21 March 2025
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Growing flowers, fruit and vegetables from seed is easy if you follow a few simple rules. We show you how in this simple guide.
THERE IS little more hearty than produce magnificent , colourful flowers or toothsome crop from a few midget seeds . It ’s also a pot chintzy than buying new plants . Many people never try sow seed because they think it ’s hard . It ’s not . Others are put off because a sowing fails to spud , or seedlings keel over and die . allow me reassure you , it happen to the most experienced of gardeners . But it does n’t happen often if you stick with a few simple rule , and with a trivial practice you’re able to enjoy regular winner .
How to Sow Seeds
We have break down seed sowing into five simple sowing methods :
1 ) Small pots
2 ) Fine seeds
3 ) mobile phone tray
4 ) Seed tray
5 ) Sowing in the filth .
Sowing under cover ( method acting 1 - 4 ) can come out much before ( February / March ) , while sow outdoors in the soil pick out place in April - May as the ground warms up . Each method acting befit particular types of seminal fluid or flora ( more will be disclose as we go along ) .
A greenhouse is utilitarian , as is a heated propagator – but they ’re certainly not essential for successful seed sowing . A bright , warm windowsill will do amercement to get early seeds bug out , and untested plants can be moved outdoors as the weather warms into any of the cheap plastic tents or cloches available from garden centres . I use both .
Let’s Begin
To pop seeded player sowing you ’ll take :
– some clean , small 3 in ( 7 cm ) pots
– cubicle tray
– seed tray
– plant life label
– a pencil or marker penitentiary
– a udder of vermiculite
– a dish of fine horticultural sand ( depending on what type of cum you are inseminate ) .
– a antimycotic agent such as Bayer Fruit & Vegetable Disease Control is a useful gain to combat damping - off – a common fungous disease affecting seedlings – and a water spray to practice it .
– percipient plastic bag , and an unheated disseminator tray with a clear credit card lid .
You will also need a fresh bag of eitherSeed & cuttingscompost , orMultipurpose compost – it ’s best to have both . seminal fluid & cutting compost is very down in the mouth in nutrients . This is because some germ will not germinate well in compost which check lots of plant food . broadly talk , o.k. and delicate seeds should only be sown in Seed & press cutting compost , while bigger , racy seeds will be OK in Multipurpose compost . Unless you ’ve try before , you wo n’t know what size of it the seeds are until you start the seed packet !
Other Things to Remember:
Very fine seeds ( for example lobelia , nicotiana and petunia ) should be sprinkled on the surface of moist compost and NOT covered with more compost .
All seeds – even those of fully hardy plant , require some passion to burgeon forth ( set off to grow ) , and proficient light ( though not direct sunlight ) as soon as they have sprout . The sill of a sunny windowpane covered with a last curtain is fine , or you may bribe a cheap electrically heated disseminator ( under £ 20 ) . position in a bright point it will give more reliable results .
Top Tip
Do n’t maturate more industrial plant than you may somewhat utilize in your garden . Some packets contain hundreds of seeds – do you really demand 200 petunias ? And have you space to produce them on ? A minor pinch of , say , 20 source should acquire on to give you around 16 plants , allow for a few personnel casualty .
