Some vegetables are very sensitive to root disturbance. An example of this are pepper plants and specifically bell peppers. Normally, to cover less than 100% germination, a gardener will plant 2 or more seeds (depending on expected germination rates) for every seedling desired. When the seedlings are at their first true leaf you would cut off (kill) the less desired seedlings in a bunch to prevent disturbing the roots of the chosen seedling.
I found that vermiculite does not hold to the fine roots of seedlings. What I have been able to do then is to gently pull seedlings apart from the vermiculite and place them in another spot (making a hole for them with my finger). The ones remaining do not get disturbed, and the transplanted one continues to grow also. I did this first with tomatoe seedlings that had reached their first true leaf. Tomatoes are hardy plants anyway. But after that, I successfully did it with bell pepper seedlings.
This is a picture of seedlings in a bed of vermiculite. The red circled ones have been transplanted and doing fine after 3 days. Note the coir pots for some of the seedlings. These are meant to be transplanted into other beds. Since it is all soil-less I can even put them into the hydroton beds.
This is growth after 11 days total. Note the transplants are doing fine. If you lift transplants when they are bigger, you need to be do it more slowly and gently as they have more rootlets developed. I separated the two larger peppers on the left side just after taking this picture, and the one pulled successfully with vermiculite attached to its rootball.
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