6,340 Garden Web Discussions | Growing from Seed
It's too hot in the summer for the Himalayan Blue Poppies to do well here so I finally gave up. Our summers can be in the upper 90's with 90% humidity for weeks at a time. As for the others I'd just direct sow and see how they do. They don't like to be transplanted and don't need any pre-treatment to sprout. You don't have anything to lose by trying.
libael, you did kind of get left behind in this thread. While you may have a chance with some of the annual type poppies, you also might want to consider the climate of origin of some of your seeds - mountains of Turkey for the oriental poppies, normally thought to do best in US zones 3-8 where they go late summer dormant, then return with the arrival of cooler temps and Fall rains.
I'm not sure why we yearn to grow things that don't do well in our own zones, but somehow those out-of-reach plants can be what we covet the most...then can take the failures as a reflection of our gardening talents :) I'd love to be able to grow bouganvalia, citrus outdoors, or the orchids you mention but I'm old enough to know now I'd just be sending myself down the road to dissapointment and frustration.
I know little about Costa Rica but a quick web search shows many, many botanical and public gardens so apparently there's a strong gardening interest there. I also don't know how conveniently you are located to any of these beautiful displays, but if you have the chance, a visit with notepad in pocket might really open doors for you in growing some remarkable plants those of us in temperate climates couldn't attempt....Just a thought :)
Lupine grows from seed, and can be bought at almost any store that sells flower seeds. And yes, it's a beautiful plant. :) I love the leaves.
That'd need to be a reasonably big bird to swallow lupine seeds whole. They're the size of pebbles. In fact, they even look like smooth river pebbles -- even the seeds are pretty ;) Oh, and in some varieties, the seeds are edible.
If you have any plastic bottles (soda, water juice) you can take off cap, cut off the bottom and stick in ground over direct sown seed. Open top lets in rain. If it's too hot/sunny and you don't have time to check every day for germination you can put vents up near open bottle top. Just be careful to remove bottles from over germinated seedlings or they could fry in sun/heat.
Deer chewed up some bottles but can keep seeds safe from diggers and seed eating birds.
thanks everyone.
Johnny's has a list of veggies that can be directly sown and those that are usually transplanted, with some plants being on both lists.
What I hoped to find was a similar list for flowers.
--I have plenty of peat pots/jiffy 7 that I can use for those plants that don't like root disturbance.
I would think there is a list somewhere of flowers that do better with not transplanting.
I realize that it's quite possible to if careful, to successfully transplant even those that say sow in place, do not disturb roots. All my plants are "transplants," but those which don't like root disturbance will be started in peat pots.
I appreciate your comments. I suppose what I'm going to have to do is go through several seed catalogs and note what they say for the growing of each flower. (ugh)
Bob
Have you considered winter sowing? I've found I can start my seeds outside in January or February and they are really ready to go much earlier than if I direct sowed them. I never had much luck with inside sowing, plus I couldn't plant as many seeds.
That's not the root. It's the cotyledons (seed leaf) that haven't split the seed coat yet. I have a Fuyu that I started from seed and it took quite a while to push off it's coat. Someone mentioned misting it in one of the previous posts. That's what I would do. Unless that's a wild persimmon you might be better off with a grafted tree if you are looking for fruit.
Surface sow, or barely cover - some light may be beneficial to germination.
You don't say which allium, but many are warm, cold, cool germinators, needing a moist period at all three temps to break dormancy. Fall sow, or use approx 71ºF for 4 weeks, move to 39ºF for 6 weeks, move to 50ish for germination for those.
That's not true of all, some need no special attention and will germinate at room temperature.
Marie, glads will form seeds that can be sown at 70-75F for germination in approx 20-40 days. The seedlings should be left in the pot for the first year while corms form below the grass-like seedlings.
But not deadheading (removing the spent flowers) and allowing seed to set will take energy away from the existing corms that you plan to save, and unless growing the species types the seedlings will not come true to the parent glad. You'll have glads but will have no way of knowing what color if that matters to you.
What's your light level?
If you don't have much light, perhaps coffee plants? They grow slow in the shade, but they do survive. And they flower with beautiful-smelling flowers, and yes, produce coffee cherries (although, again, don't expect them to produce well when kept small and in low-light situations)
Any transplanted plant needs a recovery time. The trick to digging a seedling up is to try to get every single root. I dig at an angle so the shovel kind of come up underneath the seedling. Preserving the root ball, soil and all, will stress your seedling less.
This experience is basically trauma to the seedling. You need to baby them a bit until they take. They can't be in soil that's allowed to dry out and they also can't be put into bright light right away. They have to be weaned off of coddling.
Whoops, I didn't spend close enough attention. What you want to do is press on the container sides to loosen the dirt from the container so the plant slips out easily without stress to the roots. Then you plant it with as much as the original dirt intact as you can because it'll disturb the roots less. But the rest of what I said is still true for indoor started seedlings.
whispering raven: Where at in TN? Are you open to the public?
- Steve
Hi Steve. We are in Ashland City (Cheatham County) and hope to be open to the public at large very soon. We purchased our farm in October and between the rain and the certification process, we are WAY behind schedule. But we do have some wonderful medicinal babies coming up quite nicely! :)
Many Blessings!
Tracy