Did you by chance grow tomatoes in these pots last year....or close to these pots? Those look like wilding tomato seedlings to me.

Definitely a tomato seedling.

Tomato plants are growing next to it but I never knew tomatoes would spread like that? I thought that’s what they were but am shocked to know.

Or else you put compost in those pots that had tomatoes in it.

No it was 5-1-1 mix that I just made

I don't suppose your pots are big enough that birds or other tomato-loving animals would be relieving themselves in them?

Definitely tomato seedlings; if there are many of them (as the OP implies) then seeds must be present in the mix. Tomatoes, if allowed to fall on the ground, can become weeds the following year - sometimes in great numbers.

Kinda hard to understand what tomato seeds would be doing in pine bark fines, sphagnum peat moss, or perlite, which are the ingredients for your mix. I suggest someone added them to your mix after the fact. Maybe you, accidentally, by adding something else like compost, and maybe an animal, after running a tomato through their digestive system.

Idk, the pots are on the porch with other pots and these pots are the only ones it’s happening to, the pots happen to be my moms and first time I’m using them, but she never garden so idk why she even had them in her shed. Now another thought that could play a part is her brother is a tomato farmer. He grows local tomatoes and sells them. She could have asked him for the pots for some reason or another but I know it wasn’t for her to grow any in because she always got tons from him. Anyways could these pots be old pots of his that had something in them? The mix is new and the mix has been used in other pots with out this issue. I have pulled at least 10 or more of these things out of these pots and they just keep coming back like weeds!

The only thing the might have been in the pots was seeds, and that should have been pretty obvious. If the seeds were stuck to the bottoms of the pots, they wouldn't have sprouted. I think the seeds were in your mix. Maybe birds like the peppers, and pooped some seeds in the mix while they were sitting on the rim of the pot admiring the plant? Kind of mysterious.

Agree that somehow the tomato seeds were in your mix ingredients. It isn't all that unusual.

But in the long run it makes no difference where they came from or how they got there. It happens and it could be far worse things than tomatoes sprouting. You now know what the plants are and it is a simple matter of pulling them as they sprout.

Dave

Thanks and no thanks Dave, what makes no difference to you might not be the same as everyone else. Thanks to everyone for their help

Free plants! If you have room, just move them somewhere else if more pop up. I compost and always have tomatoes popping up in random places where I have used it. I've also had tomatoes grow where birds must have dropped little cherry tomatoes.

Well, of course you have no idea what these "free plants" are. If they came from hybrids, they could end up being pretty abysmal fruits. Free seeds and plants are often worth what you paid for them.

I wanted to share the lates sprouts with y’all lol

"Thanks and no thanks Dave, what makes no difference to you might not be
the same as everyone else. Thanks to everyone for their help."

No offense was intended. You wanted to know what they were and they are tomato plants. My point was seeds can get there in all sorts of ways and frequently do. So it isn't unusual to find this situation. But you usually can't know 'HOW' they got there with any degree of certainty.

Dave

We've ground squirrels, Otospermophilus beecheyi, which will climb plants and harvest fruit and drop uneaten parts when startled.

We've a jay bird, Aphelocoma californica, that will grab an bury almost anything that it sees falling to the ground.

Were it here we would suspect one of these had moved some tomatoes with seed.

Ok I just pulled these sprouts up in this one pot and look what I found!!! The bagged compost I bought must have had cherry tomatoes in it lol

I have to say, if you're finding remnants of tomato skins in your compost, that stuff is poorly composted. If you don't make it yourself, I'd bag your own at some responsible nursery, or have a couple yards trucked in. The highest quality compost will have been hot-composted, and won't even have any viable seeds.

Nor should it have any remnants of the ingredients that are immediately recognizable other than maybe some wood or bark pieces. Certainly not anything as quick to decompose as tomato skins!!!