Welcome back!
Transplanting makes for an exciting day! Several weeks ago, we started several trays of plants. One of those trays held 80 Napoli tomato seeds we bought from MIGardener (Napoli Tomato – MIgardener).
We chose this variety for its usefulness in several different ways. It is advertised as an excellent sauce tomato which is pretty high on our list. Tim has a smidgen of Italian in him and it likes to come out in his cooking. So pasta sauce and pizza sauce are definitely on our canning agenda for this year. But Napoli tomatoes are also supposed to be good for slicing, so that means diced tomatoes and salsa as well as just eating in salads or on hamburgers.
Now, we weren’t expecting anywhere close to 80 starts from that tray. But, since we have lots of canning plans for our eventual tomato harvest, we were hoping for at least 40. Half is pretty good, right?
Well, it was finally time to transplant all our Napoli seedlings. So Alayna and I pulled out small plastic cups, a box cutter, a bag of Burpee organic seed starting mix (Burpee Eco Friendly 8 Qt Seed Starting Mix 0.06-0.03-0.03 – Burpee), and of course our tomatoes.
Alayna had the job of cutting three little 1-inch tall triangles around the base of each cup and then stacking them in another uncut cup. These triangles were for bottom watering so I didn’t have to pour water on the top and increase the chances of fungus. I started teasing the plants out of their cells, dividing all the ones I could, and filling the cups with starter mix.
Once we got into the rhythm it was not a hard job by any means, but it was a time-consuming one. I had to be careful not to damage the roots and Alayna had to take care not to damage her fingers! One by one the cups started to fill up and orderly rows of amazing-smelling tomato starts began taking up more and more room on the table. Tim had some free time so he jumped in to help, carefully separating the seedlings into their cups. Between him and Alayna, I had to hustle and still ended up woefully behind.
When everything was said and done, or every last seedling separated and filled, we had an amazing total of… Drum roll… 75 tomato plants. 75! That means between the seeds that didn’t germinate and the ones that weren’t healthy enough to save, we only lost 5. Those are some amazing results! We have never had tomatoes grow this well. I’m not sure if it was the variety or the quality of seeds or that we started them in coconut coir instead of potting soil or a combination of everything, but we are thrilled.
Watering them all was the next challenge. I did not water them the evening we transplanted them as they came out of the tray cells rather wet. But the next morning I knew they would be needing water. My options were as follows:
- Lift each interior cup, pour water into the outer cup, and replace the inside one.
- Find enough trays with rims to hold all the inside cups while I put water in the trays and let the cups soak.
- Run a few inches of water in the bathtub and put all the cups in at once.
I chose to go with Option 3 for several reasons. Less fuss and chance of mess than Option 1 and I didn’t have to find a place to store that many trays full of water where 6 children were unlikely to bump them.
So into the tub they went and by the time I had finished getting them in there, the 5 minutes I had been planning to let them soak was up making it time to take them all right back out.
So far, none of them look to be in danger of wilting from the transplanting which is wonderful news. It’s moments like these that remind me how much growth—both plant and personal—can come from just a few tiny seeds. And this is only the beginning.
Bringing Life 