Parsnip Seedlings in Newspaper Pots

Well, this isn't going to make much sense without photos, which I now realise I completely forgot to take ...

I grew two varieties of Parsnip, chitted on damp kitchen paper and then "sown" in newspaper pots 4" - 5" tall. This is my normal method.

This year I decided to plant out early. I normally plant out as soon as the first true leaf appears, but by then about 10% have the tap root already poking out of the bottom of the pot.

So after "sowing" there was only a few days before the seed leaves appeared (on 02-Apr)

and I immediately started hardening off, and after two weeks I took them to the plot to plant them.

I planted the first batch of about 25, then measured up and realised there wasn't room for all of them before I bumped into the Sprouting Brocolli, so I kinda did nothing having a bone idle moment, and went in to put my feet up in front fo the telly ...

... then, down here in the South East, the heavens opened and they haven't closed since. I'm on heavy clay, so working the soil and planting is definitely not a good idea when it is water logged. The gravel tray containing the newspaper pots sat on the path in the veg patch, where I left it, and have been sodden all that time, the first true leaf appeared weeks ago, and they have just sat in an inch of rain water in their tray

I decided, yesterday, that they had to go in, regardless. Surprisingly only a couple had tap roots out of the bottom, so perhaps all is not lost. The cold, being outside, has presumably held them back. I also put in 160, or so, Sweetpeas also in newspaper pots and in similar condition, looking quite yellow from lack of nutrients.

Fingers crossed that they will perk up ... some warm weather would help. Haven't been out in the garden in a T-shirt since the start of March !!

I need to be better-planned about the Sprouts and Sprouting Broccoli in future. I'm going to put the Sprouting Broccoli at one end of the bed, and the Sprouts at the other. The Sprouts can come out in good time to allow that part of the bed to be prepared for the Parsnips following on, whereas this year I had the Spouting Broccoli in the middle of the bed, and there was not enough space at either end for the Parsnips.