this year's challenge - growing from seed

[ssweetpea]

I have decided that:

1. I am going to grow a lot more flowers in an effort to beat my mother in at least on catagory at Garden Circle. Besides, flowers are pretty.

2. I am going to grow as much as possible from seed and cuttings rather than buy punnets of seedlings or potted colour.

I figure that if I germinate 12-24 seedlings per packet of seed I will save money.

As a result I have ordered quite a few packets of seed to supplent what I already have. About $110 worth I haven't told MrSp that.

On the flip side my mini green house is full of punnets of germinating seed and some of the plants will be different from the usual run of the mill.

[ssweetpea]

Results of growing everything from seed.

 

I am blaming the dull summer we had.

In some cases I did get seedlings but I had more complete failures that successes and fungal problems thanks to the dull damp summer killed off much that did germinate. The lack of light seems to have dealt to many of the cauliflower seedings I planted out too, they germinated so late that they were big enough before that part of the veggie patch lost the sun in Autumn.

My tomato crop was pitiful as were my pumpkins. Out of the 6 plants I grew from seed I got one pumpkin and two spaghetti squash.

Out of the 48 pansy seeds sown I got one plant.

However some of the lily seeds I sewed did produce seedings that have survived winter despite Sally lying on them repeatedly and of the 24 purple asparagus seeds I started in a polystyrene box have produced 10 crowns to transplant.

I ended up buying flowering kale and pansies.

I am not entirely put off, I will try again. This time I am commandeering the sunny spot in the lounge widow and starting of in the newly cleaned polystyrene box (to hopefully hold in the heat). Keeping the cats off could be a problem.

I wonder if it is going to be warm enough for capsicums this year?

[ssweetpea]

So far I am doing much better. I have even managed to geminate a single cyclamin seed and almost all of my expensive gerbera seeds.

My strike rate with pumpkins germinating is much better than last spring and the lettuses that refuse to germinate or grow last year are doing well - they are all from the same packets as last year too.

The forget-me-nots are still a complete failure and I am still waiting on some of the capsicums.

Lessons learned so far:

*Cleaning the punnets before sewing is a good idea - I scrubed them with soapy water then spraied them with dettol and air dryed them.

*Peat pots dry out way too fast and have a tendancy to grow mould when packed close together or in a plastic pot to prevent them drying out.

*Jiffy plugs (pellets?) - compressed peat pellets with an permiable outer coating that you soak in water then put a seed or cutting in work really well. I have had a better strike rate with them than I have with normal seed raising mix.

*Polystyrine self watering propergator with cover - results were mixed, germination patchy but then I was trying seeds known require a higher temperature and to be difficult to germinate in early spring. The seed raising mix did stay warmer and I didn't get fungal problems so I am not writing off the extra expense ($20) as a waste of time and money yet but I am not going to get a second one yet either. If the seed doesn't require light the hot water cupboard (if you have one - I don't) would work just as well or better.

*The $5 thin plastic propergation tray with cover gets the thumbs up. It didn't keep the seed mix any warmer than room temp but was very successful. My tomato, pumpkin, snap dragons, chillies, egg plant, catnip, and lettuce seeds have all done very well in the lounge window in this tray.