"There are no gardening mistakes, only experiments."
Janet Kilburn Phillips
Janet Kilburn Phillips
A while ago I did a post Signs of Spring where I talked about something called winter sowing. Since work in the garden has now begun, a little later than usual this year, I thought I would share the results of my winter sowing experiments.
I put plants out on 3 separate occasions: January 1st, February 4th and March 14th. In total I planted 37 half gallon milk jugs of which 12 were duds and 25 produced. That amounts to about a 67% success rate,
I put plants out on 3 separate occasions: January 1st, February 4th and March 14th. In total I planted 37 half gallon milk jugs of which 12 were duds and 25 produced. That amounts to about a 67% success rate,
Some of the containers were so full I had to break them up into multiple pots after I opened them up.
Breaking it down by months, the January sowing was the least successful, of the 8 cartons, only one grew. February was better, of 10 cartons, 5 grew. March was the best in that all 19 grew.
Some of the failures were my own fault since I forgot to put drainage holes in 3 of the January cartons. For others, I noticed that some of the same seeds failed in January and February so perhaps the seeds were not viable. The rest, who knows?
Overall, however, I a very pleased with the results of the winter sowing and plan on doing it again next winter.
Have a fun day!
Cynthia
Breaking it down by months, the January sowing was the least successful, of the 8 cartons, only one grew. February was better, of 10 cartons, 5 grew. March was the best in that all 19 grew.
Some of the failures were my own fault since I forgot to put drainage holes in 3 of the January cartons. For others, I noticed that some of the same seeds failed in January and February so perhaps the seeds were not viable. The rest, who knows?
Overall, however, I a very pleased with the results of the winter sowing and plan on doing it again next winter.
Have a fun day!
Cynthia
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