Only a (seedy) Gardener…

… would get excited about coloured envelopes containing dried vegetable matter, and especially excited because it is the first of March and she can start sowing another batch of seeds….. as if the date really matters that much. But gardeners do get excited about seeds – about planning their purchase, sowing them, waiting for them to germinate and then watching their progress as they magically transform into fully grown plants (well, some of the time!). Having planned to write about seeds and stuff today, when Annette2121’s blog appeared in my inbox I was able to teak it a little and link it to her ‘Only  a Gardener’ meme – have a look her blog to see what it is all about.

All the above seeds can supposedly be planted from March with some heat, so they will be installed in trays next to the Aga either later today or maybe tomorrow. The last of February’s trays have been now been moved on, the minuscule seeds of Antirrhinum ‘Liberty Classic Crimson’ just germinating on the cusp of the month change. They are from Sarah Raven whose seeds I have used for the first time this year and despite her generally excellent information she doesn’t say whether seeds need light or night to germinate – I was dithering with her cleome, but as soon as I removed the black plastic the seeds burst into life after about 3 weeks of sulking. Similarly, the antirrhinum started off in the dark until I googled the question.

During the week I received my allocation of RHS seeds, a collection designed for ‘the cutting garden’ and some others. I haven’t sorted out a sowing timetable yet, but know that my seed tray pile is rapidly going down already! After slightly below zero temperatures overnight  it is definitely too early to be sowing anything outside, so hopefully many of this batch don’t need to be dealt with yet.

In the greenhouse some potting on is becoming necessary as some of the strongest seedlings are already developing a good root system – cerinthe and malva in particular – which means staging for the half greenhouse will soon become a necessity. In the meantime there are a growing number of pots and trays on the floor. Another Sarah Raven delivery yesterday brought dahlia tubers and Anemone coronaria ‘Sylphide’ – the size of the tubers compared to the ones I bought from our local garden centre last year suggest why the latter (recently potted up) were not very successful. I was impressed with her detailed instructions for the dahlias and other bulbs too – so much so that I dug up the crinum and eucomis I recently bought from Broadleigh Bulbs and replanted them in temporary pots to give them a head start.