Are Winstrips Worth It?
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- เผยแพร่เมื่อ 2 ส.ค. 2024
- I mean, the title probably says it--today I'm answering the question as to whether winstrip trays are worth the money? The video covers: Winstrips vs soil blocks. Winstrips vs Cell trays. And all that good stuff.
You can find winstrip trays at neversinktools.com
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I love that you gave your opinion in the beginning and then went into detail. I liked the video based on that alone.... the rest was good too.
th-cam.com/video/zzh1m9s_Tcg/w-d-xo.htmlsi=MnFSNLLiPkN5Ve1Y
What a high level of integrity to just give the answer straight off the bat instead of wasting our time with filler.
I am liking, commenting and watching to the end just for that.
Wow. YES! A YTer who answers the question in the first couple minutes instead of making everyone wait until the end. Thank you, sir, for the detailed, concise, well done video. :) Can't wait to watch more! Sus'd. :)
FINALLY, an honest farmer! We tend to not say that a hangover was the reason something failed to get in the ground.... 👍
I feel silly. I was really confused when he said that because I thought he meant the plants and I didn't know what hungover plants meant. Thought it was a term I hadn't learned yet. 😂
As someone who is NOT a market or large-scale grower, but just has backyard gardening and very much enjoys your videos and still learns from them...I would say the winstrips are just easier, more organized, & cleaner for us to use and the transplants are comparable to soil blocks.
I absolutely give the nod to soil blocks and don’t have many complaints about them. I find the bottom watering of them to be very quick and easy.
Thank you for your thoughts in this video and also thank you for mentioning in a prior video that when growing salanova lettuce, people have put their soil blocks in the refrigerator overnight to increase germination. I went from a very poor germination rate for this lettuce to about 85% after performing the aforementioned action - thank you!
We are a homestead. My wife went through cheap cell trays. They just didn't last. So last year, we bought 10 72 winstrips. Love them. But she also purchased super durable 6 cells too. So we have combined 20 trays worth, and we use all of them, AND soil block too.
Thanks for the honest review.
I love it and appreciate it so much when people get strait to the point in their videos. Thank you.
Great video. I think if I look to upgrade I'll just go strait to soil blocks.
I really am loving the health of the plants with blocking and just started it this season. While the winstrips are good I like that I can choose how many blocks of plants I start at one time with the soil blocks. In my context the soil blocks are for me and I have the winstrips.
I moved from soil blocks to Winstrips 20 years ago ( they were much cheaper then) and have probably used each 50 times and only broken 1 out of 250 ( drove over it). That’s 8c/tray use at what I paid and 24c/tray use at what you pay now, so far.
I bet they will last another 20 if stored out of the light.
It used to be you had to order a whole container from Korea and once the GH operation in NC had what they needed they stopped getting and selling them.
I agree Soil blocks produce superior transplants but the Winstrips have most of the benefits, especially rapid transplant ‘take’, with a lot less fuss and resources,
Great input, Dave! Thanks
My wife tried some and she loves them. We also moved from cell trays so they work so much better for us. My wife puts all the soil into a 56qt tote and loads the trays, brushes the excess of the top, through the holes in between the cells, and doesn't loose any of the soil as it ends up back in the tote. Problem that he mentions is solved.
Awesome Video as Always!!
Happy Sunday!
Love that you are honest to soil block users within the first 2 minutes. Still watched the video.
thank you, high quality video and very packed with information!
Thank you, immediately got to the point.
Subscribed!
Great to get an honest answer from a trusted name.
Some of the most direct commentary about the topic presented...thank you.
I like this kind of no-nonsense straight to the point video. Thanks a lot.
Thank you for the information, very good informative video
Thank you for this video. Im Just starting out for market garden and looking at getting away from Cheap plastic trays. Also excited to get your book in the mail one of these days!!!
Love the humor at the end... great content as always thank you
Now I see where your channel is going, Matt 🌿💚🌿
I am in Ontario, -20 this morning.
February 2022
Very sunny today, very grateful.
Thanks for the review
I tried them out for the first time this year with peas; was pretty impressed. Nice root development and easy to pull out plugs. Ive already invested in Proptek 13x26 trays though (also excellent trays, super durable, will last decades and plugs pop out easily if roots well developed)
Ty, I always wanted to know this
As a home gardener, I’ve enjoyed using the six cell version of these from Epic Gardening. The air pruning is so nice. I have never been able to get soil blocks to hold together.
