OK, this year I decided to plant some of my own fruits and veggies. I have planted tomatoes, cantaloupes, yellow squash, and watermelons. The plants have germinated and began to sprout. There are two things I am worried: 1. When is it time to transplant the plants to a bigger container? Right now I have them in a 50 pod seed starting tray but I know they cannot stay in there with that soil forever and at some point I will have to transplant them, my question is when is the right time and how do I do the transplant successfully? 2. In several of the pods in the tray, there are some tomato plants that have sprouted and there appear to be 10+ sprouts in each pod. Is there anyway to successfully save these plants or are they doomed due to overcrowding? My assumption is the root system on these plants will become entangled and the plants will not be sustainable. Am I wrong? I have included the following pic: If you look at the pic you can see what I am talking about. So, can any ClutchFans help me out?
You can already transplant them. I used to start my water melon plants and tomatoes in a ziplock bag on damp paper towels. You can start now, before their roots get too entangled. YOu should be able to separate them pretty well with out tearing the roots.
Transplant when their first true leaves appear (the initial two leaf looking things are not leaves) In the future, plant 3 seeds per pod, and weed out the weaker 2. Plants, especially young plants, don't like their roots to be disturbed. TBH, you might be better weeding most of them out and then replanting a second crop with fewer seedlings.
LOL. Different ends of the spectrum. Well, I'll tell you this. From all the years I have grown my own stuff :Tomatoes, Watermelons, Oranges, Grapefruit, Chilis.... Basically, I waited till they had the initial 2 leafs. So that basically, they were one solid little root, which made it very easy to transplant. Don't recall losing any of them unless I broke the roots (sacrificed to save other plants). Give it a try. He basically said trash them and start over....why not attempt the transplant. Good Luck. Wish I had a backyard right now.
As uprising said, it doesn't hurt to try. Most will likely survive. Keep in mind of the different climates too. Im up in the mountains, so its much more important that I transplant after the plant is stronger due to the cooler nights. Also, if you're using seeding dirt/fert., that helps too. My stupid cat knocked over a whole trey of my seedlings over the weekend and while they are still alive, they have not grown much. The tomatoes Im not worried about, but I can't afford to lose any more time on my watermelons. I already started too late on those as it is.
I am in Arkansas and I have been told I can plant the plants but I need to get the seeds started by the end of the month. Is that true? If so, I'll try the transplant tomorrow and buy more seeds just in case I start over.
dude, wait till the true leaves come in for the mato plants. And kill off the other other ones. why did you plant so many in one pod? True leaves is the right answer. And unless you plan to grom a farm do you really need more than 50 plants? No. So kill the weaker ones.
I had my little nephew helping and I guess he got a little carried away when planting the seeds. In my pods I planted 4 seeds, in case some did not sprout. It looks like there is a lot more than 50 plants to me and we plan to spread them. Plant some at my house, grandmother's, aunt's, and my girl's parent's house.
I have some long, shallow metal and plastic containers. They are about 18 inches long, 10 inches wide and 3 inches deep. Can I cut some drainage holes in these containers, fill it with soil, and then try the transplant while spacing the individual seedlings out? If I do wait for true leaves to come in, will the plants survive that long or will some begin to die because of the overcrowding?
If you use that container as you described, make sure you use some type of spacers between each set of of seedlings. a 2"x2"x2" should be plenty sufficient. You want the roots to bunch up some, so no, they won't die of overcrowding (they will if you let more than one plant in the same pod). You want to disturb the roots as little as possible, so if you don't put spacers, the roots will grow out, and when you go to transplant, you will break some of them, thus making the plant weaker or even killing it. I use little yogurt cups for my pods. Although what you have will likely survive if you transplant now, they won't be as strong if you keep them protect indoors. The difference is not whether the plant lives or dies, but how much fruit is produced and the quality.
Any suggestions on what to use as spacing material? Damn yogurt cups!!! Why didn't I think of that? We have tons we just throw away because my daughter eats it like crazy. What are some other containers that likely get tossed that would be good for that? I think now would be the ideal time to try to transplant these seedling as the roots are probably not tangled yet like Uprising noted and if the transplant is unsuccessful I do have time to plant more. Are you saying that initially I will need to transplant the plants to soil outdoors or just outdoors period? I had planned on doing that anyway once the plants get big enough.
I really need to till my area where I will be transplanting my plants once the first leaves arrive but my area is expecting thunderstorms today and tomorrow. Can you till after rain or should you wait until after the ground is dry?
