There are a ton of guides showing you how to start seeds. But ... then what? What comes after your brand new baby vegetable plant has sprouted?
So you started your seeds and they SPROUTED. And now you aren't sure what the hell to do.
If you haven't done it yet, take a look at how to start vegetables from seed. All the instructions you need for starting seeds are in there.
But then what?
Table of Contents
What Do You Do After A Seed Has Sprouted?
A cocktail with an umbrella are the industry standard. So yes, the first thing you do is get one of those and then cheers to you.
Once your seed has sprouted and is looking lively you need to start thinking about:
- Potting up your plants
- Getting them light
- Giving them nutrients
Today you're going to learn how to pot up your seedlings and give them their first dose of fertilizer.
What's potting up?
I'm glad you asked. It's literally moving your seedling UP to a bigger pot (potting up). Not only are you moving it to a bigger pot so it has more room to grow, you're also going to start using actual soil that has nutrients.
Remember - when you start seeds it is with a soilless mix that contains no real nutrients for your hungry toddler plant.
The seed contains all the nutrients the plant needs to sprout and grow its first set of true leaves.
Why pot up?
When you start seeds you normally do it in a seed starting tray. Each cell in the tray holds a very tiny amount of growing medium with just enough moisture to get the plant started.
Once your seed sprouts and starts growing you need to make sure it has enough room and soil to become a big healthy plant.
Potting up gives the plant more room to grow bigger roots which in turn can take up more nutrients.
Potting up also means you'll switch to nutrient rich soil in the pot (instead of soilless mix).
More soil for each plant means you won't have to water as much as well.
When to pot up
- With brand new baby seedlings from a seed starting tray, you can pot up once they have grown their first true set of leaves.
- With mature seedlings you will pot up when the roots start to snake out of the bottom of the pot OR if the plant looks too big for the pot and doesn't look happy.
DON'T BE FOOLED BY SIZE. Not even going to make the easy joke here.
Some plants are tiny when they grow their first set of leaves, like the pepper seedling below.
Others, like the luffa to the right of it, are much bigger at the same stage of growth.
Still not making a joke.
How to Repot (pot up) Your Seedlings
This method is the same whether your seedling is going from a seed starting tray to a 4" pot or from a 4" pot to a 6".
Gather up some pots. If you're like me, they might be dirty.
1. Wash Pots with Soap and Hot Water
That old soil is potentially teeming with disease, fungi and pathogens just waiting to murder your seedling.
If you've ever had a problem with your perfectly healthy seedlings rotting at the base and keeling over seemingly overnight - you could have damping off.
Damping off is a condition that can obliterate your seedings and it spreads through infected soil and wet growing conditions. (it's why you should water your plants from underneath instead of on top)
2. Spray or Soak in Bleach
Soak your pots in a sink with a mixture of 90% water and 10% bleach for 30 minutes. Go watch Jeopardy or something.
If your pots are generally clean, you can also add 1 tsp. of bleach to a standard spray bottle of water, spray the pots and let them air dry before using.
3. Fill Pots with Soil
Fill all your pots with new soil. Reusing old soil can introduce fungus, disease and critters to those pots you just cleaned.
YOU CAN STERILIZE SOIL by adding ½ cup of hydrogen peroxide to a gallon of water. Put the mixture in a spray bottle.
Then pour out 1cm of soil onto a baking sheet, a sheet of plastic or a large cardboard box. Spray the top of the soil with your hydrogen peroxide mixture.
Keep adding 1 cm layers of soil and repeat the spraying. Doing it in layers like this will help ensure all the soil has been touched by the peroxide.
How to Separate Seedlings
1. Grasp the leaves.
Always lift your seedlings by their leaves - NOT the stem. If you happen to break a leaf off, the plant can grow a new one. If you break the stem you're down the road kicking stones.
2. Grab a dibber or a pencil
Gardening supply stores sell things called Dibbers. They're just little pointy tools that make certain tasks easier. In this case, lifting up and separating seedlings.
If you grew multiple seedlings in each cell or pot you can carefully separate them and plant them individually.
Even though real dibbers are very cute, I just use a pencil. It does the same thing.
3. Stick your dibber into the soil, getting it under the stem and roots of the plant and gently pry the plant up while lifting the leaves.
