As soon as four or five leaves on a plant about the size of a dollar have appeared, they are large enough to transplant. Take the plants up with care, sprinkling with water and keeping covered. In taking them up, the earth may be allowed to remain on the roots, or shaken off, at the option of the grower. As a general rule, however, the earth should remain rather than be shaken off. Remove to the field and drop one at each hill, and where the plants are small, two. A common custom is to "set" every tenth or twelfth hill with two plants. This is a good plan, as they are frequently needed during hoeing time to "fill in." If holes have not been made, insert the first two fingers, making a hole large enough for the roots to remain in an easy and natural position. Press the earth gently around the plant if the soil is moist, but if dry, more firmly. See that the plant stands in an upright position. If dry after "setting" the plants, water them, and if a protracted drought follows, cover them up with grass or hay dipped in water; remove, however, in a day or two.[75] Plaster may also be used to advantage, as it keeps the hill moist, besides fertilizing the plant; put a little just around the plants. In taking up from the bed select large ones, leaving the smaller ones to grow. Transplanting should commence as early as possible that this result may follow.
Transplanting.
Plants with large broad leaves are considered the best, those that grow tall and "spindling" or "long shank" plants, as they are called at the South, are rejected and should not be set out when others that are more "stocky" can be obtained. Avoid, however, setting too large plants, as they are not as apt to live as smaller ones. Transplanting should be done as fast as possible, that the tobacco field may present an even appearance and be ready to harvest at one time. If the plants are to grow and ripen evenly, the transplanting should be finished in a week or two from the time of the first setting. This can generally be done unless plants are very scarce, when circumstances, beyond the growers' control, often make the field give apparent evidence of want of care, although the real trouble is a want of plants.
"It may be necessary to water the plants once or twice after transplanting; this in a measure will depend upon the season."
Tatham in his Essay on the Culture and Commerce of Tobacco, (London 1800,) gives an account of the manner of transplanting in Virginia at that period. Under the head of
"THE SEASON FOR PLANTING,"
he says:
"The term, 'season for planting,' signifies a shower of rain, of sufficient quantity to wet the earth to a degree of moisture which may render it safe to draw the young plants from the plant bed, and transplant them into the hills which are prepared for them in the field, as described under the last head; and these seasons generally commence in April, and terminate with what is termed the long season in May; which (to make use of an Irishism), very frequently happens in June; and is the opportunity which the planter finds himself necessitated to seize with eagerness for the pitching of his crop: a term which comprehends the ultimate opportunity which the spring will afford him, for planting a quantity equal to the capacity of the collective power of his laborers when applied in cultivation. By the time which these seasons approach, nature has so ordered vegetation, that the weather has generally enabled the plants, (if duly sheltered from the spring frosts, a circumstance to which a planter should always be attentive in selecting his plant patch,) to shoot forward in sufficient strength to bear the vicissitude of transplantation.