Anyway, I've made an early start with sowing seeds and although the instructions on the packets say sow in Feb or March, I've decided to cheat and here's why:
- If I sow now then I could get a head start on some crops. For example tomatoes and aubergines should have no problem growing under shelter early.
- Should the crop fail then it won't be too far into the growing season to sow more seeds, effectively giving me time for any disasters.
- I can grow my veg in succession, meaning that I could start harvesting early and continue on harvesting later in the season until the last possible time.
- Starting early could mean that I could take advantage of a warm spring or early sunshine. There's been times when I've followed the sowing times only to have cool summers and not enough sunshine to ripen fruit. I lost a lot of tomatoes that way one year.
- I'd potentially save myself some space in the greenhouse and poly, because there's been many years where the shelves have been creaking under the weight of trays and trays of seedlings all sown at the same time. This way I can rotate seedlings and new seed sown.
Here's what I did:
Today's seeds consisted of tomato, aubergine, artichoke, lemon grass and leeks. I thought it would be interesting to experiment with different propagation methods to see what works better.
Method one - the heated propagator. I only have two of these and luckily they both still work. In each tray I put five varieties of seeds. Mostly tomatoes and aubergines, with some leeks and artichokes. After watering I covered them with clear lids for a couple of reasons. Firstly, the seedlings will need some protection from possible frost. Secondly, as a poultry keeper, I do tend to suffer from pests such as rats. Last night they came into the polytunnel and ate over half of my winter cabbages. as you can imagine, I wasn't very happy. Keeping a cover on my seeds and seedlings does keep them away.
Remember to always look for pests before you go ahead with planting and sowing. Slugs will rest close to your plants.
These are tomato seeds. The variety here is Moneymaker. They were a great cropper last year and I'm hoping that they'll be amazing this year too.
I placed just the one seed in each cell.
Method two - lemon grass was sown in small (1/2ltr) pots. These are now on a windowsill in the house as lemon grass requires humidity and it would be easier to keep on top of that everyday without going outside to the poly or greenhouse. The pots are in a windowsill propagator, which I bought from Wilkos. It's their own brand and I got just the one to try for £5, which was a reduced price (although I don't know what the normal price would be). Being indoors, enclosed in glass and next to light should help encourage the seeds to germinate. I've struggled with lemon grass in the past but I'll keep trying until I get it right as both my husband and I do cook with this ingredient quite often.
This looks very nice but I hope it does the job. The only amendment I made was to line this propagator with cling film as it's wooden and I didn't want the wood getting wet. Ideally, it could have come with a plastic tray.
Method three - the last method I used was for some quick growing leaves for flavour and salads. My son helped me in sowing these. I used one tray with two smaller inserts. The seeds here are fenugreek and pea shoots. Once sown, they were watered and then covered and brought indoors to keep warm. Not only do I have to then use any extra electricity for this but as the leaves grow, they can be easily picked in the kitchen and added to cooking straight away.
My son expertly sowed the peas in rows.
Fenugreek seeds were scattered, then some compost was lightly added just to cover the seeds. These seeds like moist conditions so as with the lemon grass, it's easier to keep on top of checking humidity while these are indoors.
Unfortunately, the idea of the hotbed made from duck manure wasn't ready today. I took two temperature readings of the bed, one in the morning and one in the mid afternoon. There wasn't much change. Morning temp was 8 degrees Celsius and mid afternoon only one degree warmer at 9. I also took a reading of the surrounding ground temperature, which was 10. Why it appeared warmer I don't know but I'm hoping that with a little more time the manure will start to rot down and warm up the soil. If it doesn't work it won't be a waste of time though as I'll just dig the manure in at the right time. Poultry manure does have a high nitrogen content, which will be beneficial to any veg I'll grow there.
The thermometer I used was a propagation thermometer by Gardener's Mate. It doesn't cost much at £2.99 and I'm sure I'll get more use out of it over the years.
Finally, I checked on the veggies I started in December, which are in an old fish tank in my poly! There's only broad beans and peas and I'm happy to say that they are growing well so far. Why would I grow these so early? There are advantages with broad beans - for some reason they don't suffer with black fly when they are sown so early. I'll be looking closely at my plants when they go outside on the allotment. With the peas, sowing early just means getting an earlier crop and I'll be growing these in succession as I'm always fighting the kids for fresh peas so the more the merrier!
I love peas and so does the rest of the family so I need to make sure I grow plenty.
Broad beans are not everyone's cup of tea but I really do enjoy eating them. In the background here you can just about see some rosemary cuttings (on the left).
So before I finish up here I wanted to give you a list of things you should consider before you pick seeds and sow them:
- Think about what you enjoy eating and start with growing that.
- You also need to think about spacing and how much you're going to grow. Then with an estimate of how many plants you want to grow, sow just a few more, say 10%, to count for any potential loss of seedlings/plants.
- Look at where you'll be planting your home grown crop. What soil do they like? Is it a sunny spot?
- Is what you're aiming to grow easy or hard to look after? If you're starting up it's always a good idea to grow veg that's easy to maintain.
Happy gardening!
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