Get ladbrooke
I worked in a foundry an when we made sand molds we taped them , which sets an compacts the sand so it doesn't fall out the bottom.
Thanks for the info, what I like about you and Conor is that you present info and it's left up to us on how we use that info. Me, I grow for my family. So cell trays work for as I don't have the quantity that you and Conor have
So thanks again
Same here, Many thanks Jesse. Soil blockers are way more versatile than the dreaded plastic crinkle trays. I have used my 2" blocker for 30+ years. I bought ten Winstrips to start corn early so I could grow two varieties in the same season without bagging(seed saver). It's a work in progress but do-able. Peas too. Blocks also work even better. I don't find popping out 4 -6- 8 or however many blocks for a new batch of lettuce etc. onerous at all.
Conor has a video on his TH-cam channel (look in playlists for tools, 12/12) where he goes over what he sees as then advantages of Winstrips, and how he loads and waters them.
Great video 🌿💚💚
I have been doing soil blocks for this whole season, and I was really optimistic, but it has felt like a lot of work. I think the learning curve of getting your mix right is a little disheartening. I just picked up 10X60 cell trays from charles dowding since he has a distributor in the US now. As a small gardener, with about 375 sqft of growing space in my back yard, I struggle making soil blocks. I needed to sow more seeds then I did this year, and I felt like it was a lot of work to do the soil blocks. This coming from more of a hobby than a market garden that actually generates revenue. Plus a 10X20 of soil blocks is like 3 times as heavy as a 60 cell from Charles, which isn't a big deal for me, but for my wife and son, who are helping me, it is a struggle. I love the concept and the performance of soil blocks, but they are a lot of work and messy to set up. lol I have a love hate relationship.
I would like to see a video about the watering trays and the pop-out "attachments."
Looks like Bootstrap Farmer has the 72 plug “air prune” tray as well.
Yes they are worth it! They last for years. Very sturdy.
Not a farmer; Just a backyard grower/future homesteader here. When I first took on gardening, I used soil blocks. Never used cell trays before this year when I decided to try selling veg starts as a little side hustle. I hate it. I hate it so much and I'm never using them again. Even if I continue & grow into a proper home-based nursery business, I will never again stray from soil blocks. Far superior in every way. Even for my succulent propagations, I regret putting them in cell trays. Should've gone with the 2" pots from the start.
Whether I’m using punnets, plastic or paper pots for seedlings or cuttings, I place them in a tray of damp sand. If I can’t get the seedlings out for some reason the roots can continue into the damp sand.
Cheers mate!
😂. I could have said more but sometimes a simple verbal slap on the back of a job well done (or well said) is all that is required.
Thanks.
I’ll add the Winstrips onto the gridder order...good tools ain’t cheap!!
Thanks
If you're from Europe, check out Containerwise! They make similair strenght celltrays (company based in UK). They are cheaper than the Winstrips, but doesn't airprune as good. Lasts 15+ years tho!
But never have anything in stock 😭
@@alb5346 they do but at the moment because of the pandemic will only take so many orders a day log in at 9;30 order what you want cheers 🍻
You go from days of making soil blocks to one day of filling the trays! Lots of People have trouble making soil blocks (Hoss), I understand the roots of soil blocks tend to grow from block to block. They recommend filling them with dry medium, the soil in the holes falls through which allows them to air prune properly!
Home gardener here. I agree I do like soil blocks better however these are just so much faster to fill. If it didn’t take me a whole day to make soil blocks I’d use them so much more.
THANKS for giving the answer first. Very kind! I did listen to the whole thing but it helped my thought process to have the answer first. I'm a home gardener doing indoor seeds starting. I need that added time flexibility. I already own sturdy 24-cell trays w/no air pruning holes that are OK but for new air pruning trays I may go for 6 cell trays since there are things I don't want a lot of. Epic Gardening has an air pruning seed starting 6 cell tray that looks good so that could be my pick.
bootstrap farmer has a better deal than epic gardening.
