A quick guide to transplanting tomato seedlings

Alright.

Yes, it's been a while. Exhaustion had its way with me, but I'm fighting back! I thought I could probably just post a bunch of videos and photos of when I transplanted my tomato seedlings.

Now, I did this about one and a half weeks ago, or on May 15. That is about two weeks later than I usually would do this- but what can I say? Life is sometimes complicated.

In a normal year, my tomato plants would actually be in the ground already. This year, I was lamenting the fact that they weren't until yesterday. You know what happened yesterday, right? Northern Utah was plastered with tons of snow. Yes, on May 24, we had snow here.

So I was glad my tomato plants were not in the ground. They should be in the ground in about another week or two. That will be fine.

Anyway, I really like to keep costs down, so here's what I do for planting pots:



Once the pots are ready, you want to get a layer of dirt in there and pack it well, mainly so that the dirt doesn't just spill out the holes you just cut. Since I tend to have a lot of seedlings, I do this as an assembly line in order to be efficient.

Here's the simple process:



Next, you want to just start planting:



When everything is transplanted and placed back on the windowsill (or shelf, depending on where you are setting these), water them well. What does 'well' mean? You can water them so water comes out the bottom.

Then don't water them for a week-- or at least as long as it takes for the dirt to look quite dry. I've said this countless times, but I am happy to say it again: This wakes up your seedlings' roots.

Okay, so here are my tomatoes, all transplanted and arranged on May 15 (about 10 days ago):

And here they are today:

Not bad, eh?

Anyway, here is probably a good place to announce a revision to this blog's approach. Instead of trying what seems to be impossible at this point: a post every day, I will post stuff here on at least Tuesday and Friday.

See you Friday! I will share with you some of the things I've put in the ground and how I have protected our planting patches from our chickens.

When to transplant seedlings

Okay, so the time has come to discuss the transplanting of your little seedlings into larger pots. Doing this right will encourage your seedlings to grow larger and have their stems thicken. Your seedlings need this growth in order to be ready to go in the ground.

Now first, you are not too late if you haven't transplanted your little seedlings yet. You want to get them to the point of transplanting in the next week or so, however.

I just recently transplanted the pumpkin seedlings we have.

Here's what I started with:

One of those pots has 2 pumpkin seedlings and the other has three.

What are the red cups for you ask? They are my larger pots. They are just under 4 inches across and they are nice and deep. I call them perfect pots for seedlings that need to grow up and get ready to go in the ground. Here's how I prepare the cups for dirt and seedlings:

 I just used scissors to poke a couple of holes in the bottom in order to allow for drainage.

Notice also the bag of potting mix in the first picture.

It doesn't technically have potting mix in it. It has compost dirt mixed with regular soil in it. It's a handy bag.

I decided to do this inside because I could sit down and work at chest height, which makes my neck and back more happy then hunching over outside.

So with everything ready, step one was to put a little bit of dirt in the bottom of each new pot. Here:

There's not much dirt in there. Maybe an inch, with a little crater hollowed out in the middle.

Your next step is to remove the seedlings from their pots. If your seedlings have their roots tangled up, it's not a problem. Here's a video showing what you can do. Warning: this is of me so you have to be subjected to my face and voice now.




Now you want to get those seedlings planted firmly in their new pots. Here's a still image of the technique:

You hold the plant up straight in the pot with one hand and with the other hand you arrange soil around the stem. Notice how deep the plants are going in these pots. Here's a video with more detail:



So once you've got all of the dirt in there, just pack it firmly, being careful not to squeeze the seedling's stem. Then water until the water is coming out the bottom.

Then don't water for a few days. I'd say let the top couple of inches get pretty dry. This'll stimulate those roots. After that, water every few days and keep your seedlings in a nice sunny area.

Oh yeah. Be sure to have your assistant label the transplants to keep things straight.



Next time we'll transplant tomato seedlings.

Since it's Sunday

I'm going to post an article I wrote recently that provides a solid overview of organic gardening practices and principles.

Organic gardening can be broken into these areas: Soil, Plants and Nurturing.

SOIL
The basic idea of organic gardening is that chemicals that are harmful to the environment and potentially prejudicial to humans and animals are not used. So when you are preparing your soil, you basically just want to keep from using any chemical fertilizers.

Manure, that lovely waste product of equines and bovines, is the best fertilizer out there. What's more, you want to try to get manure from animals that have been fed on alfalfa, rather than on grain such as corn. This just yields better, more balanced manure.

You can get bagged steer manure from your local gardening center usually. When you've gotten some manure, the method of application is simple. Simply spread it over the top of your garden area. If you are doing container gardening, go ahead and put it on the top of the soil in the containers. You are looking for a layer of a couple inches of the manure.

With the manure spread out, you are ready to mix it in. So if your gardening area is small enough, do this by hand. Try to get about six inches down into the soil. What you do is dig down and then turn over each spadeful, breaking up the dirt clumps as you go. This will mix in the manure and loosen up the soil.

If your garden area is big, say larger than 75 square feet, you might want to use a roto-tiller. These are heavy-duty machines, but they save you time and do a good job.

Now you are ready to move to plants.

PLANTS
One of the hallmarks of organic gardening is the art and science of companion planting. This type of planting does three things: maintains soil/nutrient balance, encourages plants to support each other, and repels common garden pests.

First off, you can do as the American Indians did and plant corn, squash and beans together. Beans provide nitrogen and potassium to the soil, which corn needs since it is basically a grass. The tall, strong corn stalks provide poles for the beans to climb. The squash fills in spaces and shades the ground.

Another companion set is the tomato/pepper, onion and marigold set. If you plant your tomatoes and peppers with onions in amongst them and a border of marigolds, most common garden pests will keep away. Spiders will still show up, but these lovelies are wonderful because they eat bugs too!

The only other organic issue regarding your plants and their arrangement is the choice between organic seeds and non-organic. The truth is that organic is in the nurturing, not the seeds. So you can get any kind of plant you want and still raise an organic garden.

This is not to say that some organic seed and plant choices aren't worth it. If you can get heirloom seeds, your plants will actually provide seeds for each year's garden. This will not happen if you get regular old hybrid seeds and plants.

NURTURING
Your goal is to avoid all toxic pesticides and fertilizers. We say toxic because you can actually get mycelium (mushroom)-based pesticides that are in no way harmful to soil and animal (and human!) life.

As for fertilizer during the growing season, don't use Miracle-gro. Get another bag of manure or make a compost pile. Then, when the season is in full swing, spread the compost mulch or the manure around the base of your plants. Then just water as usual. The nutrients from these organic fertilizers will get the job done.

And that's pretty much it for this session of Organic Gardening. One final note about organic gardening is that it pays to be creative. Try new arrangements and experiment with lightweight row cloth to keep wicked pests away from your plants. For example, lightweight, water and sun permeable row cloth will keep quail from your lettuce and peas. So build a little framework and put some row cloth down. This is better than getting some nasty chemical that wards off quail.