Busy Lizzies

I remember an old chap where I used to work complaining that he'd never been able to get "Busy Lizzy" seeds to germinate. With the arrogance of someone who'd just watched an item about them on Gardener's World I loftily replied "You're using the wrong type of seed-compost, old boy!"
However for years I've used the "right" type of compost (peat-based) and have had little success with germinating these seeds. I've just had another batch go rotten on me and think I won't bother again. Unless, of course, somebody knows a foolproof method of dealing with these seeds.

 

Yes, thanks. I've observed MOST of what you say but have kept them on a window-sill in an unused bedroom without any heat. They must have died of hypothermia!!
Looks like this year I'll have to buy them ready-grown but I'll remember the temperature factor next year.

 

Gardening novice I may be but my mum is the Busy Lizzie queen. Every year she fills, and I mean fills her garden with the things and collects the seed for the following year.

She uses any old compost that she can find, she says the trick is that they need heat rather than light. They need a constant temperature because they are very slow to germinate (she estimates a fortnight). Which is interesting being the exact opposite of Marleys advice.

She germinates them in the airing cupboard in a seed tray which has been put inside a plastic bag. She says that if you can get a dark plastic bag rather than a light coloured one she finds this better.

When the first come up she puts them out in an unheated greenhouse, she says the first ones will be leggy and not much good but they let you know that the rest are ready and on their way.

Don't know if thats helpful or if I've just confused matters.

 

I find that Busy Lizzie's are one of those plants which some people can grow and others just don't have the knack for instance my Nan for years would shove a packet of seeds in the pot and 3 weeks later she'd have the best germination rate your ever likely to find where as I cant grow them for the life of me:hehe:

 

I agree Aescelus,


None f mine have germinated-I have used a loam based compost with one third, pure vermiculite with the next and then just dug some soil out of the garden for the rest-not one has germinated-its about 5/6 weeks now since sowing.

 

Based on Abi's and Aesculus' anecdotes it looks like the best thing to do is treat 'em rough!
I begin to wonder if the problem might be with the actual seed itself. The type that I tried this year was Safari from Mr Fothergill's, but I bought them half-price (in the dear-departed Woolworth) at the end of the season last year from stock which hadn't sold. Perhaps Abi's mum's seeds, being self-collected, are fresher.

 

When I was a little girl I remember going to a big garden with mum to buy her busy lizzies, I distinctly remember it because my mum hardly ever "bought" plants. That was where the busy lizzy obsession first began really. I remember being really bored ( I must have been about 6) but trying to be all grown up and interested and mum chatting to the old couple who sold her the plants for ages and ages about growing them from seed. She says they were the ones who told her to start them in an airing cupboard.

From those first plants she bought she just collected seed from one year to the next. *shrugs* Interestingly, when she began she had many more white flowers, after years of collecting seed it seems a larger majority of the plants now come up pink.