First Time Winter Sowing #6 : There's still time!

I finally have the pictures done. Sorry for the delay. 2 of my "grown up" children came home for a couple of days....
I hope this is clear to understand, one thing I love about using the empty rolls is the adjustable length. As I said earlier, I stand the starters up in containers ( lids off blank cd spindles) to pour water in and let them wick up what they need, then just plant right into the ground as is when ready.

Here is a pic showing how to put the rolls together depending on what size you want.
The folded TP is great to just plant, while the paper towel holders work so great when starting roots - you can easily remove and do as you wish.
One I gave my SIL had tops on each end - rooting going on in the middle...

Is there a way to post more than one pic?

Is there a way to post more than one pic? I think so !

Here are just a few of the strange things I use year round with plants (and more....)
I will have to think about posting the one my daughter was testing today......

I finally caught up some on reading the thread.
Our winter this year has been insane.
It is like talking to my FatherInLaw !
Tues - Thurs last week it was over 70*
Friday was supposed to get cooler..... the low was 64* I think.
Saturday morning at 7:09 am I turned over to get my pillow back from
my dog and this is what I saw through my open window....
(actually picture was taken about 15 min later, the pillow theif is in
the photo!)
It is now Sunday night, 10:47 pm, and still have about half of the yards covered, where there is no afternoon sunshine.
Mother Nature is soooo fun!
Must say "Night Everyone" , time has come to get my coffee and go knit awhile,
my back is having a party....

I agree Ozarkgypsy, We are practically neighbors by Ozark standards and it has been nuts! One day it is jackets off and next day it is jackets on and grab the snow shovel. I never know whether to put on my mud boots in the morning or my warm snow boots or my yak tracs to tred on ice.

Gypsy,
How do you post more than one photo at a time? I have been trying to figure it out.
Bonnie

Bonnie,
I have a great program that I use for all my graphic work, resizing -cutting out things, adding txt.
Jasc Paint Shop Pro 7
there is newer models but this is the one for me !
I resize the photos, and then put them all on one new blank......
I think they offer a trial version. ? They used to...
~Gypsy~

yep they offer a trial version

Bobyrd and Ozark: Try Picasa. It's also free and you can do a collage.

Great pics and ideas OzarkGypsy! Do you find it easier to root plants with this method than in a glass of water, or do you reserve this method for plants that don't root well in water? Have you rooted any roses this way? How often do you open it up to check for roots?

Lots of questions! I love to learn...

Tonya

ChocolateMoose--great name--I love that! It was 25 this morning again here in GA. We just don't get the snow you get up there in AK. My WS seeds are, naturally, frozen and no activity to report these last few days.

OK, Winter Sowers!
Here's great news from the same wonderful folks who gave us bird flu, melamine milk and antibiotic honey :

In a word? No. LOL!

I take the attitude that I am just going in a different direction to all that.

For now, my first-timer Winter Sowing issue is, I would never have believed this, too much rain.

Too much water. Here in drought stricken CA. sheesh. We had a big snow fall, then a few days of sun and now on the second full day of steady rain, not enough time in between for draining and drying, I fear.

So....... I have very few options to protect those containers which have already germinated and which I feel are sitting in too wet potting mix. It is too early by far to plant anything in the ground or in the larger containers where they will live. So I am a touch anxious here...... I just went out and covered four containers loosely with transparent plastic to keep yet more water from coming in, tho it is a bit barn-door-after-horse-long-gone at this point...... I may bring those and maybe one or two others inside tonight to let them dry out a bit. I've done everything I know to do to provide adequate drainage.

Were it not for my WS project I could truly celebrate this rain!!!!!!!

Wonder if those beets will have a faint "fish-y" taste! LOL!

I'm worried about my little WS seeds, too. I only have two that have germinated, but my MG haven't nor my Penstemon. And now they are frozen.

Potagere, let's hope real gardeners won't grow these monsters.

plantRN, frozen is okay I think, better than drowned!

Fish beets! toooo freaky for me, LOL.

Kyla, are your containers not draining well enough? Mine in years past have been practically flooded, but were fine.

plantRN, typically seeds that germinate early are frost tolerant. I've had several germinate, freeze solid, and continue growing when it warms up. MGs typically wait till its warmer to germinate, and usually I don't start seeing Penstemons germinating till March.

I checked my containers today. Most of the snow has gone, but part of the earth in the containers is still frozen. The melted snow has left about a cm of water on top, it can't flow away because of the frozen underside. Will my seeds wash away?

