Transplanting Questions

I just tried my first transplant on a plant with a lot of problems and it was a total disaster. I even dropped the plant on the ground trying to get it out of the cup, so it will probably die.

Do you water before transplanting or do you let it get as dry as possible before transplanting or what?

Should I use nutrients on the soil in the larger pot or should I just use plain water for the soil in the larger pot that I'm transplanting into? The plants in question are like 16 days old and are getting transplanted from solo cups into 1 gallon pots.

Thanks. Also any other tips or anything would greatly be appreciated. Or any help with how to get the plant out of the solo cup without hurting the roots...

Thanks again.

Here is how I transplant from Dixie Cups:

1.) Wait til cups are drying up and soil shrinks in away from edges of the cups. Basically wait until they are ready to be watered again before you transplant.

2.) I place my hand over the top of the cup with my pointer and middle finger gently holding the stalk between my knuckles.

3.) Tilt the cup upside down.

4.) Gently squeeze the sides of the cup all around the roots to loosen the cup away from your soil.

5.) Gently pull on the cup, separating it from the root ball. If it doesn't feel like it is coming, don't force it. Just squeeze the sides more and try again after the sides separate more.

6.) GENTLY rough the rootball. I try to break it up a bit by softly squeezing the rootball and removing some of the lower soil in order to expose the lower root mass before putting it into my new container. This helps the roots spread out faster. Just becareful not to break roots unneccessarily, they are quite fragile.

7.) Place the plant into new container. Prep the container first by putting the amount of soil in the bottom that you need. Then when you put your ladies into their new containers, you only have to fill in around your plant and don't have to hold the plant in one hand while trying to fill a bucket with the other. I like to put the plants from one container to the other as fast as I can to minimize root exposure and stress.

8.) After my plants are planted securely in their new containers, I water them with some Rhizotonic for root growth, but nothing else. Some people use a low dose of nutes on their plants also. I have had problems with stress and shock in some plants after a transplant, so I lean away from nutes for a 1-2 waterings or until the plant tells me that I need it.

I have been going from dixie cups to 1 gallon pots, then to 5-10 gallon pots. If you have the lights and space, I would recommend going from dixie cup to final container. That way you dont' suffer stress from transplants, and your roots won't be impeded by any walls until later in growth and will grow normally and you will never wonder about being rootbound.

I know I tend to be long winded... or long fingered... whatever you want to call it, but I hope this helps and if you have anymore questions, feel free to ask.

Cut the plastic cup down the side. Or just turn it upside down and gently shake and pull on your stem...GENTLY. But if its like stuck i'd just cut the cup. Water just plain water in the new pot for a few weeks, the new soil has nutes in it enough for about 2 or 3 weeks atleast. Practice makes perfect, and plants thankfully are forgiving to a certain point, so you might find that one that was dropped could survive. Try slipping a butter knife or something down the sides of the cups before extracting.

JOTIM made a great point also. If you are using a pre fertilized mix, just add water. A fresh pot of fertilized soil will have enough nutrients for 2-4 weeks of vegetative growth. Or if you are like me and probably got a hot batch of super fertilized soil, it last for 2-9 weeks, lol.

Link: https://www.rollitup.org/general-marijuana-growing/345245-transplant-without-any-stress-soil.html

Great link Phyzix. Its much easier to understand something when you have a visual.

Thanks. And I'm not using a soil with nutrients. Should I? I figured I would rather control nutrients myself while I'm a noob I figured that would be easier.

When will I know if the plant I dropped is going to die? It looks exactly the same now but its only 14 hours later

So if I'm using soil without nutrients should I water the soil in the larger pot with some kind of weak nutrient solution or just plain water?

Thanks to everyone who has helped so far. I'll wait til its dry next time. I did the same thing you did in the picture, phyzix. So I guess it would have gone well had I not dropped the plant.

Weed is... well a weed. It will grow anywhere and is very hardy. I've dropped plants and they've been fine. It isn't recommended, but it will probably survive unless it was dropped into a vat of acid or something.

If you are using a medium that is fertilized, I would start with pH water and slowly introduce nutrients. The first couple waterings after a transplant though, i don't recommend dosing with nutrients. Just water and let the plant recover from the shock of the transplant without having trying to process a dose of nutrients. Let it take its nutrients from the soil. That is after all why you are using it.

But its a soilless mix, it has no nutrients.

It was transplanted into Fox Farms Light Warrior, which has no nutrients. Do you recommend I use a soil with nutrients? I just figured that while I'm still new at this it would be easier to control feeding them myself as opposed to not knowing how much to feed and how much they are getting from the soil.

So even if it has no nutrients, should the first watering still be just pH water?

And the plant was only dropped 6" or so. When will I know if its dying or if its okay?

I say give the plant a few days to recover with just water. It's true that different foods and additives can promote root growth, but if you don't know what you're doing it's easy to mess up.

The plant will probably pull through fine. Give it a light feeding after it dries from the straight water, then slowly pick up nute levels.

I bet it pulls through. Good luck.

The plant has had zero new growth since the transplant but the leaves are already much less droopy than they were prior to the transplant, so I think that's a good sign?

It's working on root development.

Alex17 said:

But its a soilless mix, it has no nutrients.

It was transplanted into Fox Farms Light Warrior, which has no nutrients. Do you recommend I use a soil with nutrients? I just figured that while I'm still new at this it would be easier to control feeding them myself as opposed to not knowing how much to feed and how much they are getting from the soil.

So even if it has no nutrients, should the first watering still be just pH water?

And the plant was only dropped 6" or so. When will I know if its dying or if its okay?

Click to expand...

A first watering with just pH'd water is fine. I use a soilless mix also. If you want to use a soil with nutrients, that is your choice. I do on some of my plants. I would not recommend using 100% soil mix. I have had problems with it burning my plants. The consistency of the nutrients in the soil is not great either. All the soil I've used runs hot and I really should not have added any nutrients to it, but I did and I have had many problems with nutrient burn. I prefer to be able to add more nutrients, and know what I am putting into the soil rather than wonder what is in the soil and how my nutrients and plants are going to react to feeding. But I use a 1:1 ratio of Happy Frog Organic soil and Pro-Mix and it is working great. My plants happily take nutrients and are growing vigorously.

And yes the plants are just working on establishing their roots in the first few days and will grow once they recover and establish themselves. That is why pH'd water is recommended, they are stressed from the transplant anyways and have nutrients in their system, let them use what they have without dosing them too heavy.