Early Seedlings

One of my favorite times of the year is planting the first seedlings of the season. Even though some of the varieties that I plant can be found at my local nursery, I do enjoy planting as much as I can for myself. However, the one advantage to starting your own seedlings is that you can choose whatever  plant variety you want, many of which are not available as transplants locally. This can be especially advantageous with tomatoes and peppers.

But the first seedlings that I like to plant the early in the season are onions, cabbage, lettuce and tomatoes. Instead of getting some pots or planting cells from my local nursery, I like to use recycled containers such as butter dishes and food containers.  Some of my favorites are the Panda Bowl containers I get from Panda Express (I like their Chow Mein and Sweet and Sour Pork!). They are wide, relatively shallow, and with 3/8” holes drilled in the bottom, they provide excellent drainage.  They also come with clear lids, so I have my own mini greenhouse! I like to plant the onion seeds in the Panda Bowls especially.  I have also planted Romaine and Buttercrunch lettuce seeds in some available cream cheese containers.

Even though I have in the past have grown the onion seedlings to transplanting size, ready for the garden in those containers, this year I am planning on getting the seedlings large and strong enough to transplant into individual plant cells so the roots could mature without competition. Hopefully this will make stronger transplants and better sized bulbs this fall.

One trick I like doing when preparing containers for transplanting is to fill the lower two thirds of the container with normal potting mix, leaving the upper third for the more expensive commercial seeding mix.  The seeding mix is good for providing a safe bed for the new seedlings. When they get older and more disease resistant, the roots can move down into the coarser and more nutrient rich potting mix, and mature from there.