Another way to grow from seed

This way is easy, needs few supplies, costs next to nothing, and provides more plants than you can use.

It is called winter sowing and this is the website:
http://www.wintersown.org/

The basics are: in the winter prepare your containers. Mine are plastic water jugs which I get out of the recycling bins in my neighborhood.
Cut them almost in half, so the top is attached by a little piece.
Put holes in the bottom. Fill with soil. Plant seeds.
Swing the top back across, leave it open. (no cap)
Put outside. Leave outside under 10 feet of snow, or whatever weather conditions are.
In the spring, plants will bloom.
Plants are very hardy and disease resistant.

The website has more details, and there are many different kind of containers you can use.

ellen

Not sure how this work with fungi, as I haven't read of anyone using the method with fungi. But it works with vegetables, and flowers, herbs. I recently discovered that using this method it is easy to grow lavender for instance. And the germination rate is usually so high, I end up with more than I can use and give them away.

Cool!!!  Think I'll go out and start my garden! 

i snow sow a lot of things here in Michigan..the best one is grass seed if you happen to want grass..if you have a bare area or a thin area, throw the grass right on top of your first lasting snow and in the spring it will grow..you can do that with hardy wildflowers, lettuces, etc..probably any hard seeds I would guess

the difference between this and WS is that in WS we create mini-greenhouses, so can do almost any seeds, not just hardy.

Also keeps the birds from eating them, altho don't know if in snowy Michigan, birds are a problem. 

For me, the best part is that in the middle of winter, when I despair of Spring coming again, I can get my hands dirty, and create something to look forward to.

Brenda Groth wrote:
i snow sow a lot of things here in Michigan..the best one is grass seed if you happen to want grass..if you have a bare area or a thin area, throw the grass right on top of your first lasting snow and in the spring it will grow..you can do that with hardy wildflowers, lettuces, etc..probably any hard seeds I would guess

This looks intriguing.  I think I will try this in January.  Thanks for the tip.

I tried this last winter.  Most of my seeds germinated very well, with things like spinach and kale coming up in February.

The challenges of doing this in the PNW were the critters.  Slugs liked to hang out in the containers; and curious deer liked to tip them over.