Sunday, December 4, 2016

A Time to Sow


So many hopes and dreams in these packets...


After months of drought, the rains have finally arrived.

With rain in the forecast, I rushed to sow the wildflower seeds - some bought, others gathered on my own property - that I had been squirreling away.

I'm taking a multifaceted approach to seed starting this year.

For those seeds that need months of cold stratification, I sowed many outdoors yesterday. After all, I figure that's how these plants propagate themselves in the wild - they drop their seeds, which undergo freezes and thaws all winter, and then they sprout in the spring.

Of course, there are drawbacks to sowing seeds outside so early in the year and letting them fend for themselves. Some seeds may get washed away. Others will probably get eaten. Still others may rot or dessicate. But with thousands of seeds sowed, presumably some will find the 'just right' conditions that allow them to germinate.

As a control, I'm holding other seeds in cold storage (the refrigerator) all winter. In February and beyond, I'll start taking action with those seeds - sowing some outdoors, transferring some into bags of wet sand (that I'll still hold in the fridge), eventually trying to start some seeds in eggshells that I'm already saving, etc.

I'll keep you all posted on the success (or not) of these various experiments.

For now, here's a list of the seeds that have been sown outdoors:

- Allium tuberosum, garlic chives (gathered from my own plant)

- Anemone virginiana, thimbleweed, native (from Missouri Wildflowers Nursery - these seeds are amazingly fluffy! I thought I'd been shipped a piece of wool when I looked into the seed packet!)

- Asclepias tuberosa, butterflyweed, native (from Sow True Seed)

- Chamaecrista fasciculata, partridge pea, native (gathered from my own plants)

- Desmanthus illinoensis, Illinois bundleflower, native (from Missouri Wildflowers Nursery)

- Echinacea simulata, glade coneflower, native (from Missouri Wildflowers Nursery)

- Gaillardia x grandiflora, blanketflower, 1/2 native (the G. pulchella parent is native across the Southern U.S., although rarely present in Tennessee) (gathered from my own plants)

- Heliopsis helianthoides, false sunflower, native (gathered from my own plants)

- Parthenium integrifolium, wild quinine, native (from Missouri Wildflowers Nursery)

- Polanisia dodecandara, redwhisker clammyweed, native (gathered from my own plant)

- Rudbeckia hirta, black-eyed Susan, native (from Sow True Seeds)

- Senna marilandica, wild senna, native (gathered from my own plant)


All of the seeds purchased from nurseries (i.e., all seeds other than those gathered from my own plants) represent my first attempts to grow these species in my garden.

Incidentally, for the first time, I tried mixing the seeds with sand before sowing. As I'd hoped, the sand helped me get better coverage and allowed me to see where seeds had already been sowed.

In colder climates, I've read that some people will wait until it snows and then scatter seeds (sample image). That way, they can easily see where the seeds have been scattered and when the snow melts, the seeds will gently sink into the ground with a ready supply of water.

I don't sow all species outside indiscriminately. Even though zinnias (Z. elegans), for example, do lightly self sow here, I suspect/hope that I'll have better germination waiting until spring to sow those seeds. And I'm also holding off on some other species I've purchased (like Monarda fistulosa, wild bergamot, from Missouri Wildflowers Nursery) where my research indicates that cold stratification does not improve germination. If the seeds will germinate just as well from a spring sowing, I'd rather scatter them then on the reasoning that fewer seeds will be lost, washed away, buried or eaten than with a winter sowing.

Dear Readers -- Do you sow any seeds outdoors in the winter? If so, do you scatter the seeds as I do or use a more controlled sowing method (e.g., something like this)? 

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A lot of interesting plants there, including some species I've never heard of. I also sowed Partridge Pea seeds in the fall, along with some False Nettle.
1 reply · active 434 weeks ago
I hope you have great success with the partridge pea, Jason.

It was one of my favorite new introductions to my garden in 2016. I only had a few seeds germinate (from wintersown seeds scattered in the garden last autumn), but several of the plants that grew provided flowers for months, attracted bees and hosted sulfur butterflies. Beautiful plant! And it was easy to collect seeds in the fall (though I also allowed some pods to open to scatter seeds naturally in the vicinity of the parent plants). Wish it was a perennial, but hopefully I'll get plenty of volunteers next year!
That is awesome. I can't wait to hear how your various methods work. I did something similar--sowing some of the seeds in late autumn, and saving some to start in small pots in the sunroom in late winter. The cold stratification needs of some of them make it a little trickier, but the fridge and the back porch are handy helpers for those purposes. Good luck!
1 reply · active 434 weeks ago
Thanks for your encouragement, Beth.

Of course, I do plan to report the results of my tests. Hopefully, everything will be a wild success! :D

Historically, have you had better luck direct sowing in the garden or raising seeds in pots in your sunroom? Or does it vary by plant species?
Look forward to hearing about how the seeds grow!
1 reply · active 433 weeks ago
Thanks Chris! Appreciate the great work your company is doing to bring open-pollinated, non-hybrid seeds to the world!

PS - The daikon-type radish seeds I bought from Sow True (https://sowtrueseed.com/product/nitro-radish/) have already done better than I expected. I'll have a post on that next week!
I start loads of seeds under grow lights but sowed alyssum, talinum, and California poppy seeds outside today. These grow really well without any help. I also scattered seeds for stipa (Pheasant's Tail Grass) and hope they grow next spring. Your rudbeckia hirta should definitely germinate for you. :)
1 reply · active 432 weeks ago
I have some poppy seeds to sow, but I'm saving them in the fridge for now. (I'm under the impression for whatever reason that they don't need any pre-treatment, so I *think* I can sow them in the spring and get good germination, but please correct me if you think I'm wrong on that point.)

Like you, I've had good success sowing alyssum (or letting it self-sow). I find it to be a nice spring-to-early-summer flower, though it tends to burn out here by midsummer most years I think.

Which Talinum species did you sow? I hear some love Talinum and others find it a pest due to excessive self-sowing. Have you grown it before?

Thanks for the encouragement. Which are some of your favorite species to raise under grow lights?

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