Are any Canadians interested in growing cotton?

Currently they are in just promix potting soil, inside under lights since it hasn't been conducive to growing anything outside here at the moment lol. Weather is looking better though so I think I'm gonna be moving them outside for a few hours during the day in the shade to start hardening them off. They aren't very big yet even though they are about 4 months old, little over a foot or so. Its possible it might be too little water, I have a bad habit of over watering my indoor plants, so I've been trying to hold back with them cause I don't want to kill them,

I started my seeds in potting mix on a heat mat maybe a month ago. I had a bit more than 50 % germination, but a few withered and died (including the bare seeded one ). They are all still on their first set of leaves, I want to keep them indoors for another week or two, but may transplant into larger pots now that most of the tomatos are out. I figure i will grow a few here in the front garden as a flower, and give a few to my dad as potted plants (he has an attached greenhouse, so can being them in for the fall if necessary).

Oh! I should mention that I had decent germination on the heat trays, but no germination without them, even after I moved those trays onto the heat mats later.

mine took close to a month before they grew any true leaves. I got 3 plants still going, but they are looking rough, should be able to move them out sometime this week, so hopefully they will perk up with better light and more space.

Well, I've got a few bolls on my plants, only have maybe a week or two left of growing season, maybe a little longer if I'm really lucky. Hopefully they are mature enough to produce some seed for next year.

I should update this as an utter failure for me. I planted my cotton in the hottest garden, the front, expecting it to need a lot of warmth. We had a drought, and I ended up needing to go away for a week for an emergency in the worst part of the drought, and my cotton all shrivelled up and died. I had been having a hard time keeping it alive in the heat even before the emergency. I begin to see why those infographics say cotton is a very water intensive crop!

Eldon Dore wrote:Well, I've got a few bolls on my plants, only have maybe a week or two left of growing season, maybe a little longer if I'm really lucky. Hopefully they are mature enough to produce some seed for next year.

'Cause I'm not sure what's best, I harvested a couple every week to find out which would work and which wouldn't.  

Another thing to try is to dig up one plant, prune it back, and see if it will survive as a houseplant over the winter.  I did this with my first few plants and it went well.  

Anyone else have any updates on 2020 Canadian Cotton?  There may be a prize.

I'm in! I live is South Eastern BC!

Zone 4 - 950m above sea level

I have a 1/2 acre I own and 5 acres I rent (zone 3 - 1000m).

Very late to this party, but would be interested in trying this in Cape Breton, if you've got any seeds left to spare.
I'm thinking not - the etsy link said sold out, but I thought I'd give it a shot here anyway.
Can't wait to get my hands on your book r ranson - sorry I was under a rock during your kickstarter!

The germination test I did this spring had them at 95% viable, but I'm hearing reports of much lower germination - 25-50%

Q. What is causing the lower germination rate for others?  I am waiting to hear back with details on how they were planted and what went wrong.  

This brings us to the big issue, I have shipped out nearly 50 packets of seeds, and heard back from maybe a dozen people.  I'm disappointed and need to review what is needed to make it easier for people to report back.  What I really needed is for them to report back their failures.  

I'm worried that this isn't being treated as a citizen science experiment, but rather as a source of seed.  This is walking a very tight line as I can sell seeds as farmgate and I can provide them as part of the experiment, but I'm in untested waters "selling" seeds online.  

I imagined that each participant would buy one packet, but I've had people buy half a dozen at a time.  Some of them I hear back that they are gifting to friends and family (WOOT!) and others I see the address are for florists or a plant nursery ( um...woot?)

Q. Are people actually interested in participating and are having trouble reporting back or are they just buying seeds?

Q. did the paper printout help or no?  (see attached)

The cost ended up being more than I expected.  Postage is okay, but the listing and processing fees on Etsy as well as the packaging were higher than I calculated.  So I upped the price a bit but I'm still losing a few cents each time.  But still, it's a lot less than buying cotton seeds from a US supplier.  

If I do this again, I would have to make it more economically sustainable.  


Anyway, I'm feeling a bit down on this project as it didn't achieve the goal of gathering more information about different cotton-growing experiences in Canada.  

There are only a few dozen seeds left and once this final listing sells on Etsy, I'm going to stop offering the seeds.  
It's one of those things I guess, try 200 things and maybe 1 of them might work out.  

Thanks to everyone who participated and reported back: You are awesome and appreciated!
If anyone does have extra seeds from their cotton, you could mention it here and maybe other people who want to participate could get in touch.

I just snagged the last one from your Etsy shop. I am really excited to give this a shot and report back!

Mahlon Barrault wrote:I just snagged the last one from your Etsy shop. I am really excited to give this a shot and report back!

awesomesauce!  It's packed up and will head out in the mail today or tomorrow.  
Happy growing.

Does Etsy allow you to send a survey to people who bought things?

Survey monkey is pretty good for that and free, if so.

Catie George wrote:Does Etsy allow you to send a survey to people who bought things?

No, I'm not allowed to contact them after the sale is complete except for very specific reasons.  A lot of it is consumer law stuff.  So I rely on the people to send their feedback.

If I were to provide seeds again, I don't think I would do it through etsy as there is no way to limit one item per customer.

I had hoped I could provide a packet per person at a low cost for those who cannot afford to buy cotton seeds from abroad.   I have a feeling that a lot of customers were treating it like I am selling seeds.  I felt like I was being taken advantage of with some people buying many many packets of seed.  They didn't seem interested in the citizen science part of the equation.  

Well I've just planted my cotton plants out this weekend. I've got 6 plants this year, three from seed I saved from my plants last year, two from some cotton I purchased online that still had the seeds in it, and one green cotton. Two of the plants from my saved seed already have some flower buds coming out, so here's hoping they actually set and I get a whole growing season for them to mature. My cotton that I grew last year I don't think fully matured, because I had a heck of a time getting the seeds to sprout, used up pretty much all of my saved seed to get the three plants I did.