Help! I've sown seed trays of all kinds of things - clary,
romanesco, leeks, looseleaf lettuce, etc - and now I have
little teenshy plants. Now, I don't want to plant them out
at this stage and leave them at the mercy of the s**gs (say
it quietly, they might hear). But there's about a million
of them. What's the best way to prick them out or pot them
on? (I'm a bit hazy on the difference.) Do I put each one
in its own pot? This way bankruptcy and death from annoyance
looms - my home only has so many windowsills. Advice will be
gratefully received. - JTT
ps - on the bean thread, as it were, I saw a plan for planting
peas in a length of plastic guttering; then you can just slide
the whole length of pea-plants gently off by digging a trench
and putting the gutter along it and gently sliding the length
of plants back or forward into the trench.
You can pot on the leeks and looseleaf lettuce in small clumps (not more
than about 5 to a clump and they will do fine like that when they get out
in the garden (more long white stem on the leeks and a higher yield per
square foot). Pots can go outside somewhere where you can watch for the
dreaded slugs in the evening until they are big enough to transplant - its
time they were outside anyway (not that most of mine are). Do you have a
cache of the dreaded plastic soft drink bottles - cut in half and pushed
well down they make great slug barriers cum mini cloches - very good if
you're putting out corn, french and runner beans etc as well.
Btw for those in Ireland - the Herb Garden in the Naul, about 20 miles
north of Dublin, has a garden walk - I think its next week - phone number
in todays Irish Times on the food page. She's developing a small organic
commercial herb nursery with no finance and a small child and doing a great
job - well worth a look if you are interested and withing striking
distance.
kathryn
