Three types of leaves

 

The seedlings are doing great, very healthy looking and growing fast. I just wanted to take a quick picture to document the different types of leaf habits commonly found on tomato plants.

From left to right: 

Regular leaf - these plants should be generally sturdy and upright. Most tomato plants are RL  (shown Cherokee Green)

Potato leaf - these plants are robust and can be more resistant to diseases and environmental conditions. Some PL varieties can grow very large and there are PL versions of some popular RL varieties (shown Brandywine Cowlicks)

"Wispy" regular leaf - usually oxheart or paste varieties, the finely-serrated leaves have a tendency to droop. Sometimes mistaken as being unhealthy, these plants may produce very well even though they look weaker than other plants or are more susceptible to leave roll/curl (shown Prue).

So far so good

The seedlings are growing well inside their red cups. This picture was taken like a week ago, they are quite a bit bigger now. Most likely they will get repotted again into even larger cups. There's a fan blowing over them so they get nice stocky stems. Generally we fertilize them with 1/8th strength kelp and fish every other week.

The heart shaped varieties like Bull's Heart, Opalka and Prue always look really wispy and half-dead. We just have to remind ourselves that that's normal :)

Getting sorted

Things were getting out of control in the seed box so we bought some 1 dram Wheaton glass vials to store the tomato seeds. Works well for any small seeds, including carrots, coriander, lettuce, basil, etc.... The names are written on top with a silver Sharpie! Yay for organization!

Potting Up.

We did our first potting up of our seedlings today. They are growing like champions.

So many sprouts!

The tray of tomatoes are looking pretty great and healthy. Had another seedlings come through today as well.

The Twins

Replanted some seeds

Today I replanted 5 seeds of Earl's Faux, which never came up, 3 seeds of Aunt Gertie's Gold, which came up and mysteriously died, and 4 seeds of Prue.

Both Prue seeds came up but I accidentally killed one of them by decapitation while trying to get the seed coat off. I really wanted two Prue's. Next time, I should just wet the seed coat and let the plant pull it off in a few hours, but I was too impatient.

Planning to plant JD's Special C-Tex in place of Cherokee Purple, which never came up, and Lucky Cross to replace Opalka which came up but I'm not overly excited about.

Seedling Light Setup

Here is a couple photos of our light setup. There are picture hangers on each wooden post and the light has holes that align with them. We can then move the light up gradually as the seedlings grow. The idea is to keep the light source as close to the plant as possible to make them not grow too tall and reach. Ideally spending more time growing thicker stems and growing roots.

All but 3.

So far, all but 3 tomatoes have come up. The are all looking pretty healthy and they are under the lights now. We have the light on an 18 hour timer.

These three below are the stubborn plants so far. Maybe it is time to re plant their seeds and try again.

• Cherokee Purple
• Earls Faux
• Brandywine - Cowlick's

Growing and...

First Tomato Sprouts of the New Year

Our first seedlings decided to sprout today (3 days after planting)! Top photo is the Opalka and bottom is Aunt Ginny's Purple.

Seedlings, Jan 1, 2014

Starting our seedlings off right. 14 seedling cups and about 2-3 seeds per cup of each variety.

Our treasure box of seeds.

2014 Tomato Grow List Include:

• Brandywine - Sudduth's
• Brandywine - Cowlick's
• Green Giant
• Cherokee Green
• Cherokee Purple
• Black From Tula
• Sungold
• Virginia Sweets
• Aunt Gerty's Gold
• Prue
• Aunt Ginny's Purple
• Earls Faux
• Opalka
• Bull's Heart