Transplanting Tomatoes and Spinach

One of the to things on my "to-do" list today was transplanting my "Ukrainian Purple" tomato plants. Almost every cell in which I dropped two seeds now has two baby tomato plants. And a couple of the cells have three. Apparently my seed planting has some quality control issues! All of the books I have read this Spring say you are suppose to take a small pair of scissors and cut off at ground level the smallest  plant in each cell. This doesn't cause any root disturbance. But I didn't have the heart to kill any of my new babies, so I gently divided each cell into single plants and transplanted them all into new, larger digs.

I now have 20 individual plants growing in 2" X 2" cells. This is way more tomato plants of this one variety than I need, but I figure it allows me some security if a few plants don't make it along the way. Plus it would be nice to have some plants to give away to friends.

Now that they are all settled into their new, roomier homes, they suddenly look so little and fragile once again. I am hoping that they will get over the transplant shock quickly and begin the process of growing their first set of true leaves.

After I finished up with the tomatoes, I headed over to the Kitchen Garden. My bed of spinach has been quietly and happily growing underneath its protective cover of remay. For the past few weeks, I have need to do a little thinning, especially in the four rows of "Gazelle" spinach. It came up faster and thicker than the "Abundant Bloomsdale" spinach did. 

I decided to try to transplant some of the "Gazelle" plants into some empty spaces in the four "Abundant Bloomsdale" rows. Of coarse I am attempting this on the first sunny day in a month, or so it seems. After I gently moved the plants and watered them in, they quickly began to wilt a bit. I am hoping, after the rains return tomorrow, the newly moved plants will bounce back and settle into their new space.

A row of "Abundant Bloomsdale" spinach.