Sometimes I find seedlings crowded around the edges from having gotten wet like that, but they still seem to do fine.

gemini_sage, thank you, that was reassuring. They are draining as well as they possible can, I did provide for that..... it is just that there has been so very much moisture and not enough time between soaks for them to adequately dry. Those which have germinated I worry about the rootlets rotting. Especially my precious onions! But I just visited Trudi's website again, thinking perhaps I had been foolish to think onions could work this way -- and indeed they are listed among the vegetables which have successfully been wintersown.... as, by the way, are cucumbers (we were mentioning them somewhere a few days ago.)

I'm probably just being a nervous first-time mom here. ;-) But it is good to hear about another's experience with "too much" water. I knew freezing was okay, and snow, but this had me worried.

gemini_sage--good to know about the MGs. I really hope they germinate for me this year. I have Penstemon already growing in my yard--although I want loads more--but the MGs had me worried. Thank you!

Kyla,
Don't worry about the onions. Really. I often put sets in in the Fall, if I have the space worked up for them, and they overwinter (and over-early-Spring) just fine. A lot of onions are usually direct seeded in the Fall. In fact, that's how some of the best Walla Wallas are grown.
I am a first-timer at this WS business, but have direct seeded onions in the Fall for years. They'll do great. Everything is then going to depend on your transplanting technique! But, hey! You live in California! There's probably a Lamaze for Onion Moms course available at your local CC!

Now, as to cucumbers. OK, they can "successfully" be WS. Well, but will they then be a "success" in the potager? I have my profound doubts, but am trying a few of all my tender veg this way this year.

When is it too late to WS in zone 5? Is there a time when it is best to just wait and direct sow? I have a lot of jugs sown and still have more to do.

well, I am behind as usual, but I FINALLY got some of my containers planted yesterday! The weather was fairly mild and it did drop low enough to frost last night. I think I planted around 55 -56 containers.... I lost count and I still have oodles of seeds, but I am out of jugs. I did not plant anything that I KNEW was an annual....although I wouldn't swear to no annuals since most of these I am not familiar with. When can I plant the annuals?? I figure we will get our last frost in mid to late April..... but before then we will probably have temps in the 80's......

I was under the impression that I should not plant the annuals yet. .... but maybe I am mistaken. I have at least 25 more types of seeds to plant and maybe a few more...... am in the process of trying to round up some containers and I have to pick up some more potting soil....then maybe with some luck I can sew everything else this weekend - assuming it isn't too early to sew those marked as annuals.

Genna

Kathy , we cross posted ,.... I had wondered the same thing, if I had waited too late - I am in 7b.... but hopefully, with at least 6 or more weeks til Spring, I should be ok..... The air temps may be warm somedays but the soil is still cold.....

???? Guess it is a trial and error thing.

Genna

LOL Planting is always trial and error! Gardeners are either the most optimistic people in the world or the craziest.

......or both at once! LOL!

I have heard folks say two months before your last frost date is still good WinterSowing time, some even said don't start before that! I have also heard folks say they wintersow right through the winter into spring......

I intend to do a final big sowing around March 5 probably -- I missed a time this month I planned to do some as other events intervened.

Do keep checking http://www.wintersown.org for answers too, a lot of this info is on there. There are pages according to zones, for instance, and lists of things that people have been successful with.

edited to fix the link

This message was edited Feb 23, 2009 11:42 AM

Thanks. I keep forgetting to go back there for more information. Info is so quickly avaiable here that I get lazy

I'm going to shoot a theory out here, and more experienced WSers like kqcrna can correct me if I am wrong.

WS for annuals and tender perennials (mostly veggies, so far as I am concerned, but includes datura and a lot of other climbers, geraniums, most fuchsias, etc.) :

Most of these will re-seed on their own. Some of the tropical perennials do not, but the important garden vegetable tropical perennials (notably the Solanums) certainly do so : e.g. the notorious "volunteer tomato".

So : my theory is : any plant that would naturally re-seed in your environment (this does not necessarily mean that it would naturally GROW in your environment : good example is the tomato. A lot of tomato varieties have been developed in Ohio, but there is no archaeological evidence to suggest that tomatoes ever "naturally" grew north of Mexico. That is not to say that, eventually, undisturbed by Western invaders and/or spread gradually by native farmers, that they wouold NOT have naturalized in the American MidWest; because garden-grown tomatoes re-seed themselves as far north as Alaska. But this is a digression.)

