Winter Sowing

Free plants?? Well almost. Winter sowing is one of the cheapest and hassle-free ways to grow new plants. You get some seeds, put them in a little clear container with some dirt and stick them outside. Yes, outside now, in the winter. Then you forget about them until the spring when the start coming up. Here are the details:

Seed selection

Winter sowing works best with native plants. In Michigan the plants I’ve had the best luck with are Black-Eyed Susan (Rudbeckia hirta), Purple Coneflower (Echinacea purpura), Prairie Blazing Star (Liatris pycnostacha), Wild Lupine (Lupinus perennis), and grasses like Little Blue Stem (Schizadyrium scoparius). Native plants are especially good for this because they already have evolved to withstand and grow in the local conditions. By winter sowing you’re just giving them a little helping hand and maximizing the ratio of seeds that survive.

Planting medium

This is easy. Dirt. Just plain old dirt. I like to use fresh compost or the cheapest dirt I can find at a store. If you use dirt from outside just be aware that you may get some weeds or other plants, so you’ll want to know what your seedlings look like at early ages so you don’t accidentally weed out all the good seedlings.

Vessel preparation

I like to use old, clear plastic two liter pop or juice bottles. I tried milk jugs but didn’t get great results from them. With an exacto knife poke about four or five small holes for air around the top, then about two holes on the very bottom so that water won’t collect. Then cut the bottle nearly in half, leaving a little ‘hinge’. (see photo) It should go without saying that the pop bottle should be well rinsed before use.

Planting

Fill the bottle about a third of the way with your dirt. Place your seeds in the dirt (usually two times as deep as the seed is long is a good rule of thumb). I find it easier to do one plant type per bottle rather than mixing them up. Give the dirt a small splash of water (just so it isn’t completely dry), then tape up the bottle along the cut so it stays closed. I’ve had good luck with regular masking tape. Then write the name of the seed in permanent marker in a few locations on the bottle (the bottle cap seems to keep the marker the best).

Spring harvest

As it gets warmer out in the spring you’ll start to see little sprouts form. Around the first week of May I start to poke more holes in the top of the bottles. Then after about a week or two I take off the bottle caps. Then at about mid May, after the threat of frost is gone I untape the bottles. The hardest part of winter sowing is determining when the seedlings are ready to plant. I tend to get excited and plant too early, so I usually wait longer than I think they’d be ready. But usually it’s before June when you plant them. I just take some scisors and cut the bottle open so I can easily scoop out the dirt as a whole unit. Then you carefully divide them and plant them. Remember to water them a lot as they grow.

The first year

Some plants like Purple Coneflower won’t flower until they’re two years old. So, don’t get too worried if your yearlings don’t get too big or flower. They’ve got a lot of work to do that first year. You’ll find that some plants work better than others, so have fun and experiment.

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