Hello Mama's!
This year I took it upon myself to actually buy vegetable seed's and grow them on my own rather then go out and buy them already grown. I planted zuccini seed's and they grew perfectly! Only problem is that they are now looking "wilted", I don't know if it's because I used the pellet's to start them (the green house kit) and when it grew I planted them in those special paper containers (the one's you can plant into the ground) and used the Miracle Grow seed starting potting mix. Is it a "shock" afftect of transplanting them or what? I would greatly appreciate any advice given! Thank's in advance!
When you germinate/grow plants inside, you need to harden them off before they go outside permanently. That means taking the tray of seedlings and putting them out on the porch for a few hours, bringing them in and repeating every day gradually extended their time outside till they stay out for good.
Shock is hard to overcome when you plant indoors first. Indoors we provide them with a stable temperature that changes little more than a couple degrees. They get indirect light much of the day and usually not a lot of direct light and or even grow lights. Putting them outside where the light is strong and natural and the temperatures can fluctuate as much 30-40 degrees in a day or two is h*** o* plants. I've tried many, many times! The key is to bring them in and out of the house, starting with about 30 minutes and slowly working up to several hours over about 2 weeks. Who in the world has that kind of time to invest in "hardening them off"?!
It's not too late to plant these seeds directly into the ground. When the plants germinate and grow in the outside temps, the fluctuations don't hurt them as much.
Given the climate we live in, we have to wait a little longer to plant anything outside. Here in northern IL, we should wait until after the last freeze &/or frost, which is often late April or even early May! Vegetable plants don't handle freezing temperatures well and we've had some pretty chilly nights this week. I have a large garden and am not-so-patiently waiting to get out there! One year, I planted a little early, but we had a late hard frost and I lost all of my tomato plants. Weird thing is that the soil temperature didn't drop as far overnight, so most of them re-sprouted since the below-ground parts didn't freeze!
With your cucumbers and other veggies, though, keep an eye on them and if they don't seem to recover and thrive (given the amount of rain we're having, it's not likely to be a need for water), just wait a week or 2 until it warms up more consistently outside and you can replant new seeds directly in your garden and they'll grow just fine. Just watch out for bunnies! :)
Sounds like you put them outside too quickly! You're north of us and our rule of thumb to plant outside is after Derby Day (first Saturday in May).
cut off all brown leaves and get you a gardening book to show diffrent diseases and remedies. sounds like you are over watering.
