When we plant seeds of sweet corn, beans, peas, melons, squash or cucumbers we always pre-soak them. This helps them germinate sooner and when we started adding a material from Taiwan that was made to aid rice germination we saw more seeds germinate. Getting a good germination rate saves us money by needing to sow less seed plus we do not gaps in the row where no plants grow. We soak the seeds for about two hours then lay them out on paper lined trays to dry. We need them dry enough so that we can handle them at planting.