"Start Seeds in Pots?"
I know many gardeners start seeds in pots and enjoy considerable success. Fellow students in my horticulture classes seemed particularly adept at growing seed months before the plants were ready for the garden.
I, too, have struggled with grow lights (are they too close or too far from the seedling?), wick feeders and cells of soiless mix. Regretfully, this is NOT my calling. I prefer to haunt plant sales where folks sell the surplus plants they've grown from seed, cuttings and the like. Sure, it costs more, but I rationalize by telling myself the sponsoring organization is getting a chunk of the money I spend and I am supporting them this way.
By the way, if you are using grow lights, you don't have to pay up for the fancy full-spectrum bulbs. A very successful nurseryman told me that for every four standard florescent bulbs you use, add one incandescent bulb and "you will pretty much cover the spectrum the cuttings would need."
Still, I like the idea of growing from seed, so I've taken a page from nature and found plants whose seeds you can broadcast (not plant!) directly on the ground. Of course, now it is winter and that technique works best in the fall.
But, if you live where it snows, and much of America does, you can do what Joan Hoeffel does. She and her husband produce more than 500 varieties in their upstate New York nursery. She told me how she sows directly on the snow, particularly if there is more snow in the forecast. The second snow protects the seeds you just distributed from birds. She has had great luck in mid-January with columbine, gentian, shooting stars (dodecatheon) and anemone. When the snow vanishes in the spring, where she does this has "plants everywhere." It sounds like something fun to do on those winter days when you think there is nothing you can do in your garden.
A word of warning, garden author Lauren Springer gardens in Colorado pointed out that snow is not the same as ice. Sow your seeds on ice and watch them blow to the neighbors' yards and beyond.
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David Soper, The Garden Guy, writes and lectures on gardening topics.
Read more on his website, Adventures in Gardening, www.gardenguy.com