Are we starting to sow to early .....

Hi All

Apart from daylily seeds I haven't sown anything thing else and they are now in the fridge !! being checked on weekly.

But reading through a lot of the posts , a lot of GC members have, I can understand with growlights etc but its still only (Just February) and I sow most of mine 2nd week of March flowers and veg, the thought of having windowsill crammed with pots and trays and light levels still very low plus plenty of time for snow etc.

Planting out time for most summer annuals is late April or until no more signs of late frost , and all the tender plants middle of May if we are lucky.

Spruce

 

You've got a fair point @Spruce but after last years terrible spring a lot of plants were behind and didn't catch up until late summer.
I've got myself some LED grow lights this year but only sowing things that need extra time or I've had problems germinating before. Ie coleus, chillies, cannas.
My dahlias, marigolds and other summer bedding will be started in March

 

It's far too early for me apart from sowing some foxglove "foxy" which should flower this year from an early sowing. Thanks @Ian Taylor I won't start sowing in earnest until March and direct sow some annuals later than that.

 

I think its mainly the people with growlights that are sowing earlier and earlier.

The main problem I personally would find with doing this is the growing on in warmth and light for the next four or five months.
Most of my cool heated space is taken up with plants overwintering, the last thing I need is tender seedlings in early March and no space.

I tend to stick to the seasons with most things, even exotics, although I did sow a few Musa seed back in November, and they are doing OK.

 

I sow according to my spreadsheet It has wanna-sow date, and actual sowed date. Each year I insert new columns for "actual" and shunt the previous years' ones over to the right. Easy to see when I sowed (and pricked out & planted out) in previous years ... if plants come on too quick to be ready for planting out I note that, and adjust the wanna-sow date back a bit. If the crop doesn't come on quickly enough I make a note and adjust earlier. For example, after chatting with @JWK last year I changed my Tomato sowing row (in spreadsheet, not the allotment!!) to be two rows, an "Early" date for varieties that take forever to get the first truss ripe, and a later date for all-the-rest that manage to crop just-fine-thank-you-very-much.

 

I haven't started any veg yet, just flowers, and the ones I have sowed say they can be sowed from January . I don't have any special propagators, lights or heat lamps - they get sowed in an opaque tub (the kind you get fatballs etc in) and get put in front of the radiators for heat of an evening and on a table in front of the garden room windows for light during the day. It's worked ok so far for me. I've got 3 tubs at the pricking out stage, and 5 germinating, and I'm lucky enough to have spare rooms they can live in until they're ready to go in the greenhouse. I stagger the sowing so there's always plants at different stages but yes, come end of April my house looks like a nursery. At least this year I'll actually have a greenhouse so can spread things out a bit more. Or probably just grow more . I'm not sure there's a definitive 'right' time to sow seeds. It depends very much on what space you have for propagating/growing on; the climate and conditions where you live etc.

 

Well i've managed to hold back thus far and havn't sown anything yet but its not for the lack of wanting to, thats for sure lol

Fern, would sweet william flower this year if I sowed them now do you think ?


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I've never grown them HB to be honest but some varieties are said to flower in the same year as sowing like the Sweet Series and Wee Willie. The Sweet Series needs an early start and Wee Willie is supposed to flower 7-8 weeks from sowing.

 

I think you will find that most people who sow early are mainly the show people who like to get stuff for the early shows.When I was showing I would start on boxing day and work out what came first,but all you want is a hard frost and heating to go down and your year is over as regards early shows.Now that I don't show I hang back while mid March.

 

I've a few seeds sown ,the ones IMO need an early start....Chillis,Peppers,Onions,Nicotiana Sylvestris,verbena and Nemesia....my tomatoes i'll hang back a little but raring to go

 

Ooooooh same here on the packet says March to May