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Old 10-10-2018, 04:44 PM
Stan Stan is offline
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Join Date: Apr 2011
Posts: 213
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gdgdad, hope you are a safe way from Hurricane Michael.

Very nice cloner set up. Since you want to transplant the seedlings outdoors the cloner should also be outdoors. The seedlings should not be in direct sunlight but in an area with enough light during the day like under an awning or a carport.

Since these seedlings were grown indoors when you move the cloner outside don't be surprised if only 1 plant survives if any. If you are lucky they might all survive since they're still very young. In case they do die the seeds should be started outdoors in the cloner so they will not suffer from shock from being grown indoors and transplanted outdoors. Right now from the pics I see give them just a tiny amount of nutrients until you start to get a second set of leaves. At that point start them on a little less than 1/4 nutrients.

When the roots come thru the rockwool go to 1/4 nutrients the plants will start shooting upward quickly. When the roots are 4 - 6 inches long transplant to dutch buckets. Stay at 1/4 nutrients in dutch bucket it will take about 1 week for the plants to get used to it's new place. Keep an eye on the growth it will not grow that first week but will the second. When you see new growth go to 1/2 nutrients. When plants are over a foot tall you should start to see flowering when you do go to 3/4 nutrient strength. When you get 3 levels of flowering go to full nutrient strength the plants will skyrocket and will be flowering all over.

When plants are around 6 - 8ft tall (I've grown black cherry tomato plants 14ft) or when you feel they have reached their limit cut the nutrients off and just use plain water. Let some of the suckers(new growth) grow about 5 inches clip them off put them in rockwool cubes and into the cloner you built to start the next set of tomato plants that will replace those in the dutch buckets.

One last thing make sure the water ph level is between 5.5 - 6.5 not higher or lower than those numbers including when you add nutrients. When plants are growing some fruit add a little epsom salt once a month to the reservoir.
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