sowing seed, transplanting

An update, tomatoes on the window sill doing well but pots of lettuce and rocket outdoor have been turned over. Not sure who's the culprit but the squirrels are No.1 suspect. So battle commences!

A real easy way to get your seeds off to a good start is to do this:

Use supermarket pots, the ones the fresh flowers are sold in, in morrisons they sell them for £1 for 8.
Use your favourite compost, I add vermiculite for drainage, fill pot to three quarters full, and water, sow seeds as packet says, cover with compost as required, and pat down gently.
Use a plastic bell cloche, diameter about 30cms, over the pot, this will fit snugly as its slightly too big for the pot, so you just wedge it firmly on.
Place in a sunny part of the garden or patio.
Open vent on top of bell cloche on hot days or as required.
Thin out if needed after germination.
When it comes to planting in final position just a small hand trowel or even a dinner fork will do. Just be quick, as the roots don't have a lot of soil around them.

This works well for making small plugs for the allotment, and also garden annuals. The big outlay is for the cloches, but they will last for years if you wipe and store safely after use.

I'm basically a lazy gardener I think! The above method does work fine for me and my growing purposes though.

The bean seeds are doing exactly as expected, I am handling them very gently. This morning I prepped some root trainers, taller ones for cobra and moonlight and shorter ones for borlotti and ferrari. There is some sprouting already and I have popped 8 ferrari into trainers, lightly covered with compost and some perlite on top. Ditto with 2 cobra. Borlotti and moonlight seeds have swollen but the only signs of roots are on 2 broken moonlight seeds, I won`t be planting those. It really is worth doing it this way. You just need a very light handle. I am waiting for good solid moonlight seeds to show signs of life, those with plenty of seed food in them

All plants are out this morning, the delicates in the mini glasshouse with doors open. The brassicas sown in pots in poly bags are showing good signs of life, I need to be watchful and to get thosepots out of the bags and into the sun asap

I need to limit the number of beans that I grow, hence the pre-sowing sprouting. So far I have sown my full quota of cobra, ie 4 and 16 ferrari (dwarf). 1 of moonlight (these runner beans are being very slow to sprout) and the dwarf borlotti are just starting to sprout.

I have never grown borlotti but I believe that they cope better with a variable summer, they are destined for a trug and a raised bed on the ground, will not need support although I have a support in the trug

I intend to take growing tips off the tall beans at about 80 cm, they will get bushy and will be fine up an obelisk. I did buy long canes but not needed. I may sow ferrari direct into the ground in may/june depends if there is room with the peas

I had an e mail yesterday, my geranium plugs are no longer available, I have been offered garden ready plants as a sub in early june. That will do, the nurseries are really struggling

It’s exactly 2 weeks since I sowed my squished-out tomato seeds, and the first few are showing their first true leaves already.
I am well chuffed!
Some are still coming up but I’m reluctantly having to murder them. Four good plants will be plenty - I don’t have space, pots or compost for more.

I'm trying that now, Witzend, so far only have some seeds drying on the windowsill.
Red pepper seeds too, not that I've ever had any success with peppers.

I sowed some pepper seeds (from half a red pepper in the fridge) yesterday, @Callistemon. They’re in one of dh’s discarded hummus pots, plastic bag over the top and in the airing cupboard.
Must remember to check regularly. I forgot for a couple of days with the tomatoes, so a couple were very leggy and had to go.
But some tomato seeds are still coming up over a fortnight later! I swear that just about every seed I planted must be germinating. The latecomers are having to go, of course - I’m daft enough to feel mean for condemning them to death!

My pepper seeds came, Witzend, all 10 of them in a packet!
So I planted the others from the pepper we ate as well.

Good luck with all yours, Callistemon!
Let’s hope for a good summer and bounteous crops - some consolation for being stuck at home.

This thread is fascinating for me, and shows how much I have to learn

I've put loads of seeds in, and just hoped for the best. Most are in the greenhouse, a lot in unheated propagators, sweet peas by the fence they're hopefully going to grow up, and vegetables in a trug type thing.

Reading how carefully you all tend your seeds and plants gives me some insight into why I've not had much success before. Except for tomatoes and courgettes for some reason.

ps - just checked and six tomato pits are showing signs of life, and four cucumbers

Pots, not pits!

More than half the borlotti seeds are swollen but have not yet shown any sign of sprouting. I have rootrainers ready for them, as soon as I see that tiny root then it goes in and I cover lightly. The toscana strawberries came and I have planted them into planters plus some marigold plugs bergamot seedlings and a few nasturteum seeds.

