Root Riot Plant Starter Cubes

I purchased these plugs to use with our LettuceGrow hydroponic tower. I’ve had great fun choosing and starting my own seeds. Enter Root Riot plugs … Typically we harvest 2-4 plants for our weekly salads, so we usually start about 12 seeds every 2-3 weeks. These plugs arrive moist and ready to use; but since we stagger their use over many weeks, we lay the new plugs out on a cookie rack and let them dry out completely before storing. When we are ready to start seeds, we just rehydrate the needed number of plugs for a few minutes. We have had no issues with molding or algae growth when working with the dehydrated plugs and they perform just as well as they do when they are new. (We did have issues with both black mold and green algae when we tried some less expensive foam plugs.) The first pic shows the varying levels of growth and variety of seeds that we’ve got started now. (Cucumbers, peppers, lettuce and some flowers.) The missing plug was transferred to the tower last weekend! Cucs, peppers & flowers are destined for outside planting - and that front right tray (with all the baby lettuce sprouts) was just planted yesterday! The second pic of the tower (with varying levels of plant maturity) shows how the plants are growing. The Root Riot plugs are perfectly sized for the 2” baskets AND they fully support the mature greens in our Farmstand. The third pic shows how developed the roots are at harvest along with a typical salad. It’s cool knowing that our greens have not languished in a grocery store, have only been handled by us and have absolutely no pesticides. Added bonus, no dirt or sand to wash off when preparing the week’s salad. Greens don’t get more fresh! Bottom line: we wouldn’t be this successful if we were using inferior plugs. My only wish is that they came dehydrated so that I wouldn’t need to dry them upon arrival … but even so, this is an awesome product and is perfectly suited to our seed-starting needs.

When i use the cubes i have 98% germ rate and 100% clone rate. If I use Anything else I have about a 50/50 shot. Not sure Why this is but it’s True. I Highly Recommend this Product along with Clonex when cloning.

Best growing starter cubes I've found

10 out of 10. I use these plugs in my home garden and at a commercial farm with 99%+ success rate. Using a heat mat under your trays to regulate temperature will increased speed of rooting. These plugs are great for transplanting into any growing medium. CloneX Cloning Gel recommended but cuttings will still root without it. Recommended using CloneX Clone Solution fertilizer to promote health growth and prevent leaf yellowing.

I’ve run thousands of clones through various media, and I keep coming back to Root Riot. Unlike rockwool, you don't have to worry about pH stabilizing these before use—they are ready to go right out of the bag. The texture is perfect; they hold exactly the right air-to-water ratio, which is the biggest factor in preventing stem rot. I typically see 'fuzzy' lateral roots pushing through by day 7 to 9. They stay together much better than peat pellets and don't crumble when you're transplanting into your veg pots. If you’re running a high-volume room and need a 100% strike rate without the headache of prepping cubes, these are worth every penny.

Use hydro-dynamics for these type products if you have a choice with 3rd party vendors. All thing considered these are competitively priced so I would give it 5 stars but all these plug/sponge seed starters are way over priced for what you get unless you buy them in 2000+ quantity. If you already have the Styrofoam float rafts like I do from gurneys etc. they are excellent for controlling root water & minimizing damping off from over watering. They will fit just make sure the bottom of the sponge plug is all the way to the bottom of the hole in the raft so they will absorb water. As long as you have air flow & correct lighting you can leave your seedlings alone for a couple days. If not you still have to check them daily like any other seed starting system. ALWAYS, I say again, always water from the bottom no matter what system you use for healthy plants. I previously purchased large quantities of a similar product from this company when I was only starting a couple hundred plants at a time (tomatoes & peppers BTW but I hear they work great for other tall green plants as well) but have since switched to conventional soil-less seed starting mediums like Berger BM2 for input cost reasons. You can get this product from a variety of sources the product brand is decent quality & does what its advertised to do. Hydro-dynamics consistently acts with a sense of urgency when it come to getting stuff out on time & truth in advertising. I rarely have anything good to say about 3rd party sellers but hydro-dynamics is the exception they act like they want your business! Amazon should take responsibility for allowing other 3rd party vendors to drag their feet on shipping, communication & truth in advertising I give Amazon (negative) -5 stars on that one.

I bought these often. Then thought the price was high so I tried another brand. Well ended up buying these again as they work.

Would definitely buy again