Any plant that would naturally re-seed itself (once planted) in your environment can be "successfully" WinterSown.

BUT (and this is an important "but"), to me "success" in this context means that it will, when the temps rise to its required germination level for the required number of days, germinate. It will even grow.

However, whether or not it will "grow successfully", which to me means here : "mature and produce a usable and edible crop worth having spent the time and energy on", is another matter.

I am convinced that one can WS tomatoes, cucumbers, even squash and melons.
What I am playing with this year, because I don't expect it to work, is whether one can WS such crops and always expect them to succeed.
Now, I have also read the reports of "My WS tomatoes were only 1/2" tall, and the indoor-grown ones were 24" high when I planted them out, but the WS plants quickly overtook the indoor-raised plants and exceeded them in production." That's an obvious exaggeration, but even that I do not claim is untrue IN CERTAIN ENVIRONMENTS.
On the other hand, if you live where there is a 120-day window between first and last frost, I don't think it would be possible to WS an 80-day tomatoe (considering that the 80 days is an established convention counting time from transplant to 1st fruit) and expect to get a harvest worth bothering with.
I don't think that one could even WS any of the "Alaska" tomatoes (Polar Baby, Polar Beauty, Arctic Midi, etc.) in Fairbanks and expect to get much of a crop.

I know I am being "negative" here.
But I do now have over 100 WS containers out in the yard, some of them containing vegetables (notably onions)

And I AM trying this out.

But I would love to hear from others with experience who can really tell us : "Just how far can we reasonably expect to push this?"

I ask mainly because I am primarily a vegetable gardener. Although I have a pretty good feel for what might work with my favorite veggies, I am willing to experiment. I am NOT really a flower gardener. This 1st year of WS is almost my first "real" year of flower gardening. And, basically, I don't mind placing my trust in WS for Columbines and other hardy perennials that I KNOW NEED cold to germinate and that may take a year or 2 or 3 to flower, but I am real worried about ignoring the seed packages and WS zinnias, for example.

You folllow what I mean here?
I hope so.

I have over the years been told by nurserymen that if you put out plants like peppers too early the cold will stunt them and you will never get a crop. This is the kind of statement that worries me and causes some trepidation about many seeds. I am doing this for the first time this year and have many jugs out in the cold. I see the sense in it. We all get "volunteer" plants in the middle of our gardens. Nature winter sowed. I would like to be able to say I have lost nothing but a little time, but that is not true. There is a huge investment in the potting medium and seed! I have many packets of seed to go and am in it for the long haul. Coward that I am, I am only sowing half packets and saving half to replant.

Yes, it has always been one of Trudi's rules of thumb that any plants that reseeds itself can be wintersown. I have a lot of volunteer tomatoes, and some of them have grown to be very productive plants. Many wintersowers do sow their tomatoes in winter sduccessfully. Last year was the first time I tried tomatoes and was very happy with the results. I wait until spring to sow them though, because I have had many tender plants sprout too early in a warm spell and then freeze soon after.

I have no qualms about sowing hardy annuals in winter. I've had them sprout as early as early March and do fine with subsequent hard freezes. In fact, my larkspur which volunteer in fall generally overwinter just fine, even through zero degree weather. I have 2 year old snapdragons out there too (though they're not looking so good now.) I only wait until spring to sow tender things, like tomatoes or zinnias, which really don't take kindly to frost.

Many wintersowers "wintersow" all year, and quite successfully. That is to say, they use the same method, sow in a container with a lid, but in summer use more air holes in the top. Keep in shade to avoid overheating. Basically it's the same as we do in winter, with slight adaptations for the hot weather. A lot of folks like to start perennials and biennials this way in summer, then plant the seedlings out into beds in fall. Then the next summer, those plants will bloom.

The thing is, there are no guarantees in wintersowing, any more than in any other form of gardening. Most of the time, by far, it works and works well. Sometimes it doesn, but who knows why? Seems everyone in the world has successfully wintersown platycodon but me. I've sown it twice- zilch, zero sprouts.

Results will vary from year to year, too. My first year, in 2006, I got very ill and stayed sick for months (3 major surgeries, 2 minor ones). Everything did incredibly well with no help from me, little from my husband. Second year, 2007, again terrific results early summer but eventually our all-time hottest, driest summer caught up with them around late August. In 2008, our spring and early summer cool wet weather took it's toll, but when weather returned to normal later (July?) everything did well. So expect effects from unusual prolonged weather trends, too. "your results may vary".

