Transplanting Tips

Vegetables and
Annual Flowers

Class 1: Gardening Basics
Class 2: Garden Planning & Design
Class 3: Indoor Seed Starting
Class 4: Planting & Transplanting
Class 5: Maintaining a Healthy Garden
Class 6: Troubleshooting

Begin by preparing your garden bed by tilling and raking. (Remember, don’t till if the soil is still too wet.)

Next, mark the spots where you’ll be placing the plants. Remember to follow the spacing guidelines. Since it’s tempting to squeeze the plants a little closer together while planting, it’s helpful to mark out the planting holes first.

Dig a hole for your first transplant, making it slightly larger than the plant’s root ball. Gently remove the plant from the container, remembering to hold it by the root ball or the leaves, not the stem. Place it in the planting hole. Most vegetables should be planted as deeply as they were growing in their containers. (See exception below.)

Planting & Transplanting
FAQ #3

I work all week. And the weekends have been too hot and sunny to transplant. What can I do?!

Answer

Be sure to space plants properly. Overcrowded plants yield less and are more prone to disease.

Fill in the rest of the hole with soil, gently firming it around the root ball. If you like, you can mix some slow-acting fertilizer into the soil, but don’t mix in a fertilizer that is meant to be mixed with water first. Concentrated fertilizer can damage roots! As you firm the soil, create a shallow well around the plant, so that water will gather there instead of immediately running off.

It's a good idea to protect seedlings against cutworm damage at planting time. Cutworms can sever the stems of new plants at the soil line. An easy way to protect plants is to fashion a collar from newspaper:

Once you’ve finished transplanting, water all the plants gently, and thoroughly.

Note: Tomatoes are one of the few crops that will develop roots on buried stems. Every time you transplant tomatoes, bury them up to the first set of leaves. If your plants are large or if you have heavy soil, rather than digging a deep hole, dig an 8" - 10" deep trench and gently lay the plant on its side, carefully burying it so the top part of the plant remains upright and exposed.

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