4. Gently detangle the roots if you need to.
5. Create a hole in the soil with your finger or dibber that's about the same length as the roots and place the plant in the hole.
Make sure the roots are mainly facing down. Also make sure that it's planted to the same soil level it was before or slightly deeper.
If you need to use your dibber to push the roots down into the soil.
7. Press the soil around the rootball (or single stem of root for very young just sprouted seedlings!). Use your finger or the dibber again to push the soil around the roots so they're in contact with the soil.
8. And you're done.
Most seedlings only need to be potted up once or twice before they go outdoors.
NOTE!
The one disadvantage to repotting you seedlings is the space they take up.
Remember when planning your little grow operation that you don't need a lot of space for 50 two leafed seedlings. But you DO need a lot of space for 50 potted up tomato plants.
It's gonna be a lot of work. But you're a farmer now and farmers work hard.
NUTRIENTS
Your plants need 3 things. Water, light and nutrients.
- My favourite method for watering is by using Capillary Mats.
- I use these LED shop lights with a colour temperature of 6,500. ALL my information and experience with grow lights is in this post. Read it so that you know the difference between shop lights & grow lights.
- The easiest way to make sure you have the right nutrients is to buy or make a good potting soil.
Imagine the magic of it all! You put a tiny seed in a hospitable environment, fertilized it, took care of it and several months later a beautiful bundle of joy like this appeared. (you really should click on that link just for my first photo)
Happy Gardening. As always if you have a question just email me.
Judy Emmert
What?? We can have more fun and frivolity with you in TV Land.?? Please tell...
Leslie
I knew I could get the info on this stage of the seed to healthy plant process AND be entertained. All I had to do was go to your site instead of just thinking about it. I love this post. Thank you!
Karen
Hey Leslie! Thanks! And good luck with your planting. :) ~ karen!
Debbie
Hey Karen, why do my tomato babies look like this and not like mini tomato plants?
Karen
They're fine. They're just young and they aren't getting enough light so they're leggy (long stems). Get them somewhere with more light if you can. If not, and it's warm enough get them outside. They'll be fine. :) ~ karen!
jtu
Just to let you know, Dirt is what you get up from the floor; Soil is that in which you grow seeds and plants.
Karen
I would like to direct your attention to comment #6 (approximately) on this post on how to dig up garlic. ~ karen
Brittany
I found this post via pinterest. I just bought two seedling kits and a TON (and I mean entirely too many) seeds. Your post sounds just as excited as I feel! My boyfriend grew up on a ranch so he doesn't understand my excitement (I, on the other hand, grew up in LA and Vegas. We don't grow things there).
I will be sure to be VERY careful when I transplant them. *fingers crossed that they even sprout!*
Karen
Hi Brittany! Oh ... they'll sprout. :) Keeping them alive is the hard part. They're kind of like kids. When they're really young they don't take a lot of care, but once they're hit teenagerhood, they're a pain in the ass. Then, as they mature ... easy to deal with again. :) I just planted several heritage variety tomato seeds and have, like you, a ridiculous amount of other seeds to deal with as well.
Alison Wagstaffe
Since watching the film about saving seeds with that amazing Indian woman Vandana Shiva I’ve been collecting mine ( and other peoples’!) I’m on my third generation of some beans and things - last year I saved my tomato seeds - which was a bit fiddly! But I planted them indoors and so far so good! Fingers crossed!
Karen
Good luck with your tomatoes! I'm sure they'll do great. Have they sprouted yet? ~ karen!
Pam'a
"You must now rise with the chickens, unless you’re from the city in which case you can rise with the last drunken “Wooooooo” you hear outside your window."
Made me all wistful about college. ::sniffle::
Karen
Drunken woooooo!!! Hilarious. Not to mention, the comment is a bit foreshadowy!!! (Sure, it's a word!)
Niki Turner
Wow! Thank you for this post. I planted my seeds last week in one of those plastic containers with the tiny peat pots and clear lid. Almost everything has already sprouted, but I was clueless as to what to do next. Up until now, I've never been able to get past the "sprouts" stage. Hopefully this year things will be different with your instructions!
~ Niki
Stephanie
What beautiful photos! Thanks for the info. I'm hoping to plant a garden next year...maybe I'll be adventurous and start the seedlings in the house. Thanks for sharing!
