I did a little experiment. I started my lettuce bowl, putting seeds on the ‘bowl’ and lightly covering with sand. I didn’t have enough room to put the whole bowl on my seed heating mat (I’ve ordered another one) so I put half ON my mat and half OFF the mat as in the picture. The heat comes from the bottom. The temperature of half ON the heat mat was 77°F and the half OFF the mat was much cooler at  70°F. The half on the mat germinated in 3 days while the half off the mat had only a few seeds germinate. Amazing how the temperature affects the germination rate. Lesson here? If you plan to start seeds indoors, get a seed heating mat. Next: Review of my Seed Starting Class last Saturday.