A fellow vendor at the farmer's market grew this cilantro from seed and gave it to me a bit ago, and when she gave it to me, it was all seedling leaves.
Since, the plant has done tremendously well in my patio containers (I think, I'm still new to all this, but I think it looks good!), but there are still a lot of the seedling leaves in with the adult leaves. Do I need to trim these out to help the plant grow more?
I'm sorry if this is a dumb question, this is my first ever garden, so I'm still in the painful learning stages!
Thank you so much in advance!
-
rainbowgardener
- Super Green Thumb
- Posts: 25279
- Joined: Sun Feb 15, 2009 6:04 pm
- Location: TN/GA 7b
No you don't need to worry about the seed leaves. They will eventually fall off by themselves and it isn't important either way.
But that's not the kind of thinning I was expecting you to be asking about.
That's a TON of little plants all crowded together and they are getting kind of spindly and limp.
Cilantro if give a bit of room, gets to be a decent sized plant. Here's a young one:
At maturity it will be about two feet (50 cm) tall.
But they hate being transplanted. So I would just take a little nail scissors and cut at least half of those stems off right at ground level. That is what thinning usually means - reducing the number of plants, increasing the space between them. I know it is hard to do, kill off some of the baby plants you've been watching grow, but the ones left will do so much better!
Often spindliness in seedlings is related to not enough light. The little plants stretch themselves out trying to reach the light and get tall and thin and weak stemmed. Are yours in a place where they get plenty of light?
But that's not the kind of thinning I was expecting you to be asking about.
That's a TON of little plants all crowded together and they are getting kind of spindly and limp.
Cilantro if give a bit of room, gets to be a decent sized plant. Here's a young one:
At maturity it will be about two feet (50 cm) tall.
But they hate being transplanted. So I would just take a little nail scissors and cut at least half of those stems off right at ground level. That is what thinning usually means - reducing the number of plants, increasing the space between them. I know it is hard to do, kill off some of the baby plants you've been watching grow, but the ones left will do so much better!
Often spindliness in seedlings is related to not enough light. The little plants stretch themselves out trying to reach the light and get tall and thin and weak stemmed. Are yours in a place where they get plenty of light?
Oh gosh. I thought I had thinned them down enough earlier, but you're saying there's still too many??? 
I guess I need to go break out my clippers again...
I thought they were getting enough sun, but I can also move them around on my patio to see if there's a spot they like better, or just go ahead and stick them out on my lawn.
Thank you so much Rainbow!
I guess I need to go break out my clippers again... I thought they were getting enough sun, but I can also move them around on my patio to see if there's a spot they like better, or just go ahead and stick them out on my lawn.
Thank you so much Rainbow!
-
rainbowgardener
- Super Green Thumb
- Posts: 25279
- Joined: Sun Feb 15, 2009 6:04 pm
- Location: TN/GA 7b