Burn Baby Burn

I wrote the post at the bottom last year. I always thought that 1-2 weeks was excessive for hardening off seedlings. This year, I did 2 hrs/day for a few days, then 3 hours, then 5 hours, and ZAP! Now I'm rethinking my hardening off strategy. I think I will be more conservative in the future.

These babies will survive, but they gave me a scare. I have all my container tomatoes in partial shade, either under a tree or behind some bushes. My giants are going in the ground this weekend, so I can't move them in and out of shade. Here's hoping for some cloudy weather!

Tuesday, May 19, 2015

Hardening off time

It's that time of the year where the seedlings meet the soil. A few brave souls have already put their plants out! As for me, I'm going to be planting this weekend.

Seedlings started indoors live a very sheltered life for the first few weeks. There's no wind to contend with, minimal UVs, and temperatures are a consistent 70 degrees. In order to adjust to outdoor growing conditions, tender seedlings need to gradually adapt over  a period of days. Skip this all-important step and it's welcome to Scorchville, population your plants.

Feeling the burn

Many "experts" say you need to harden off tomatoes over 1-2 weeks, gradually building the time each day until they can stay out all day. One guy wrote that he does 2-4-6-plant (measured in hours per day). It would be a catchier phrase if "plant" rhymed with "8". I've been doing something similar to that for the past few years, and it seems to get the job done. I usually try to plant the plants in the afternoon also, so they have the cool of the evening to recover from transplanting shock.