Acclimating Seedlings to the Cruel World
Yeah, I know. You’ve heard it a million times. So have I.
“The most important thing about starting seeds is properly hardening them off.”
“Yeah, right, ok, ok.” I said, ignoring the sage advice. But as usual, I was dead wrong.
My last frost date is historically March 23rd, but that does not mean that it won’t get down into the mid 30s after this point (duly noted). I had been moving some sunflowers, nasturtiums, cucumber, and zinnia starts in and out for like…a day…then I left them outside. They fared OK for a couple nights, and then we had a night in which the low was 36o.
That didn’t go so well.
My excuse is that I’m at work all day and can’t follow a rigorous and increasing hardening off period. Yep, it’s just that – an excuse.
So while I try to save the sunflowers and nasturtiums by moving them back inside for a little while, the zinnias fared ok outside, but the cucumber starts bit the dust. Have to restart them and think a little harder about the next rounds of seedlings making their way outside soon.
So folks, be sure to harden off your seedlings properly. I’m sure Andrew will.
Tags: acclimating seeds, cold weather, frosts, hardening off, last frost date, starting seeds
April 3rd, 2008 at 6:04 am
Well, I was thinking about whether or not I really needed to harden off my seedlings…so, thanks for this post. I have a small greenhouse and have created a method that doesn’t involve moving every flat outside…but does involve unheated nights and ventilation…we shall see if it is a good method.
April 19th, 2008 at 8:21 am
[...] last frost date was nearly a month ago, I’ve been leery to plant seedlings outside because I lost a few seedlings back when we had a cold spell around our last frost date (not even a [...]