Early showings

Morning guys and gals,
I'm sure threads like this pop up all the time at this time of year but I'm chomping at the bit as I'm sure most of you are judging by the amount of word association games that are flying around.
From this thread I am wanting to gauge an idea of success rates of early sowings of both plants flowers and vegetables.
If you could post your efforts past and prescent I would much appreciate it.
The details I'm after are
Obviously, what was sown
We're it was sown, greenhouse, heated prop etc
When it was sown. I don't need an exact date if you can't remember. Some thing like, late feb will do.
And lastly the success of the plant, did it out perform later sowings? Did it go leggy and not perform etc?

I'm mainly posting this for veg growers as that's what I plan on growing mostly this year. But I am also going to be growing a lot of flowers from seed for the garden this year which is why I've left it open to those too.

Ill start but as last year was pretty much my first year growing any thing and by and large quite unsuccessful due to starting late in the year, poor weather and slugs ill do this years overly eager sowings

I have peas, caulis and onions sown in pots on a large shelf in my unheated halway/porch and I also have various chilli varieties in my boiler cupboard
Thanks for taking the time to read
Dan

 

Dan, There is always peoples blogs to look over and see what is or has done well and not so well.
I wish you well on your season and hope all get a better one than last year.

 

Aah! SOWINGS! I was all set to tell you about my early showings...including snowdrops, hellebores, all sorts of winter flowering shrubs....and a welly!! The welly had been left by the back door after my daughter sank through the snow into thick mud when checking our cattle, then covered in another 6" snow. It's now showing again
Re. early sowings...having single glazed old sash windows that freeze inside when it's cold and no glass house or polly tunnel yet...I don't make em!!

 

Cheers landimad ill have a look for the blogs. Hope you and all have a good season too!!!

 

Sorry rural gardener. Damn I phone changes every thing

 

Ornamental wise, it's a matter of experimentation. I've grown several Penstemon from early sowings with great success, but this year I'm trying P.procerus which has germinated readily but is already very leggy. Fortunately, as with all new early sowings, it was just a few so I can start again in the spring. Penstemon digitalis "Huskers Red" is a good 'un for early sowing, as are the many varieties of P.heterophylus.

Perennial Lobelia seem to need longer hours of light before they start to grow, so if you want a head start with these best started in the autumn. Over the shortest days of the winter they just mark time, but it's one less thing to start off in the spring.

Anything that requires cold stratification (eg; Aconitum, hardy Iris) are good to be started off now.

I always start my Chillies and Datura off early with success. And Canna too. And Tricyrtis too.

 

Simple answer: Patience grasshopper

Early sowings suffer from lack of light. That makes the plants spindly ("Leggy"), weak, and more prone to disease (and falling over!)

If you don't have windowsill space, or the greenhouse space you have is not heated, then there is no point starting early. Even then although you may have the Heat you are not guaranteed to have the Light to go with it ...

To make an early start IMHO you need artificial light, then you can grow what you like as you will have both light and heat (assuming your lights are not outside!!).

People say that later sowings "catch up". I've never thought that is strictly true, but there are plenty of postings on here that say things like "I sowed some Tomatoes in January, and another batch in March, and the January ones only fruited 4 days earlier", so for a lot of things there is no practical benefit.

If you sow, for example, Runner Beans early you will have massively long entwined stems to sort out when you try to plant them ... and anything like that is miserable if it is planted out when conditions are "chilly" (and will die if you cannot keep a late frost off them).

 

How cold do you think they need to be?

I've got mine in conservatory, but that will be a min of around 4C (I will put them outside if the conservatory looks like getting warmer than 10C)

I could stick them in the greenhouse where the temperature will fall close to ambient, so will get below 0C - but I'm not sure if that is important? or if anything I am growing that needs stratification could be killed by that low a temperature?

 

That will be fine for Aconitum, Hosta, Iris and some Tricyrtis..........

 

OK, I'm move them to the older temperature. Thanks