Let me Grow Wild or I'll Blister in the Sun...

Sooooo maybe this post has nothing to do with the title... MAYBEEEE I just really love the Violent Femmes.... Maybe this song was playing in my head while I was watering them this morning and I thought it might be a catchy title for this blog post...

Or maybe not.

There's a reason I was singing it in my head while I was watering them, and it goes right along with this lesson.

It is very important if you buy your plants in 'baby' form to let them adjust to outdoor sunlight. They have probably been sitting in a greenhouse since they were just seeds. Prolonged direct outdoor sunlight can burn your baby plants.

Last year, I didn't give my baby plants a chance to adjust. I brought them home from the nursery and directly inserted them into my garden. This shocked them. I didn't see growth for weeks. I even considered digging them up and starting over again. They eventually did 'ok'. But they never grew to their potential nor produced the fruit they were capable of growing. I blamed it on my watering system at first - but after further research and questioning of my local growing friends - I found that I had shocked my poor babies to near death, and they never properly recovered.

The following pictures will show you the amount of growth I've seen over just a few days of gradual exposure to outdoor direct sunlight:

First day home:


Three days later:


As you can see, especially with the small cucumber plants, there is substantial growth for such a short period of time.

Each morning when I get up, I let Roxy and Abbey out and bring my plants out as well. I water them first thing in the morning. In the evening, when I'm closing down the house, I bring them in the house to 'rest'.

Watch for my early planting day soon. In the meantime, enjoy some Violent Femmes: