Help setting up a backyard native plants nursery

Hey all,

I need to setup a small backyard native plant nursery to grow natives from seeds I'm collecting/buying. Most if not all of these plants need to sit out over the winter and be exposed to the elements in order to germinate. So fall sowing and hopefully they will germinate in spring. My question is how formal do I need to get with this? Can I just setup a simple table out in an open area with seed trays and just sow the seeds and let it go? Basically how much care do I need to give them? The less the better and I don't need full germination since these plants are just for my own use. That being said I would like to hit 30 to 50% germination which would still give me a ton of plants to plant out in the fall of 2021.

I'm building a simple greenhouse in my field fairly close to my house for veggie starts and I'm thinking about making a hardening off area next to it that would have shade cloth over it to provide a sheltered area. I thought about using this area minus the shade cloth for sowing native plant seeds and perhaps perennial veggies in general too.

What do you think? Any tips/advice would be greatly appreciated! Thank you!

What you're describing is basically the set up for the local native plant nursery in our area. A bunch of plants outside on tables, most things are planted out there in the fall. He's got a small greenhouse that he does some stuff in and an equal shaded area for hardening off

plan sounds pretty good. i've done a lot of over-the-winter stratification of seeds. just pots of soil (frequently with plastic with slits cut in it as a cover, so precipitation can get in but the seeds are somewhat protected. depending on how interesting the seeds are to rodents, extra protection may be needed. a lot of the herbaceous perennials you're playing with have pretty tiny seeds, though, right? shouldn't be too attractive.

Hi, Daron! I'm definitely not an expert, but I started winter stratifying seeds outside on a table last fall, with germination results about what you said you'd like. We have an outdoor kitchen of sorts with a large table (actually an old steel door on legs) in it. Its roof is a slatted metal gate to which we've wired the solar panels that power our outdoor cooler. So the table gets dappled shade almost like it's under a tree. We also attached some corrugated roofing metal to the west side of the enclosure to keep the strongest afternoon sun from heating up the cooler, and that protects the plants on the tables as well. Of course that afternoon sun isn't such a big deal in January, but by March or April it can already be a problem here where we are.

I started out with the seedling pots sitting directly on this table, watering them moderately, but eventually -- in the spring when some started to germinate -- rodents figured out how to get on the table, and then birds started to peck off anything from leaves to whole plants. I ended up crafting two hanging shelves wired to the roof of the outdoor kitchen, with low barriers around each of them to keep things from falling off. That kept them out of the rodents' reach, and it also makes things a little harder for the birds because there's not that much vertical space for them to fly in there and do damage. Sometimes we also do things like put old window screens over a tray or set of pots to keep birds off of particularly vulnerable pots, but eventually growing foliage means we have to remove these.

I'd attach pictures, but really none of this is very attractive, as it's all scrounged from our resource pile. But it's worked relatively well for us. I don't know how your rodent and bird pressure is there. Here it can get pretty intense when not much else is growing in the dry, windy heat of the late spring and early summer (as well as now, when our world should be relatively jungle-y, since our monsoon is the worst in anyone's memory). Ideally I'd create a more permanent and stable hanging shelf for our set-up and find some better solutions for non-invasive bird-proof coverings as needed.

Thank you all! Sounds like I should be able to get away with a simple system. All the plants I want to try have small seeds and I could make a simple mesh cover over the table to help protect them from birds/rodents. I will give it a go and see how it works out. It would be nice to be able to start growing my own native plants. I got a lot established now so it's fairly easy to collect seeds. I just ordered some seeds of a couple new edible native plants that I want to try but I haven't been able to find for sale as individual plants. Worth trying out at least!

I will post later what my setup ends up looking like and in the spring how it turned out.

Thanks again!

Hi there! I realize this is an older post, but I wonder how your nursery is doing? I had an organic farm for 7 years or so and started integrating native plants the last few years of it. I was stratifying in the fridge, the farm closed in 2021 just when I really wanted to stratify outdoors. I haven’t had garden space unfortunately, but will soon. How did the small seeds do germinating outdoors?

Natasha, welcome to the forum!

I prefer planting outdoors and have planted many small wildflower seeds outdoor.

I use a glass spice jar with a lid with very small holes.  I sprinkle the seeds on the ground then cover with fine starter mix using a strainer.  Then water.

best wish on your future garden.

I, like Anne mentioned, prefer to sow directly outdoors.
Many failed, but I did get some rugosa rose and seaberry to germinate last year.

I came across the "winter sowing" method this year and am going to attempt this winter.
Below is a YouTube video courtesy of Perma Gardens, which explains the history/concept/demo:


Happy growing!