The Flower Seed Sowing Thread 2015 - 2018

[mothhawk]

I thought it would be nice to have a thread for sowing flower seeds, separate from the seed sowing thread already running, which is more of a veg specific one.

Veggiechicken is doing an alphabetical one http://www.growfruitandveg.co.uk/gra...ers_83722.html, but I'm not organised enough for that and come spring quite a lot of seeds are just broadcast.

So today I have sown indoors:

Heliotrope
Cerinthe
Sweet peas (4 varieties)
Cupid's Dart
Verbascum

I don't hold out much hope for the sweet peas or verbascum as they are T&M and I never seem to succeed well with their seed.

[Martin H]

Good idea, MH. Maybe a friendly mod could sticky...

So far this year I have sown
- Sweet Peas in paper tubes, 8 varieties in January
- Delphinium "Pacific Giants" sown in January and left in the cold, moved to the heated prop this week
- Coreopsis "Early Sunrise", last week
- Antirrhynum "Rust Resistant Mixed", last week

The sweet peas were from seed freshly collected last autumn, but the others are all old seeds that have been hanging around in my seed box for years. I don't have much hope for the Delphiniums, notoriously bad from old seed, but the others might be okay.

Lots more to sow in the next two or three weeks!

[veggiechicken]

Good idea, MH. Maybe a friendly mod could sticky...

I stuck it as soon as MH started the thread.
Excellent idea - we need more Flowers

[WPG]

So far this year I've sown-

several varieties of sweet peas
yellow aquilegia (self collected seeds)
datura ballerina

Delighted to notice today that the datura have all germinated, they look a bit like morning glory seedlings at this stage. I've never grown them before, so will probably mollycoddle them a bit.

[Martin H]

Today I sowed some annuals into pots in the greenhouse. Just a few seeds of each...

Calendula "Orange King"
Cornflower "Blue Ball"
Eschscholzia "Orange King"
Godetia "Crown Mix"
Gypsophila
Limnanthes douglasii
Nasturtium "Tom Thumb"
Nigella "Light Blue"
Sunflower "Giant Yellow"

I've only ever sown these direct up to now, so I'm interested to see which ones survive the pricking out process. But it's nice to have got started, even if I have to re-sow later!

[mothhawk]

Put some Morning Glory seeds to chit (Kniola's Black Knight - a rather lovely deep cerise) - the packet said soak overnight.

The cerinthe I put to chit were showing no sign of life, so had a pick at them. The seed cases are like sweet peas - rock hard - so split them open carefully. Some were empty inside, but I found 3 or 4 viable looking seeds, so hopefully they'll start to sprout in the next day or two.

[mothhawk]

Put some Morning Glory seeds to chit (Kniola's Black Knight - a rather lovely deep cerise) - the packet said soak overnight.

The cerinthe I put to chit were showing no sign of life, so had a pick at them. The seed cases are like sweet peas - rock hard - so split them open carefully. Some were empty inside, but I found 3 or 4 viable looking seeds, so hopefully they'll start to sprout in the next day or two.

Crikey, by the next morning the morning glory were all well chitted, so popped them into compost straight away. Only 2 cerinthe chitted, but it's a start.

Today I sowed:-
cosmos "Purity"
larkspur
echium
hyssop tricolour
hyssop anise
nepeta
betony
calendula
mallow
centaurea
clematis vitalba (old man's beard)
borage
oregano

You may notice a theme developing. I'm sowing all bee-friendly flowers this year.

[Martin H]

As soon as I've drunk this nice cup of tea, I'm going into the greenhouse to sow:

Cosmos "Purity"
Rudbeckia "Irish Eyes"
Dahlia "Cactus".

[spinningsue]

So far this year I've only sown a few flower seeds: Delphinium and Laurentia a couple of weeks ago - both free with a magazine I bought last year sometime and Sunflower 'Pacino Cola' sown today and which came free with my veggie seed order from Mr Fothergill's.

I saved a bunch of flower seeds last year so I guess the next job is to find them out and sow them too.

[Jonny.D]

Aquilegia
Borage
Chamomile
Echinops Ritro - ( Globe Thistle )
Sweet Williams

[Jonny.D]

Borage (More)
Echinos Ritro - ( Globe Thistle) (More)
Nasturtiom
Sunflower 'Italian White'

[spinningsue]

Today I sowed some Aquilegia 'Beidermeier Mixed', Cornflower 'Blue Diadem' and Cosmos 'Brightness Mixed' - all free with a magazine!

[Gillykat]

Made a start on a few flowers for the allotment today Felt like I'd done tons but when I finished they barely covered a full shelf in the greenhouse!!! Still got a load to plant in the coming weeks though.

Today's sowings...

Poppy 'fruit punch'

Poppy orientale 'Brilliant'

Sunflower 'Skyline' x 12

Tagetes 'starfire mixed'

Catmint

Rudbeckia 'cherokee sunset' x 50

Rudbeckia 'cherry brandy' x 50

Morning Glory 'Grandpa Ottis' x 12

Calendula 'art shades' ~ 28 pots (!) :P

[Martin H]

Today I did my first direct sowings of annuals for cutting:

Calendula "Orange King"
Godetia "Crown Mix"
Cornflower "Blue Ball".

I've protected all but the ends of the rows from the birds. I'll be interested to see if the exposed ones get eaten; I'll be amazed if they don't because Essex birds seem to eat absolutely everything.

[WPG]

Gillykat, I love your selection of flowers. I think I've grown all those before, apart from the Catmint. The rudbeckia cherry brandy is a particular favourite of mine which I'm growing again this year. If you can protect the rudbeckia seedlings from the slugs then they're pretty much problem-free and will flower into November.

I'm hoping 2015 will be the 'year of the sunflower' on my allotment. Today I'm sowing :

sunflower Pastiche
Irish eyes sunflower
Sunflower Vanilla Ice
Sunflower Jade Green
Giant single