• Do you need help identifying a 🌶?
    Is your plant suffering from an unknown issue? 🤧
    Then ask in Identification and Diagnosis.

To Pinch or not to Pinch?

Maligator

Maligator

That is the question. Since this is my first year growing peppers I kind of went on the overly cautious side and planted like 3 or 4 seeds per section in the seedling trays. Well now they have begun to sprout and there are 3-4 sprouts per spot.

Is it possible to tease them apart when it comes time for the 1st transplant or should I just bite the bullet and pinch off the smaller ones in each spot? It would be nice if I could save them all but understand if it isn't really feasable.

Let me know your thoughts please.
 
it's not problem to save them if you want to. I've never had a problem saving two or three seedlings that were germinated in the same pot, but once the roots start expanding too much they'll get tangled up and it gets tricky to separate....but even then I've had success. Give it a go, just not right away after they sprout. Allow for some roots to form.
 
Hey Maligator!

I faced the same issue, well, am still facing it as I still have seeds in the germination bin..lol. Anyway, the one thing you might consider is space and time...you have planned for 1 plant per pod, but have 3 times or even 4 times that in each pod...if you save them all, will you have room to light them, grow them and time to tend to them? Those things were the deciding factor for me. I planted two per pod, and a bunch of pods were successful in germinating both seeds...so, with already over 200 plants planned, I barely have room for those, and I would nearly double my plants if I saved them all, so I decided to pinch the extra plant in each pod....it hurt me deeply to do so though...;(. I also found it difficult to decide which one to pinch, basically I chose to keep the older/stronger one.

Good luck with what you choose to do!
 
chillilover said:
I cut the weakest links....you might be able to seperate but do it early or you'll damage both........
Click to expand...

last year i saved my weaklings that couldn't even stand on they're own until they were like 6 months old, lol....oddly enough they ended up being the most fruit bearing plants....I have no clue, just thought I'd F with your head, *evil laugh* you could be killing your most precious babies....decisions decisions.....
 
Well, for right now they are safe. I have a few that are showing the first true leaves: Peter Peppers and Hungarian Hots. Some of the others haven't even sprouted yet. Not sure if they will. I keep hoping. I've noticed a big difference in the growth rate of the ones planted in mixed potting soil and the ones planted in just seedling mix or peat pucks! Plain seedling mix has the smallest plants by far, the mixed potting soil ones are freaking huge in comparison. Pretty sure I won't be using just seedling "sawdust" starter soil again. I really hope that most of them are able to grow to maturity. Ah, the learning curve!
 
I've found peppers to resemble weeds in that it's very difficult to kill them off without a lot of effort, so enjoy the ride as you'll soon be ankle deep in pods, Mal!
 
hey Mal, not to get off topic from this thread, but, that's what I'm doing, lol. How are your seeds planted in peat pucks doing? last year I used "miracle grow seed starter soil", and mixed it heavily with perlite and vermiculite, and I had about a 90-95% germination success within 4-6 weeks. This year I thought I'd try the "Jiffy Professional Greenhouse" with the little peat pucks inside. It's a 72cell pretty neat little plastic tray with a clear greenhouse lid, as I was skeptic to try the peat pucks, but I put all my seeds in them anyway.....
 
I usually germinate my seeds in a 4" square pot 9 seeds per pot and then separate them when the true leaves start to grow.
I havent had any problems so far.
 
hotenuff4u said:
hey Mal, not to get off topic from this thread, but, that's what I'm doing, lol. How are your seeds planted in peat pucks doing? last year I used "miracle grow seed starter soil", and mixed it heavily with perlite and vermiculite, and I had about a 90-95% germination success within 4-6 weeks. This year I thought I'd try the "Jiffy Professional Greenhouse" with the little peat pucks inside. It's a 72cell pretty neat little plastic tray with a clear greenhouse lid, as I was skeptic to try the peat pucks, but I put all my seeds in them anyway.....
Click to expand...

The seeds I planted in the Jiffy Peat pucks are doing fine. I read another thread on here that described opening up the seed hole a little more but I had already planted them. So far all is well, they are doing better than the seeds in the regular Jiffy seed starter mix (read sawdust looking stuff). As far as overall growth goes, the best growth I have going on right now is from a mixture of the Jiffy seedling starter and Miracle grow orchid mix, these look much healthier and already showing secondary leaves and they were planted a week later. Still trying to figure this whole thing out and reading alot on here.
 
FadeToBlack said:
I usually germinate my seeds in a 4" square pot 9 seeds per pot and then separate them when the true leaves start to grow.
I havent had any problems so far.
Click to expand...

That sounds like a pretty good idea. I started off using the seedling trays. It's my first year and I'm still figuring out what will work best for me. Thanks for the tip though Fade. ;)
 
Welp, the big day arrived and...I decided to tease the little buggers apart! It took much longer than I had anticipated! :shocked: However...the people at work benefitted from all of my efforts. I took the smaller sprouts that I didn't have room for and placed them in small waxed paper cups with some soil and left them on the "break area" table with a note informing everyone that these litlle guys were available for adoption. All 17 of the first batch found new homes. We'll see how the next batch goes ;)
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top