Kristen
I do love this post - very well illustrated about how to go about re-potting. However, what was particularly delightful was the line about peeing in the middle of the night. So unexpected, and so true!!
Thanks for making me smile :)
Lisa
Alas, be VERY careful not to wash too much soil down your sink in the washing pots phase. It would be better to wash those pots in a bucket and dump it outside when they're washed. Or you could do a post on how to take apart the trap underneath the sink, which I am expert at. :-)
And chopsticks work great instead of pencils, because if you get distracted and use the wrong end, you'll have a dirty eraser. Which is sad.
Karen
Lisa - Hah! Yes if there's a lot of dirt I dump the dirt into the garbage or outside first. These pots didn't have much "dirt" in them. Just a tiny big stuck to the sides of a few pots. No big whoop. And yes, chopsticks are a good idea! ~ karen
Susan
I come from a very long line of women who simply look at plants and cause them to grow massive while I myself am a serial plant murderer.
I don't mean to be. I don't want to be and hopefully with posts like these I will be reformed. Cross your fingers for me...
Audrey
Are we using potting soil, topsoil, more of that seeding soil or some other soil for this part of the indoor farming industry? :)
Karen
Audrey - Excellent question! Potting soil at this point. I'm not sure why I'm even doing this because it is currently snowing in Southern Ontario. I don't believe summer is *ever* going to actually come. I think it may have been taken hostage by winter. ~ karen
Michelle
Hi Karen,
I agree with Jeanette - your pictures are great. May I ask what type of camera you use? And if you've ever had any photography training? I really hope you use some REALLY expensive camera - I use a crappy point n' shoot, and my pics are, well, crappy ;)
Karen
Michelle - Up until a year ago I'd never taken a picture. My camera (well ... my boyfriends camera, which I use) is a Nikon D 40. The lens I used for the shots is the one that came w/ the camera. I took one course over the winter and I'm signed up for another one in a few weeks. You actually CAN take really great pictures with a point and shoot! You just have to read the manual and find out where all the controls for the F stops and shutter speed etc. are. It just takes longer to take a good pic. with a point and shoot because the controls are kindda hidden. ~ karen!
Laurel Alanna McBrine
Thanks for all the info on starting seeds - I just planted some yesterday and now I am crossing my fingers as I have tried it before without success.
Karen
Laurel - Did you make sure to cover up the seeds with plastic or Saran Wrap or something until they germinate? ~ karen
Stina
Hi Karen,
That's funny that Jeanette commented about your photos too, b/c I was just thinking, "see, I want to take photos that look like that"! They are so crisp and clear. What kind of camera do you use? I think I need to take some lessons too!
Karen
Hi Stina - The camera is a Nikon D-40 and the lens I used for these photos was the one that came with it. More than the camera you use, I think the lens is what creates a nice sharp picture. Plus good natural light makes all the difference in the world. ~ karen!
Sherry
I agree... photos are truly beautiful! Question: how did you take those when both your hands are in the picture?? You really are talented.
Karen
Sherry - You scamp! Trying to trip me up aren't you? Camera's on a tripod and it has a timer. I pre-focus, hit the timer button then stick my hands in the shot! GREAT. Now all the magic is gone. ~ karen
Sherry
Scamp! Love it! BTW, I just ordered Geek Love from Amazon. Can't wait to get my freak on :)
Laura
Veggies just went up in price by 25% in 3 months. Soon we will all be saving boatloads of money thanks to you, Karen.
Adrienne Audrey
Your little plants are looking good!
Jennifer
Your photos *are* lovely! I'm rooting for the luffah. And the post -- as always informative + funny. This caused me to chuckle: "Again, be careful. It’s a recurring theme in transplanting seedlings."
We're a little ahead of you on the growing season here in AZ -- I actually snipped my first basil for some pizza tonight.
Jeanette Schnell
Your photos are so nice! Those lessons are really paying off. How do you like being a One Woman Show?
Karen
Jeanette - I love it quite frankly! I consider myself to be a bit of a creative type and well ... the second any censorship comes in via a producer, director or executive ... the creativity dies a little. So I'm happy I have TV land to make money and 'cause it's fun and happy I have blog land for my creative side. I don't know how I'd get along without it at this point. Um ... if that's what you meant about being a One Woman Show, LOL. ~ karen