Recently I started some heuchera seeds while we were suffering through the record setting deep cold of the last several weeks. I had to do something garden related to lighten my spirits that were quickly being squashed by the weather’s entrapments and starting some seeds seemed to be a good choice. It’s easy to start a small container to bring into the house and is very uplifting when you can start to see the results of the plantings emerge.These seedlings area mix of various types of heucheras from our corner shade garden. There’s no telling what the resulting seedlings will become but I’m not very picky when it comes to free plants! It took these seedlings almost 2 weeks to sprout but they would have emerged faster if they had had some bottom heat. I put the seedlings in a homemade seed propagation chamber – which just is a fancy way of saying a container of soil!
The propagation chamber was made from a foam carryout container. I cut a hole in the top to open it up and put the whole container in a loose plastic bag to help maintain humidity. There’s almost never a need to go out and buy containers for seed starting unless you just want to buy something. You can always find some sort of container (i.e. yogurt cups, carryout containers, margarine tubs, milk jugs) that holds soil and can be made into the perfect planting pot! The heucheras were the first of my seed starting activities for 2010. I followed up a few days ago with some hosta seeds I’ve been saving. I suspect they are too old and will have very poor germination rates but we’ll see. Pretty soon I’ll have several new plants to add to the garden.
Have you started any seeds yet for this spring?