Sowing sweet peas late winter - 3 methods
I am a committed autumn direct sower of sweet peas. Straight into the ground, cool soil for months, long slow root run. It's what I’ve always done, and I've never had much reason to question it.
Until this year.
One of the ways to stay a good gardener - and stay excited about it - is to keep experimenting, even when you're settled in your ways. So when a recent extended holiday saw most of my autumn-sown sweet peas disappear while I was away, I decided to treat it as a chance to try something new rather than just a loss to mourn.
I still don't know exactly what happened. Snails are the obvious suspect. Inconsistent watering from my adult children, who were meant to be keeping an eye on things, is another possibility. There may also have been a party, and there may have been people sleeping in the garden. I'll probably never get the full story.
Either way, I didn't want to miss out on sweet peas this season. So I'm doing a late winter seed raising trial, with plants destined to go out after the last frosts. And because I couldn't just pick one approach, I'm trialling three different methods side by side, to see which ones actually earn a place in my routine.
Here's a quick look at each - full step-by-step over on Instagram.
Method One: Seed Raising in Cells
The classic approach. Deep cells (at least 12cm - I use forestry tube stock pots), damp seed raising mix, two seeds per cell, no soaking or nicking. Somewhere warm and sunny to germinate - mine sit on the bathroom underfloor heating before moving out to the greenhouse once they're up.
📲 Watch this one on Instagram → LINK
Method Two: The Fifi Faff
Borrowed from one of my students and named in her honour – Fifi is a very competent grower who does things her own way. Damp paper towel in a waterproof container, seeds pressed onto it, kept warm and damp until germination - with my twist on the original "faff" of a second layer on top.
📲 Watch this one on Instagram → LINK
Method Three: The Snail Method
Given the one of the suspect culprits in the autumn sowing disappearing act, there's a certain irony in trying this one - but here we are. A strip of waterproof material rolled up "snail" style with damp mix and seeds pressed into the top, then set somewhere warm.
📲 Watch this one on Instagram → LINK
Three trays, three methods, one autumn-sowing purist keeping an open mind. I'll report back on which seedlings make it to "planted out after the last frost" - and which method I don't bother repeating.
Which one would you try? Follow along on Instagram to see all three in action.