First garden 3rd day, pictures of droopiness -is this normal

[austingardner]

Greetings everyone,
With the help of multiple knowledgable gardners at this site, I was able to turn a 10 by 15 ft backyard area into a hopefully soon to be thriving vegtable garden - my first.
Before planting, I posted labled pictures for placement suggestions and also posted pictures to gauge if the ground was sufficiently tilled. I'm an absolute beginner so I'm trying to avoid any mistakes.
The vegtables and herbs have been planted since Tuesday and the included pictures were taken Friday afternoon - that's 3 days. I've watered them twice and it's rained once.
It doesn't look like some of them are doing so well and I'm wondering if they are just undergoing shock because of the transplant or if they're not getting enough water or if they haven't been planted deep enough... Some of the plants seem to be doing ok - which I only say because they look vibrant but others look kind of droopy (see below).

As usual, thanks for all of your wonderful suggestions and observations!

[img]https://i1178.photobucket.com/albums/x372/learnorshare/Garden%20April%201s-%203rd%20day%20planted/3e7a96bf.jpg[/img]
[img]https://i1178.photobucket.com/albums/x372/learnorshare/Garden%20April%201s-%203rd%20day%20planted/fa91e751.jpg[/img]
[img]https://i1178.photobucket.com/albums/x372/learnorshare/Garden%20April%201s-%203rd%20day%20planted/d8c39adb.jpg[/img]
[img]https://i1178.photobucket.com/albums/x372/learnorshare/Garden%20April%201s-%203rd%20day%20planted/fc385c2c.jpg[/img]
[img]https://i1178.photobucket.com/albums/x372/learnorshare/Garden%20April%201s-%203rd%20day%20planted/aa7a4046.jpg[/img]

[austingardner]

Thanks Marlingardner,
The plants were purchased at a nearby nursery and then sat in the backyard in a partly shady non-wind protected area for 3 days while I prepared, tilled then mixed the soil with compost.
I was begining to wonder if the droopiness was because they didn't get enough sun durring their first three days in the back yard, so I'm surprised to read that they may need even less sun. Is there any chance that giving them less sun could cause them to look even more droopy?
By the way, I'm assuming the shade is only for the non-vibrant looking plants or do you recomend them for all?
I'm kind of concerned about the herbs but they don't seem to be suffering as much although the one in the front seems like it could possibly begin to droop.
[img]https://i1178.photobucket.com/albums/x372/learnorshare/1a57fd22.jpg[/img]
Look how nice they all looked before they went in.
[img]https://i1178.photobucket.com/albums/x372/learnorshare/46b3c571.jpg[/img] [img]https://i1178.photobucket.com/albums/x372/learnorshare/f084c79f.jpg[/img]

By the way, any special tips on constructing these newspaper tents? I did a small amount of preliminary searching on google and youtube but nothing came up.

All the best,

Alan

[jal_ut]

It could just be transplant shock.

Tell me what your soil is? Sometimes things like this can be soil related.

[garden5]

I agree with Jal, give them about a week after transplanting and see if they start to perk up. I hardened off some of my plants for a week last year before I planted them and they still displayed some droopiness for about a week or so after planting.

[Gary350]

Jal is right it is probably transplant shock. Plant all your plants about 2 hours before sun down then give them a good drink of water. Never do trans plants in the hottest part of the day. Seeds are different you can plant seeds any time you like but I generally plant everything in the evening too a couple hours before sun down. Rule of thumb is do not plant seeds until your soil has warmered up to 65 degrees.

[austingardner]

Many thanks Jal, Garden5, and Gary,

I love that I'm having to think about just what my soil "is", I would be fascinated just to guess. I think pecans and pecan tree leaves are major contributers, there's one almost directly above the area I dug up for the garden. The birds that spend a lot of time in the tree have certainly helped out too. The soil was surprisingly soft below. Once the clumps were crushed they crumbled easily. Houses in this area including this one shift because of the soft dirt. I had no good reason to be expecting the soil to be dry and difficult other than the guess that if compost was such a widely bought product, you wouldn't find something comparable just by digging in the backyard. To be accurate, the dug up soil was dryer and not as rich as compost but I did mix in 3 bags of store-bought compost in the 10 by 15 ft area - the north half, probably wastefully, only has two watermelons and a cantaloupe and all the rest of the vegetables and herbs reside in the south half.
Are there any other considerations I should have in determining my kind of soil? It's in central Texas, if that helps.
I've enjoyed the possibilities of the garden project so much that I've bought additional herbs at the nursery today and two bags of compost which I plan to more intelligently distribute this time. Should I try to surround the areas which a plants future roots will go through with a higher mixture of compost? This time I want to do it right and gradually introduces this batch to it's new home. I'm wondering how this step helps because they've been in pots at the local nursery which has similar conditions (at least weather-wise). Are there some other unique factors that the soon-to-be planted plants have to get acclimated to? ... like pollens, or bugs? I'm definitely not doubting the hardening step and will certainly incorporate but would love to understand it a little better. I get the wind and sun protection part, but why not in the garden?
Here's a picture of the compost I've been buying.
[img]https://i1178.photobucket.com/albums/x372/learnorshare/house%20before%20and%20afters/9fb91553.jpg[/img]
And here's a picture of the new recruits.
[img]https://i1178.photobucket.com/albums/x372/learnorshare/house%20before%20and%20afters/c07461a2.jpg[/img]

[jal_ut]

From what you say about your soil, I don't think it is soil related. Just give it some time. Keep the area damp. It takes a while for plants to get roots down deeper to have more area to absorb water.

A little compost is good, it can be overdone though.