Backyard 2017

April 16:  In addition to lettuce, cakes and sunflowers, I put 8 tomato plants in the backyard.   : 2 each of HC, BC, FL, one Sun Gold, and one Uluru Ochre.   I already need to replace the UO as the first one got trampled by dogs before I could put the fence up.  :/    I also treated the soil with daconil around one each of the HC, BC and FL.  The goal is to see if this helps resist blight compared to the untreated.... if blight is an issue this year.    The backyard soil has been fertilized with about a pound or 2 of 10-10-10 fertilizer, and about a cup or two of bone meal, and hand-tilled.  Also there's some charcoal & ash from a couple of small bonfires we had in that spot recently.

Pot transplanting done

Finally.  All seedlings are transferred to 4 inch pots.  Almost all are in the square ones. I have 8 trays of 15 square pots. Plus about 16 round pots.  = ~ 136 pots.  Didn't quite all fit on the three shelves. It's actually more plants than 136 because many of the F3s are 2, 3 or even 4 sprouts in one pot.  These I will not separate to maintain highest individual count possible, which is more important at this stage than the total yield.   So far, the first transplanted heirlooms are great and no signs of damping off.

Capacity

Last year I had about 100 plants.  This year it's going to be about 130, but I'll give away 20-30 of them (including some F3s).   This number reflects the sum of the "wells" sown initially, although some of those had 2 sprouts (or even 3 or 4.)  I am splitting a few of those carefully into separate pots; some will stay together.

I have 3 shelves of lights.  Each can hold two 5x3 tubs of 4 inch square pots, plus, one 10x20 tray that can hold another 10 or so pots. = ~40 pots per shelf x 3 =120.
These will be staggered a little.  HC, SG and UO are smallish plants and can go longer before transplanting, so I could sow a 2nd round of heirlooms in that tray.  Like I need more plants!

Some of the F3s have 2 or more sprouts per well.  These I will keep together because here I want the maximum possible number of F3 individuals to be cultivated.