Hardening up undone?

[graham]

Hello. First time poster, first time gardener.

I bought my plants on Sunday and they were all outside at the stores I purchased them at. I have kept them insode as it's been raining and chilly here the past few days. It looks like the nightly low temps will be above 60 degrees in the 10 day forecast come Thursday.

I was going to plant on Thursday, but then I read about this "hardening up" business today, and I am wondering if I need to do some of that before I put them out for good after they've been indoors for a few days.

I have the following plants--

4 tomatoes
4 peppers
2 suash
4 cucmbers
parsely
thyme
basil
tarragon
chives
rosemary
dill

Thanks in advance for any input given.

[garden5]

Don't worry about it. They should be find if they were only in the house for a few days .

Hope you garden turns out well.

[rainbowgardener]

Sorry, but I don't entirely agree with the above If they have been inside for some days, I would be a little careful about just throwing them back out into full sun and wind. You might not need to spend as long hardening them off as if they hadn't been already out. But the first couple days, I'd leave them in some protected part shade or just a couple hours of sun kind of spot.

[hendi_alex]

I agree with rainbowgardener. The plants can start to get tender after a string of several days. A little care may be in order. Definitely won't hurt giving them a day or two for transition.

[jal_ut]

Welcome to the forum. Welcome to a great hobby, gardening. If those are nice robust plants grown in a green house with plenty of light and they have a good dark green color, you are probably ok to just plant them now. If they are at all leggy or kinda yellowish, I would harden them off. Put them on the east side of the house so they only get morning sunlight and are protected from the wind for a couple of days. Water them good as they can dry out really easy in the small pots.

Grandpa used to say put a shingle by them. What he meant is poke a wood cedar shingle in the ground close to them so it gave them shade from the south side. It also cut the breeze a bit. Trouble is, no one has cedar shingles any more. You could use something else to shade them during part of the day.

[graham]

Thanks for the replies.

Forecasted to be in the 60's today with showers likely. No rain tomorrow or Friday, and then precipitation is likely for the following 6 days. Although you can't trust the weather forecast too much, I figure I don't have much else to go on, so I was thinking of sitting them outside tomorrow in the morning and bringing them in in the evening once it gets down into the 50's around 9 or 10 pm (on the east side of the house), and then letting them sit ouside all day Friday and then planting them if they look okay when I get home from work. It's forecasted to be above 60 for 6 nights after I plan to plant, and then 59 for a couple nights.

The people at the garden center near my house said that the last frost date here is May 15th.

So...with this plan should I be okay? Planting my peppers and everything?

[jal_ut]

About last frost dates. Usually what is given is the average last frost. May 15 may be that date, but that means that 50% of the years recorded had frost after that date. What it means to gardeners is that we watch the weather closely and if frost is predicted or expected we must have something in mind to protect our plants. For small plants something like milk jugs with the bottom cut out works or a bucket or large flowerpot etc. Floating row covers work. Your plants will be fine as long as it doesn't go down to 32°.
40°-50° nights are no problem at all.

Planting a garden is a gamble. We have all sorts of problems. Weeds, diseases, critters, insects, and weird weather. We just plant in faith and do what we can to prevent or avoid problems and hope for a good harvest.

I have many times had failures for one reason or the other, but I always get a harvest of something.

Good luck!

[rainbowgardener]

You should be fine and I wouldn't even worry about bringing them in at night. Those temps aren't that cold. What they need to get used to more is the the sun and wind. Find a protected spot for them for a couple days and they will be fine.

[garden5]

It sound like you should be good.

I can understand RBG's point. Really, it all comes down to just how long you have them in the house.

However, doing a light transition will make things go well either way, so really, RBG covered all the bases.