When to Fertilize Seedlings of Seed Starting Collard Greens

Before Planting

• Collards need fertile soil to grow quickly and produce tender, tasty leaves. The University of Florida Extension recommends working liberal amounts of compost or composted animal manure into each row two or three weeks before planting. Other nitrogen-rich amendments that will benefit this vegetable include blood meal and cottonseed meal. Working amendments into the soil well ahead of planting time allows the nutrients to naturally break down into plant-usable compounds and prevents root burn on tender, young roots.

Planting

• Plant collard seeds outdoors about ½ to ¾ inch deep in rows spaced 24 to 36 inches apart. The seeds can be planted 2 to 4 inches apart, but be ready to thin the young seedling until they are about 6 to 18 inches apart depending on the variety. Plant seeds indoors about 4 to 8 weeks before transplanting outdoors. Small peat pots filled with a soil-less seed starting mix is an ideal environment for starting seeds and makes transplanting easier. The freshly planted seeds need only moisture, light and five to 10 days to germinate.

Seedlings

• When the seed germinates and both roots and stems begin to emerge, the seed coat that had been protecting the seed in storage breaks down and becomes the plant’s first food. However, the young seedling will soon need a more substantial source of nutrients. Seedlings started in very fertile soil outdoors will not need fertilization for several weeks. Seeds planted in a seed-starting soil-less medium have very few nutrients available to feed the young seedlings, but tender seedlings are sensitive to fertilizers, including natural and organic fertilizers. The University of Missouri Extension recommends applying fertilizer at about half the recommended strength a few days after seedlings have germinated.

Follow-Up Fertilization

• Even the most fertile soil will be depleted of important plant nutrients as the nitrogen-hungry collard plants rapidly grow. The North Carolina State University Extension recommends a side-dressing of 10-10-10 fertilizer at three to five weeks after the seedlings emerge or when transplanting your indoor-started seedlings outdoors and an additional application about two to three weeks later.