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| Orlaya Grandiflora - sow right now indoors |
A reason to stop gardening? Not likely.
What we do right now can make all the difference to our summer gardens, and it can be done from the comfort of the living room with the heating turned up nice and high - providing that the non-gardener is out and all compost is hoovered up by the time he returns.
I'm starting to sow the first seeds now : Cosmos, Sweetpeas, and Cleome. If I can find what I've done with my little envelope of Orlaya Grandiflora they will go in as well.
The "Winston Churchill" sweet-peas to the left here were grown from five seeds in one large pot that I planted out without separating the plants. When we went on holiday we stripped the plant bare to give to neighbours and by the time we were back a week later it was floriferous again.
The seed has been saved from last year's annuals, the anti-slug devices will be crushed egg-shells and the pots are saved from year to year. Total cost about £1 for the sterile compost to get the seeds going and a bit of clingfilm to put over the pots.
For a few quid more I could change the scene completely every single year - my only limit that of my imagination and my ability to give the flowers the love they need. As they grow I will need to prick out, protect from slugs and marauding pigeons and then provide twiggy supports. I may need to water and I will certainly need to dead-head. This is not low maintenance gardening, but it is fun.
Annuals are flowers for those of us who refuse to grow up and do things the easy way.
Do you have a greenhouse, or will you be putting them on windowsills? There's not much I can sow indoors without them getting leggy - French marigolds are one that do fine which is just as well as I have to start them off in the propagator. I can't grow sweet peas as they seem to like damp climates! I'm doing loads of hardy annuals from saved seed this year but they'll just be sown in situ.
ReplyDeleteI would love to have a greenhouse if I had a sunny spot that I could afford to put it in without missing the sun!
ReplyDeleteSo I put them on windowsills and yes they do get leggy, so I end up turfing them out early with a bit of protection and hoping for the best. I am going to make one of those tin-foil surrounds to reflect the light back this year if I get the time to see if that helps.
And of course because I've saved my own seed it won't matter if I resow slightly later. The Cleome by the way is famously slow so that does need to go in soon.