Looking for a "mentor" ... does anyone have a little time?

[vegbox-recipes]

Hi there all -

I am just getting started with growing my own vegetables in a very small way.

I have started off some seeds indoors for broad beans, lettuce and tomatoes, and have also got seeds for spinach and butternut squash.

The seedlings are appearing, and I'm surfing around online picking up tips for what to do next, and it got me to thinking that it'd be great to have someone here to chat to to hold my hand through the thinning / pricking out / planting out stages of everything.

So does anyone have the time to be my veggie mentor?

Ideally I'd love to post up the pictures of how my seedlings are doing... I'm feeling concerned not to prick them out too early OR to leave it too late.

Thanks so much in advance!

Clara

[Annpan]

You'll be fine

I have found that on ish you will always find someone to help... I asked questions all the time and someone is always knowledgeable enough to guide me through.

Don't feel embarrassed about just coming out and asking here, you might find that you like the answers of one person over another..... in these matters there is often several suitable methods and some might be dependent on location, facilities and time available.... but I am afraid that some is down to experience, I put my first year down to learning (I had a very poor crop) my second year, I expanded and did not badly, this is my third year.... I am hoping for at least double the yield I got last year..... I have learned many lessons, and I am sure I have lots more to learn.

Specific questions with lots of detail is good.... where are your seedlings? what are they planted in? do you have a greenhouse? do you plan on container gardening? etc, etc, etc


HTH

[Odsox]

Ann's right, just ask away on here and someone is bound to know the answer.

Regarding your pricking out dilemma, when a seed germinates it puts out a pair of seed leaves and then appears to do nothing for a week or so. What it's doing is concentrating on growing it's roots, after which it starts producing true leaves. It's at that stage when you see a well developed true leaf that you should prick them out. Pricking out at this stage means that if you break some roots it doesn't matter so much as it has others to keep it going. If you wait much longer the roots will all be tangled together and make it difficult to tease them apart.
One other point is you should handle the seedlings by one of their seed leaves, never by the stem or true leaves, as if you damage the seed leaf it is expendable, stems and true leaves aren't.
Hope that helps.

[vegbox-recipes]

Dearest AnnPan and Odsox - I am SO grateful for your offers of help.

The broad beans are growing SOOOOOO fast! I feel like Jack ; )

I'm attaching a picture of the space where my seeds are growing (on the desk in my bedroom!)

The growing table!

stage 1 with notes.jpg (197.58 KiB) Viewed 3242 times

and then some close ups of each of the "crops":

Little lettuce seedlings

little lettuce seedlings.jpg (114.67 KiB) Viewed 3227 times

Tomatoes peeking out

tomatoes peeking out.jpg (58.28 KiB) Viewed 4114 times

I'd love some guidance on whether any of them are big enough to prick out yet, and on what I ought to prick them out into ... A separate pot for each seedling? I have been saving plastic bottles for a while - do you think it's ok to cut the tops off, poke some drainage holes in the bottoms and prick out into these? Or do evil chemicals leak into the soil from the plastic?

[vegbox-recipes]

and here are the broad beans...

Broad beans surfacing in a small box

broad beans surfacing in a small box.jpg (118.73 KiB) Viewed 3232 times

[Annpan]

I love your set up there... very 'ish

I wouldn't worry too much about plastic leaching chemicals into your veg... it is food grade plastic (if it was a soda bottle or marg tub) so should be fine.

Your things all look a bit to small and delicate to re-pot them just now. as odsox says, wait for some true leaves to form.... you'll recognise them when they get there

You have a lot of tomato plants there... yikes.... you know they get pretty big, what variety are they? on the plus side, they will be easy to pot on as you can stick the loo roll in the pot too.


Are you planning on eventually planting outside? in the ground or in containers, or inside?

Can't advise on the broad beans I am afraid

[Odsox]

Hi Clara.
You certainly have a lot of seedlings there but what you must do immediately is move that table right against the window.
Seedlings especially need light otherwise they go "leggy" which means they have long weak stems as they struggle to reach the outside.
What you need is a coffee table or upside down boxes right in front of that window I can see and put the seed boxes as close to the glass as you can and turn them every day (cos they will still lean a bit) and you will end up with sturdy straight seedlings you will be proud of.
Here's a pic of lettuce I have in my window right now, you can see the true leaves just starting to appear ... they will need pricking out in about a weeks time.

Little gem.jpg (75.99 KiB) Viewed 4096 times

Broad beans I have never sown indoors but I assume that you have a plot outside where you are going to grow them later. A good idea with seeds that are big (like B.Beans) is to sow them individually in pots to start with. You can of course do this with small seeds as well but it's a bit fiddly to say the least. I always sow my tomato seeds in individual pots as well as the seeds are usually expensive and that way you don't have to worry about pricking them out.
Keep us in the loop as to how thing are progressing and any other questions, just ask away.

[vegbox-recipes]

I did as you suggested and got that table right up in the window, and I've been turning them. The broad beans are really quite big now (nearly a foot long stems) so I'm guessing I need to get the outdoors in the beds with the trellises ... Do you think that it's safe to plant them out now? If I do, should I cover them with something? Or should I transplant them into their own individual pots but keep them inside? If I do that, do I need to give them something to climb up?

So many questions!

The tomatoes and the lettuce are both looking VERY weedy ... I'm hoping they're just developing their roots and that they'll have a spurt any day now ...

Any guidance??

[Odsox]

If your broad beans are a foot tall I think you may have left it too late to transplant individually ... next year sow them in individual pots to start with.
OK .. broad beans don't climb, runner beans and some French beans do but broad beans don't, all they need is a few canes and some string to stop them falling over when they get taller. What you need to do now is "harden" them off, that means putting them outside in a warm spot during the day and bring them in again at night. Do that for a couple of days and they should be OK to leave them out all the time, then you can plant them in your garden.

[vegbox-recipes]

Thanks Tony.

Oops.

They're already flopping all over the place, so I'll get some canes and string.

Is there any special way of arranging these around the plants?

Really appreciate your help.

[Odsox]

Is there any special way of arranging these around the plants?

No not really, whatever works.
If they are in a block just put 4 canes each corner and surround them with string.

[vegbox-recipes]

Brill!

Thanks Tony.

I just had a great session tidying up the patio garden ready for planting out time.

It's basically a paved area, with the house on two sides and brick wall on the other two. The sides with the brick walls have raised brick flower beds on them - quite narrow - maybe a foot and a bit. I will be using raised beds for the beans and for the squash, I think, and then putting the tomatoes, spinach and lettuce in tubs / troughs.

Does anyone think that there might be a problem with that plan?

C

[Annpan]

Sounds OK, your light levels may be a bit low but you won't know till you try. You will be learing a lot about what does and doesn't work for you this year

Squash like manure if you can get any.

[vegbox-recipes]

Thanks Ann! I expect I really will, and that's cool. This year is all about learning. If I can eat some of my lessons, that's great too.

[Odsox]

Squash like manure if you can get any.

If you can't get any manure a couple of handfuls of pelleted chicken manure is also good.
You can get a big bucket of them in garden centres for not a lot of dosh.