When to take outside...

[Salty_Dog]

Yeah i seem to have it sorted now.

The MG Seafeed Foliage spray worked a treat. Just a general healthy up across the board.

The weather here has been very hot, so it seemed most of the plants were just in shock from the sudden hot spell.... now though, they are flying!!!

As for the tender little seedlings, i just place them in a place of filtered light, they seem to do better that way... once the seedling is say, 4 inchs high with 8 or so leafs, they seem to be able to handle all day sun.

As for planting up, i am really interested why so many people take so many stages, ie: Cell to paper cup, paper cup to 4" pot, 4" pot to 8" pot, 8" pot to ground or 20" pot.

From what i have noticed, there is 3 or 4 days of transplant shock each time you pot up... So with that in mind, i generally try and make it 2 steps.

Seedling -> 8" pot.... 8" pot -> 20" pot.

[Blueaussi]

I'm lazy, and I prefer to plant the seed in a cup that will hold it comfortably until it's planted out, but I don't have space to start all my seeds that way. Tomatoes don't seem to suffer from transplant shock much, so most of my tomatoes are started in smaller containers and planted up as needed.

[Salty_Dog]

Mmmmm all of mine have suffered shock, perhaps i over water and over fert during the transplant process and that is what the shock is from.

[ddsack]

As for planting up, i am really interested why so many people take so many stages, ie: Cell to paper cup, paper cup to 4" pot, 4" pot to 8" pot, 8" pot to ground or 20" pot.

I think it has to do with uncooperative cool weather and frosts. It would be ideal if I could leave it at just one transplant - from cell (4 seeds per cell, sometimes I just pry out the two larger ones and leave the smaller to grow, adding some soil and pushing them to opposite ends of the cell) -- into coffee cups, prior to their final place in the garden. Because I live in the north, with late spring frosts and have a short season, I don't have a lot of time to waste in getting sizable plants into the garden, so I may start them a couple of weeks earlier than I should. I have found that my plants take off better if they can keep growing in all directions, instead of becoming skinny and rootbound in small pots while waiting for the weather to settle.

I have not seen root disturbance to be a big problem, since normally the whole root and soil ball comes out of the cup in one piece, so setting it in a prepared larger pot just allows the exposed roots more elbow room in soft soil, nothing is ripped or bruised.

I end up with well over 100 plants, half of which are extras that I give away. I don't have a rigid plan. Not all of them get transplanted more than once, only those I judge will suffer if they don't. I might go from cell, to coffee cup, to 6" pot, but that's as far as I need to transplant before the final move to garden.