When the local salad greens disappear for the winter, I resort to salad-in-a-clamshell. The plastic clamshell containers do a great job of transporting fresh greens, but . . . then what? I started saving them in the hope I’d think of some use for them before I tossed them into the recycle bin. And, like so many other odds and ends that have finished one job but seem too useful to toss, these clear boxes found a new use. This time there was more than the usual amount of serendipity involved.

I happened to store my clam stash near the last of my old, plastic seedling trays and the one good dome lid that had survived along with them. In a side-by-side comparison, the similarities between the clam shells and the tray with its dome were clear in more ways than one: the clam shells were obviously meant for a second career as lidded seed trays. It seemed too much to hope that the seed starting cells would be a good fit, but see for yourself –

While I’m waiting for the seeds to germinate, I’m using the deep end of the clamshell as the base but when the seedlings get started, I’ll turn the clamshell upside down so I have a domed lid.

I know I’m pushing the season a little, and I could wind up with leggy tomatoes. That will be okay: I go by the theory that a leggy tomato plant can be “trenched in” by planting the stem at an angle. Prepare a planting hole of the usual depth for the size of the seedling, then make a shallow trench running from the planting hole. Strip the leaves off the part of the long stem that will be buried, place the seedling in the hole and lay that stripped stem down in the trench. Cover with dirt and guide the unburied end to keep its head off the ground. I usually just mound up some dirt to give the top of the stem the general idea, and in a few days the sideways plant starts to head in the right direction. Water as usual. My mom taught me to fill the planting hole with water before placing the transplant in, and that’s the method I still use. The tomato plants I’ve grown using this method set roots all along the buried stem and grow vigorously.

Thanks for this tip to bury part of the tomato seedling stem go posthumously to Anstace and Larry Esmonde-White, authors of Vegetables from a A Country Garden and co-hosts of the long-running and wonderful show From A Country Garden that was sponsored by WPBS out of Watertown, N.Y. The authors transplanted their knowledge of Irish gardens to Canada and a great guide for northern gardens is the happy result.

I loved their show and purchased my copy of the book in 1993 – in their section on tomatoes they recommend setting transplants at a 45 degree angle with 1/2 – 2/3 of the stem underground. If your plants are leggy, as mine will probably be, you can plant 3/4 of the stem underground.

Next project – figure out where I’m going to find enough sun for tomatoes in my wonderfully shady yard!