@@orangemoonglows2692 YES I'm sure you're right. I love bootstrap farmer stuff- so durable! Earlier I didn't see that they have a 6 cell w/air pruning slits but now I see they do. Do they have little domes for them???? That would make it perfect. After I made my original comment I did buy the Epic Gardening 6 cell trays and domes and bottoms. It was pricey. I think I had not wanted the 60 tray amount that bootstrap farmer offered and was attracted to the Epic Gardening lowest amount of 12. Now I see that's ridiculous because I probably paid close to the same amount for just 12 from Epic Gardening as I would have for 60 from bootstrap farmer. Maybe if you had been able to comment sooner it would've knocked some sense into me. :-) If I get more in future years I'll likely go w/bootstrap farmer again.
Hmm like your videos and podcast
We tried soil blocks, but just found it to be too time consuming and the soil mix had to be just so...
We load them and place them on a plastic sheet and have never had the bottoms dry out.
As for the handling, you can walk around with two winstrips carried like briefcases no problem; never worry about them falling apart.
What attracted us the most was the air pruning and the durability.
Good insight, Marc, thanks. Carrying the trays is a bonus over soil blocks for sure. Didn't consider that one 👍
Nice. Been waiting for something like this to balance Connor's profile of the trays vs. blocks. I'm on a mainly paperpot tray system but, as I find some crops just don't like paper chains and COVID's been making it hard to get more from Diego, I'm settling on a blocks in paperpot trays and am pretty happy with it. Winstrip is the temptation in the corner, however. Kinda curious what kind of densities you could get with winstrip trays cast to fit paperpot bottom trays.
So Poo Tube shat this vid up to me again. A little feedback after my first year with winstrips.
Still loving them. 99% of my help is either Woofers, or neighbors with not a lot of gardening experience, at least large scale. Winstrips require very little training to fill, none at all to empty for planting. So I can fill them, or line someone out on it in about a minute. Yes the extra holes are a pain in the arse. Thought about spray foam, but I very much avoid frangible synthetic anything in my garden, don't use plastic row cover, etc. Too much plastic everywhere already! I fill them in a flat bottomed masonry mixing tub, available from home Depot for less than $20. So I fill a tray, poke or knock out the annoying extra holes, dump the excess soil from the masonry tub back into the main container them keep moving, filling more. And I always put them them in solid bottom flats to hold water for those rootsies. Don't over water, or let them dry out. So far nothing but good results and easy transplanting, and they seem like they'll last a LOOONG time. And Jessie, I'd be glad to have a beer or few with you anytime if you're in Oregon.
Starting our very first, large garden this year. 40' x 40'. We rolled out paper, covered it in some soil for weight and it has now been tarped for nearly six weeks. We are making our first attempt with soil blocks. Maybe next year we will try this type of tray. We are throwing everything at our garden using your tips Jesse.
Michael Tackett from Parrottsville TN. We will keep you posted on our results.
How are things?
If you put handle on the plywood base, then load the soil , gran handle on plywood an pick up an pound on work table .you'll be happy with result
Thanks for the info. I'm trialing them this year too, and have been really surprised how much of a learning curve there is to loading them - they make me feel like an idiot, because I put dirt in, then pick up the tray and all the dirt falls out 🤦♀️ The point about closing the open holes at the top is spot on! I have the 128s and my hope was to use them for my lettuce successions, being a perfect 2-3 week tray, that can stand up to many uses per season. So far, they get a pass, but I definitely need to start treating them as their own thing, not just a pumped up cell tray
Agreed. certainly their own thing!
You guys have too much work to do for the seedlings sale to be in here commenting! JK, love your channel... we just started 'HomeGrowin' in Perth Ontario.
I have some as well
Winstrip trays are good for people like me that absolutely hate soil blocks.
They stress me out just thinking about them.
thanks I just got 10 winstrips I will see if I like them
There are cell trays on the market now that are so strong that you can stand on for anyone needing any. They aren’t all as pants as they use to be
Try walking around without most of the soil falling out. I don't like shallow high intensity plug trays in comparison either because there are no drip trays for them. Not even a baking sheet fits. Although an oversize boot tray will. I'm not sold on soil blocks either because prep is a waste of time. It is just easier to use something you fill once then seed and your are done. I don't get root bound plants because I don't let them get nursery stock big, and I don't have a constant supply of diluted fertilized in the water.
I imagine on the scale that you are doing it might be alot of work, however I would make a suggestion to improve the trays that you have so others might also benefit.
