The Demo Garden Blog

If you have ever planted vegetable seeds, you know how very tiny many of them are. It can be a huge challenge to get them spaced appropriately when seeding. (For larger gardens, I would encourage you to purchase some type of push seeder. It makes for less bending over when planting, and it conserves seed.) Therefore, it is important to thin the seedlings to the appropriate spacing shortly after they have germinated.

Thinning is both a psychological challenge and a timing issue. Timing is probably the easier to address. The seedlings should be big enough that you can easily grasp individual plants. However, they shouldn’t be so large that the roots have started entangling, making it hard to only pull out some of the seedlings. Usually when the plants have 4-5 leaves is a good stage to do your thinning.

The psychological challenge of thinning can be more difficult to overcome. It is hard to force yourself to go out and “murder” large numbers of baby plants! However, to have a good quality mature plant in a few weeks it is absolutely vital to thin.

I know the plants look sad, lonely, and dejected right after thinning, but it is really more like losing a baby tooth. In a week or two, you won’t even notice that these plants were thinned because the remaining plants will grow so much faster without the competition.

The other thing to consider in overcoming your psychological barrier to thinning plants is this – almost all baby vegetable seedlings are tasty as an early spring salad! (Well…baby salad greens anyway.)