope this helps! Please let me know if you have any other questions! 🌱
Joan Duncheskie
Do I keep adding water every day?
Linda cook
My friend had chlorine in her city water and her seed quilt almost turned black and nothing grew. I got her on bottled water and her next crop flourished beautifully. Chlorine and ammonia and or products out into city water systems are clearly not good for this growing process. I have mineralized well water and my plants are beautiful.
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Brittany Hamama
October 01, 2021
Hello Linda!
Thank you so much for reaching out to us! I am glad you were able to get some help from this blog post! It is super helpful. As for the white strands, I think what you are seeing are just healthy root hairs! 😊 I totally understand their similarity to what we all know mold to look like, so I understand your concern.
Root hairs help the greens grow by giving them nutrients and absorbing water! Here is a a blog post we just published on the white fuzzy root hairs.
https://www.hamama.com/blogs/hamama-blog/white-fuzzy-roots-what-s-the-deal If what you are seeing is different from what is in the blog post, please feel free to send your picture to us at hamama.com/help! :)