Checking in on the Tomatoes & Peppers

On January 1, I posted how I planted seven different varieties of heirloom tomatoes, and then five varieties of peppers and two types of eggplants.  In less than a week all of the tomatoes had germinated and were growing nicely.  The peppers and eggplant have longer germination times so I left them covered in plastic wrap so I wouldn't have to water as much.  Once the plants sprouted, I moved them under the fluorescent grow lights.  You can see how they are stretching out and growing up to the light.


Move toward the light

Here is a side view photo where you can see just how tall they are growing.   I'll pick the grow light up a bit, though as the plants are almost touching the light.  The 4 foot fluorescent lights usually hang over my workbench in the garage, but I borrowed it for a little while to help get our plants growing.  

Almost touching the light

I propped  up the light a little higher with some pint jars of local honey.  Now the plants have more room to grow.  You can also see that the peppers have all sprouted as well now, so I removed the plastic wrap.

Ready, Set, Grow!

Every morning and every night I water the seedlings by spraying them with water from a water bottle with a sprayer.  The light dries out the soil pretty quickly, so you want to make sure you keep an eye on things in order to keep the soil moist.

Black Krim Tomatoes are thirsty

I planted at least two seeds in every seed pot as insurance against bad germination, but these seeds were all fantastic.  Most of them were purchased seed, but even the saved seed germinated at a 98% rate. 

In the top right of the photo below, there is a tomato seedling whose seed still is on the cotyledons (first leaves) of the tomato plants.  In the past, I tried to help plants like this by pinching the seed off of the leaves, but ended up doing more harm than good.  I'll leave this one to fight its own battle.

Tomato Seedlings

As soon as the tomato seedlings grow their first "true leaves," I'll do a couple of things:  I'll separate the seedlings and re pot them into little cups that will only have one seeding per cup and then I'll also mix up a batch of fish emulsion with some water to spray on them to give them a little boost.  I want them to be as healthy as possible so that when I put them in the ground, they'll grow with vigor.


Close-up shot of tomato leaves

There is still a lot of work to do and a lot of time that must pass before we pull that first vine ripened tomato off the vine, but we've made a good start.