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What's the best location to harden off my plants???

LGHT

LGHT

Well my plants have been growing indoor from seed and as they grow (very fast) I typically rotate 6 at a time outside when I pot up. They where growing under a 400w MH where they get light for about 16 hours a day. The fastest growing ones where potted up into 2.5 gallon and 5 gallon pots, but not sure what the best location to harden them off would be. Last year I took them out in the sun and I lost several leaves on each plant. This year I'm hoping to avoid the leaf loss and excess stress if I can.

I have a few options, but what is the best?

Indoors next to a window that gets direct sun from 8:00am to about 10:00am and shade for the rest of the day
Indoors on the 3rd floor that has a white plastic sun roof pretty much all day.
Indoors next to the front patio that gets direct sun from about 5:00pm until sunset

Outdoors in the front patio that gets direct sun from about 11:00am until about 3:00pm
Outdoors on the 2nd floor patio that gets direct sun from about 3:00pm until sunset
Outdoors by the front door that is shaded, but gets direct sun only for an hour from 6:00pm to 7:00pm, but this area stays bright all day.
 
Tough call LGHT. The direct outdoor from 11AM till 3PM will def just wreak havoc on em right out the gate. Doing a morn and evening outdoor(unfortunately that prob means moving them daily) would be a better start, gradually increasing times until you wanna try the mid day sun thing. Even then I'd keep an eye on em if possible. Difficult process unless you work from home, have somebody at home to do it for ya, etc.

I put my plants right outta my grow box indoors into full sun all day. But I had a structure built above the plants, a frame. On the frame, I had a piece of 50% green shade cloth. First day let them sit under it all day. As days progressed, I gave them morning and evening sun and covered them during midday hours. Kept doing this over a week or so, a bit longer until they could hang all day out in the sun. Some plants still took a bit of sun damage, but minimal- worked pretty well for me. I constructed the thing so it'd be easy to pull back and forth, cause my wife was doing the shade cloth furling/unfurling while I was at work. Just had to call her and let her know when to pull it, etc.
 
I have a North-western facing covered front porch. I put mine straight out there as soon as they leave the grow lights. They get full sun from about 4 till sunset and have never had any scalding issues. A week and half to two weeks up there and they are ready for full sun all day.
 
I'd go with your front door location and intro them to the wind and temp swings for several days and then start on adding sun to the mix later.
 
Yeah, I wish I could be home all day to watch them, but the best I can do is go home for lunch and rotate them as needed and then again after work. It's VERY cloudy today and almost no sun so I moved them on the front patio this morning, but may try and move them into direct sun when I get home since it's pretty cloudy anyway and direct sun around 5-Sunset isn't that strong. Saturday it was hot and I put them out in the direct sun around 10:00am and they started wilting after just 15 minutes. Last years plants eventually made it through, but each plant struggled and lost several leaves so I'm gonna go a lot slower this year.
 
LGHT,

I wouldn't worry about losing a few leaves - I usually bury the bottom ones on transplants!

If you put them on the patio where they don't start getting direct sun until 3 pm, you should be fine. My most tender plants go on the back porch where they get direct, strong, overhead light from about 11 am until 3 pm. A few leaves got scorched but the plants have a short memory! They are doing great!

Mike
 
Silver_Surfer said:
I'd go with your front door location and intro them to the wind and temp swings for several days and then start on adding sun to the mix later.
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i have to agree. a location with a bit of morning sun to start has worked best for me this year. I definitely wouldn't start them off in mid-day sun for even an hour if they're not used to it. In less than a week they'll be fine if you can give them a bit more each day. Overcast days are great for the brand new ones.
 
Ballzworth said:
i have to agree. a location with a bit of morning sun to start has worked best for me this year. I definitely wouldn't start them off in mid-day sun for even an hour if they're not used to it. In less than a week they'll be fine if you can give them a bit more each day. Overcast days are great for the brand new ones.
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I would also add a fan blowing softly to tuffen them up!
 
The "flowerhouse" portable greenhouse I'm using makes hardening off so very very easy. New starts stay under shade cloth w/ the vents closed. They slowly move to the side w/o shade and open vents. Then they come outside. It's so much easier than bringing them back in and out.

IMG_8550.jpg
 
LGHT said:
They are actually very short and stalky since I kept a fan on them since they sprouted.
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you got nothing to worry about. Of the options you stated above, the indoors sun just doesn't work the same even though it helps. When I'm home I put them in the sun and pull them back into the shade every so often, but the morning sun i find is the best method for the first few days. I put a few out in direct sun right way and although it won't kill the plant, all the leaves fell off. good luck, although i'm sure you won't need it.
 
"Outdoors by the front door that is shaded, but gets direct sun only for an hour from 6:00pm to 7:00pm, but this area stays bright all day." - gets my vote. After a week of that, they should be ready for anything. If you've kept a fan on them, they're already somewhat wind hardened. That mild late evening sun for only one hour shouldn't bother them a bit.
 
Seems like teh consensus is with outdoor location by your front door. I agree that this a good place to start hardening them off.

When I was hardening off my seedlings morning was a no-go because of work. But fortunately now the days are longer, so I would just take mine outside as soon as I got home from work around 5:30-6:00 PM and leave them until it got dark. That gave them a couple hours of good sunlight, exposure to wind, and exposure to the warmer temperatures. Now that they are stronger I have them all packed in against a fence on the West side of my backyard. This way the majority of light they get is direct morning sun when it is a bit cooler out. Also, I attached 20% shade cloth to the fence and created a makeshift canopy/awning so that once it reaches the hottest part of the day here, starting around 2:00 PM, they get a break from the direct sunlight. By about 5:00 PM the sun is at an angle where the fence blocks it completely and the plants get no direct light for the rest of the evening. I've noticed this year that my plants grow much healthier when they get some shade and/or filtered sunlight later in the day.
 
Ok I have them on the front porch that is covered. It did rain Tue night, but they didn't get wet since the porch has a long entrance. Today is the first day there is sun out so on my lunch break I moved them out under the sun for about 30-40 minutes and moved them back in before returning to work. The didn't wilt like they did this weekend. Hopefully a week or so of 30 minutes of mid day sun and 1 hour of setting sun should allow me to move them to an area that gets 2-3 hours of sun next. Then they will go out on the front patio where they will get a half day's sun.

Thanks for all the tips this year crop is going a LOT smoother than last years.
 
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