Growing plants from seed.

[thenewaveragebear1983]

Hi there,
I have dipped my toe into the gardening boards a few times and thought I'd try again with my many questions!
We have a reasonably large garden, and in the 6 months since we moved in I have made good progress in clearing out the weeds and planting a few things, (I am a very novice gardener). Some beautiful things have emerged as well as little surprises. However, I am always a bit aghast at the cost of plants and find garden centres a bit overwhelming, often leaving empty handed. I'm thinking forward to next year- how possible is it to grow things from seed rather than buying plants? I have a little shed which could be a little potting shed. I'd love to have flowering plants such as lupins, fox gloves- but also need things such a ferns and other 'fillers' for the beds.
Am I too early to start for next year? Is there anything anyone can recommend as a good starter?

www.theguardian.com/money/2009/may/20/gardening-saving-money

Ask friends for cuttings of plants - look on line at the RHS website to see how easy it is.

Make sure they'll suit your garden and soil type though.

Wallflowers are good to sow now as are foxgloves. Biennials that establish in the first year and flower in the second. Have a look on a site like Sarah Raven for idea of what to sow now.

I've had good results sowing seed trays of foxgloves and potting them on.

A warm windowsill is helpful for germinating.

Thank you,
I did wonder whether things would take more than one year to establish.

I will look at Sarah Raven site.

Some things are far easier to grow than others from seed. Some things can be sown direct and will grow without too much fuss e.g. nigella, poppies, calendula. Others are fussier/ frost prone (I've lost 3 sets of zinnia this yr). Some are fiddly tiny seed so a lot will waste as you can't spread it efficiently.

If you have a garden centre you can go to fairly frequently, look out for their reduced area (called search and rescue at ours!) as it'll be perennial stuff that has finished flowering but not been sold so looks naff but they don't have space to keep it for next year. Often, those are half price or better and pots are so full that you can split them to make several plants. Things that work well for that include asters, achillea, stachys (I got 5 plants from buying one three years ago and most ready to split again)

Look out for more local nurseries rather than garden centre, they're often MUCH cheaper (e.g. 2 quid for a perennial rather than 7 at ours local one) and will know what will grow well for you.

You can also try plugs etc from the online retailers like Thompson and Morgan.

If you have neighbours with nice gardens, ask if they have any cuttings etc going.

And if there is a plant you really like, always worth getting one or two of those as an investment

Came on to say Sarah Raven, but I can see someone got there before me! Her catalogues are plant porn.

David Austin sells disease- resistant roses for about £16, and go on for 20 years plus.

You can sow loads of perennials like lupins and hollyhocks now and they'll flower next year and every year thereafter (although hollyhocks can be short lived perennials).

Bare root roses are available from November until April and are cheaper than potted up roses. This is my David Austin rose (Princess Alexandra of Kent - a repeat flowerer) that was planted bare root at the end of April ( right at the end of the bare root season after I killed because I didn't get round to planting it having got it in November the first one I got ).

There are currently 8 buds on it

Lupins and foxgloves are easy from seed (but lupins are slug bait) and will flower in their second year. Species roses can be grown from seed, but not named varieties - but it'll take at least 3 years to flowering. I have several maples including couple of beautiful snake bark maples that I grew from a packet of mixed Acer seed, and I'm currently growing some Korean pine - in their second year they're about two inches high!

So the answer is you can grow a lot of things from seed, but it's not necessarily quick. My experience is that germination rate is either 100% or 0% with nothing in between, and in the early years there are more of the 0% than of the 100%. Try Chiltern Seeds for seeds of things that people don't usually grow from seed (that where I got my Acers from).

Ferns are a different plant group, and what you would grow is their spores, and you'd probably have to collect them yourself. Use scrupulously clean compost. The spores grow into the prothallus - sort of green stuff over the the surface of the compost. This is the sexual generation, and will go on to give rise to the next generation, the asexual spore bearing generation which is the fern as we know it. So it's possible but a bit of a challenge.

For your first attempts stick to annuals or biennials which tend to be easier, and don't be embarrassed to try things advertised as "ideal for children". Also try taking cuttings - another way to get things cheaply if you talk sweetly to the owner of the plant, or a way of buying just one plant and bulking it up. Pelargoniums and fuchsias go easily from cuttings and are good to practise on.