Eagle eye on the overnight weather this week and fleece at the ready. Its been an ongoing job, making sure that the little pots are not becoming too dry

Got to be very careful for the next 2 nights in sw. All babies and tenders will be under cover as we could get frost. I have fleece to cover some planters and potatoes in pots will be moved to below trugs, or into the garage. Outdoor potatoes have been earthed up and over, ready. The tenders will be moved indoors, cucumbers, tomatoes etc. Frost may not touch the ground here but a forcast 2 degrees is too close to call

In the old days I used newspapers to cover trays outside in a shady place. If the sun is kept off and the frosted plants are allowed to recover slowly then they may stand a chance. Another way is to spray with cold water if the frost has got to them

I am itching to get some plants out into their positions for this year. I am scratching around to find spaces in my potager garden, as always I have grown too many veg. I found 2 spaces for red drumheads, I will only need 2 big solid red cabbages to keep me going all winter via Delia and the freezer. I am glad that I brought some pop-up net butterfly protectors. They are set up and I put a bit of growmore in and settled the 2 drumheads with good cabbage collars around the stems

I have also worked out a small hooped butterfly netting system for a 1 x1 m raised bed for cabbages, I will put duncan and red alert in there. I still have minicole and nemo (mini caulie) it will be several weeks before they are ready to transplant, they will go into a small trug, I have a mesh cover for the overhead frame. I took the fleece cover off this morning and will have to do some jiggery pokery ie put the chards out to make room for the brassicas. I`ll have to make a beter rotation plan next year

You sound very organised, craftyone.

I may plant some things such as capsicum, even lettuce, in pots this year, in the absence of my usual summer flowering plants.

One of my pepper seeds has come up! I’d almost given them up. O rapture bliss poop poop, in the immortal words of Toad.
Any sign of yours yet, @Callistemon ?

I'm in Cornwall, no frost at my allotment. Have just planted peas and mangetout. Rocket, spinach and chard are poking through the soil, have harvested one asparagus spear ha ha and one globe artichoke. Found some agapanthus plants left by someone outside a random gate last year, popped them in the soil, thought they had died and now they are a foot tall. Yippee! Massive abundance of forget me nots everywhere! Last year my lettuce overwintered in the open ground but have finally dug it up.

I think one may have poked its little head through the soil, Witzend.

DH said I'd overwatered them.

ArtySue a question for you (oh, that rhymed )

I have grown sugarsnap peas before now and they only grew to about 2-3 ft. However, this year I seem to have ordered mangetout - will they need a rack like a bean rack? There's no indication on the packet how tall they will grow. Would a wigwam shape be suitable? Do I need a net for them?

So many questions, sorry

Are your mangetouts called sweet sahara by any chance? If so they don`t grow tall and just need something to support them, maybe crumpled up chicken wire or a simple system using angled canes tied at the top in a row and some stretched out hemp pea support. I say hemp because it is very easy to handle and tie onto supports

I have almost finished planting out, the sweet peas, cosmos and bergamot yesterday and I moved some unhappy hellebores. The bean sprouting method on kitchen roll has worked fab, they are in rootrainers now and very green very quickly. I have only one marketmore cucumber, the others were a complete failure and it is not self fertile. I am expecting more seeds from dt brown but not for at least a coule of weeks. I am going to try and get one more marketmore to grow and this time, again, on kitchen roll. I finally got the squash seeds to sprout this way and now have 2 healthy squash plants. No lemon balm seedlings, also a complete failure

I haven’t needed to sow seeds for several years as we had a lovely bloke with a stall at the Farmers Market who sold plug plants.

This year I’ve filled most of my trugs, pots even old horse feed buckets with compost (with shingle at the bottom as there’s no drainage) and planted loads of veg seeds. Peas, carrots, leeks and salad stuff are all through and the broad beans (special ones for containers) are just showing. Tomatoes have been repotted and are doing well.

But - the nasturtium seeds I put in seed trays for the hanging baskets, as I can’t get anything else, haven’t appeared. I dug one up and it has swollen but no sign of roots or shoot coming. Does anyone know how long they take?

Oh, thank you, craftyone, I will check tomorrow. I've washed the pots ready to sow them tomorrow rather than straight in the ground.

I've just read that peppers are difficult to germinate, they require a warm temperature day and night.

We can't find anywhere near here that has anything in stock so may have to improvise.

callistemon, I put my pea seeds onto folded kitchen roll about 6 inches wide, when most seeds had sprouted I made a shallow channel and slid the whole length in. Good result, they are now growing away

There has been 2 fantastic days of solid rain here and the ground is well and truly watered and 2 water buts are almost full. I am very thankful that the beans, cosmos and sweet peas in the ground look very healthy, even if a bit colder at night.

Tomorrow I am transplanting medium cabbages out to their final position in a square 1m raised bed, all under butterfly net on hoops. Cabbages are duncan and red alert. The 2 purple sprouting seedlings and 2 red drumhead are thriving in the ground in the potager area. I might have to bite the bullet and just bung the 2 red russian kale in wherever I can find a space, certainly there is no room for any more cages. I am trying to keep brassicas, the ones intermingled in my potager, to the right side so I have some semblence of a rotation next year

Thanks craftyone
It's got much colder here too. I think everything DH sowed in the ground and the greenhouse is coming through though.
I obviously haven't got green fingers.
On the bright side - the strawberries I moved last year, plus some from a neighbour, look as if they might do well!

Yours all sounds very organised.