Karen

We cross-posted.

That's why I have never WSed peppers. I doubt that they'd ever produce fruit here, in my climate. I know they need a fair amount of heat to sprout, then to grow and produce fruit, too. I just don't think it would work well here. It might work well in warmer climates.

Of course, I thought that about tomatoes, too, until my friend WSed them and gave me some of her plants. I had already bought a few nursery plants and all were planted the same day. The nursery plants towered over the WSown ones then. The WSown ones caught up fast! They produced fruit around the same time (for their DTM).

These were my WSown toms last year, on Memorial Day.

Karen

Here's a pic in August. The deer had eaten most of the plants around knee level. But you can see one, to the left of the hibiscus, reaching for the sky and out of the picture. (It's against a 4 ft fence). It's the same tomato as the above picture.

BTW, it's a yellow cherry tomato called Snow White, now my favorite tomato. I just pick them and eat with my basil or nasturtium while I'm out there gardening.

Karen

Kathy does raise an interesting point about peppers.

Various US State Ag College studies have shown that they germinate best at soil temps of about 75-80 degrees US (implying air temps either 10 degrees higher or at the same levels for a month or more).
However, they do best if those temps then drop to around 55-60 for about 4-8 weeks afterwards and then move back up to their normally accepted "heat-loving" levels.

I.e. a pepper plant produces at its optimum level if the seed is germinated at a fairly warm temperature and the plant is then forced to grow "in its youth" at an abrasively cold temperature and then matures in a really warm temperature (kind of a paradigm for raising good kids).

This has to be a natural adaptation to a specific climate. And it's not a climate that can easily be reproduced with the WS "put it in a pot; put it outside; and leave it method". My local climate, being a montagne climate. reflects similar fluctuations, but they won't be the same. The average Fall-Winter-Spring-Summer climatic changes in New Mexico, Texas, Oklahoma, Massachusetts or Ohio will likely be even further off.

I know I can successfully grow both Bell-type and chile peppers in central Scotland, but I wouldn't want to count on WS seed to do so in that environment.

I reiterate that I am ENTHUSIASTICALLY trying Wintersowing this year.
But I also point out that I am doing it most enthusiastically for flowers, where i have nothing to lose but the costs of my time, the seed and the potting soil (although, like kathy65468, I must say that those investments themselves are fairly significant).

We rely a lot on what I am able to get from the vegetable garden, not for beauty and entertainment, but for food. That is why I re-iterate that I am EXPERIMENTING with this technique for vegetables. I know that the old "grown under lights" system works. It would be foolish for me to abandon that entirely for something that may not work as well and suffer the results of a bad harvest.

Fortunately, we have only seen deer in the garden once; and they apparently ate nothing. The mountainside is rich in food with fewer threats, I guess! We need more than one cherry tomato plant to get us from one season to another. Can't afford to share so generously with our 4-footed friends or, if we do, we need to start from a much stronger base!
Edited to correct illegible spelling errors!


This message was edited Feb 24, 2009 10:40 AM

Well...now I'm pretty content with my perennials. Mother Nature doesn't use an 'exact' science for her gardening, but I must admit I need to stick my toe in first regarding herbs, veggies and annuals. and I'm out of jugs so I am going to try another leap of faith...gallon freezer bags as soon as I secure something to put them into, etc.

I just need more time. or a clone. winter is my time to quilt and knit. although, in a way, gardening is very much like quilting...sometimes you just gotta rip it apart and start over.

Jim...I ate beets when my mom forced or guilted me (she grew/canned them). I've never met a beet that I liked =) Someone else can have mine =)

Thanks all for the info on growing peppers from seed. I am trying to grow some sweet cherry peppers--but not WS, just indoors under lights and on heat mats. I sowed them in a 72-pot flat with several other seeds with the same germination needs. EVERYTHING in that flat has germinated except the cherry peppers. I am about to give up on them.

Nanniepb, I know how you feel -- about some other veggies I am the same. Can you say "okra"? LOL!

But may I quietly suggest, have you ever tried either Golden or Choggia beets? They are far and away lovelier and tastier to my palate than the standard deep red beet we usually find in groceries .....

just a thot.

( waving at Beth...Hi. I'm a former L'villian myself. My DD still lives in Winder)