Search - Articles

This has been a better week despite the weather. The days are getting longer, the light levels are increasing, the sun has shone off and on and the seedlings are emerging.Our nasturtium seedlings will be beautiful flowering plants at the Chelsea

I'm forever sowing vegetable seeds at the moment, and when I'm not sowing vegetable seeds I'm pricking out seedlings, both on my allotment and on the vegetable patch at work.I always seem to be behind, however, and last year I completely forgot

outside, due to the cold, frosty snap a couple of weeks ago. The seedlings have started to pop up, producing their strange, grass-like seed leaves. It's staggering to think these fragile babies turn into something so gigantic.It all goes to show what a

to be scattered onto the surrounding soil when the pods eventually ripen and split.There isn't much bare soil around my hellebores, but somehow a rash of seedlings always develops. I can then delve in with a trowel and transplant them to fill gaps around

easily, like mustard and cress, so I always sow them straight away. Just sprinkle onto the surface of moist compost, and don't cover them. The seedlings are tiny, so let them grow to a manageable size before pricking them out.Left to their own devices, it

Once spring is sprung it really does get going! My plot is a mass of potato leaves creeping out over the mounds of ridged earth, seedlings sprouting sturdily out of the ground almost as I watch. But of course, there's a hearty selection of common

to wait until these are ripe before collecting seeds. In addition to agapanthus I've regularly developed viable seeds on eucomis and galtonia, too. These can be collected and sown, but you'll need patience if you want these to flower, as seedlings of most

with high-wire training to get to those gloves and no doubt the next generation is already in training, well fuelled with seedlings and seeds! They are driving me wild, but you know, somehow I just can't bear to do anything too drastic to them!

with an inflated clear polythene bag, held in place with a rubber band. If sown in seed trays, cover with a propagator lid. The seedlings are ready to pot up singly when the second pair of leaves appear (as shown).By mid May the young plants will be ready to go

, but nothing germinated. This year I grew three seedlings from seed sown in the greenhouse in April. Slow at first , they soon developed into strong climbers, so tall split canes were pushed into the pots for support. By early June they were about a meter high