You commented that the small squares in the trays should be solid plastic. If I buy some I will put tape on one side of the tray, use spray foam in a can and fill the small squares, let cure and trim flush with a knife. Hope that helps. Keep up the great videos!
Hope you didn't do this. To fill the empty spaces with spray foam you not only eliminate one of the tray's features which are the four side air slits per cell, the expanding foam will expand through those slits and fill the cells with foam. Jesse said a cap on those openings, in the interest of efficiency, would prevent soil from falling through the openings.
This video explains the reason for those holes: th-cam.com/video/d47V34lmvW4/w-d-xo.html
How long is "longer," would you estimate? Three years is about what we're getting from the cell inserts if we carefully (and painstakingly!) clean them before storing them out of the light through the winter before using them again the following spring; sometimes, we get a fourth year of service from them.
Six years would be a definite improvement over the plastic trays and inserts, and if the winstrips last ten years or so, then I might become a fan. We absolutely want to get away from plastics in our gardening, but we've been thinking in terms of soil blocks.
They are guaranteed against breakage during normal use for 3 years, per their website. However, in this video, Conor states that they will last 30 years: th-cam.com/video/x7cNgBFIqL0/w-d-xo.html
What bizarre timing....I just put soil and seeds in my first winstrips today. Def sick of the cheapo flats. Not really interested in the extra work for soil blocks. We'll see how they do.
Gearing up for a garden next year and I like this option. Im curious how rigid and strong those trays are. I hate the flimsyness of regular trays with a passion.
Very rigid
Dang your up early on a Sunday!
Haha well, technically I scheduled this one but also yes, I'm always up between 3-4am every day. It's a curse.
So if you are a home gardener and are either going to buy 6 winstrip trays or the soil blocker which do you recommend?
$12ea definitely kills it for me.
💪
Would you be able to make initial soil blocks using the winstrips?
What do y'all use as a soil mix for winstrip trays? Perhaps I didn't screen my compost enough, or had too much perlite, but I found almost a third of cells lost a significant amount of soil from the bottom by the time they were transplant ready.
Put a little tp or paper towel in bottom
Standard seed starting mix is fine. But you really have to slam the tray down on a hard surface after each fill to compress the soil so it doesn't fall out. Conor talks about soil type and shows how to fill the trays in this video: th-cam.com/video/X3xiZvcI7e4/w-d-xo.html
Is that celery 6:25 ??? Can you please share how you got such killer germination 🤔
Definitely! Celery just takes a long time to germ. We don't bury the seed at all (celery needs light to germ), and we keep it wet for roughly two weeks. Good soil mix helps!
Check out the paper pot planter, very easy and saves a lot of time, a worth while long term investment.
Have you considered filling those obnoxious little holes with something to make them solid?
I have but I couldn't come up with anything that made a lot sense. Maybe someone else could, like a mold that you set the tray on or something
Spray foam, then cut it off flush after it sets. I was already thinking this after I saw all the soil that goes through the extra holes. If filling on a table , it adds an extra step of lifting up the tray and sweeping off the list should back into your bag or whatever.
Quick question. You mention 72 and 128 size cells. You can’t grow a 6-8” tomato or pepper plant in these. Do they make larger cell trays?
Yes, they also have them in 50 cell size.
"raining, or snowing, or hungover...whatever" - Farmer Jesse #tshirt
Maybe I did something wrong? But I have had horrible germination with these things doing side by side trials with regular 128s and 72s
Interesting. I wonder why that would be. I haven't run into any germ issues, but I haven't run germ trials.
I felt like you came to the same conclusion I did... Winstrips are a quick and dirty soil block.
Yeah, that about sums it up
I got a couple of hundred windstrips for free. They're pretty much bullet proof.
Score!
You couldn't get them because they were only sold in commercial quantities.
Ah, that makes sense.
I like the design but the cost to make these is the same as $3 trays because they’re all injection molded. Too expensive in my opinion.
Vidja says yes, unless you really went balls to the wall with this trial :D
Those things are spensive and you have a lot.
:O And jinxed it :D
Oh yeah, too many. We bought a lot several years ago to take advantage of the deal thinking we may switch over entirely and... that hasn't really happened. Still leaning more heavily on soil blocks. But I do think they are great trays generally.
This dude is such a scam.