The April cutting garden: seed sowing heaven
Its all go in the garden now, its unstoppable and April is certainly changeable in its weather, we have had heavy showers and hail occasionally, beautiful sunshine and warm days, then sharp frosts and strong winds and storms. It keeps us on our toes. The fleece is out many a night at the moment giving a bit of extra protection to my half hardy annual seedlings in the greenhouse. To be honest I’m glad its stayed fairly cool as it means the bulbs have lasted well this year. The tulips are still looking glorious and the later Narcissus are scenting the area around my potting shed beautifully. I keep bringing in a bunch for the house too and they are by my desk that I do Higgledy orders on and they are just beautiful.
So yes after my brief seed sowing guide in last months blog, its all about the pricking out, potting on and planting out now. Though I have actually only just done my last lot of seed sowing which was the later flowering half hardy annuals like Zinnias and Sunflowers. There is still plenty of time for seed sowing if you haven’t started yet. Seeds sown now will germinate quickly and grow quickly and will be fine for planting out at the end of May into June. So please don’t worry if you haven’t sown, but het started soon. This month I’ve been busy pricking out my Cosmos seedlings, Phlox ‘Creme Brulee’, Larkspur, Daucus carota ‘Dara’, Lavatera ‘Mont Blanc’, Rudbeckias and Calendulas
The Zinnias and Sunflowers are on the windowsill in my front bedroom and they are just starting to germinate now. They will get moved out into the greenhouse as soon as they have germinated as there is much better light in the greenhouse and I don’t want them to get too leggy. But that is also why I have the fleece on hand for the cold nights that we have had recently, including quite a hard frost last week. It just gives some extra warmth to my Cosmos seedlings and Tomato plants. There is a lot of juggling of stuff to make space for the new seedlings, anything hardy can be hardened off and brought outside now.
The autumn sown annuals like Cornflowers, Corncockle, Orlaya and Candytuft ‘Crown’, are all settling into their beds now, they went in at the end of March. They are often much sturdier plants and will flower just that bit earlier for you. But you can still sow these now. I’ve planted a few Nigella, Cerinthe, Salvia ‘Oxford Blue’ some Ammi visnaga and Snapdragons have just been planted this week. These have been pinched out to make bushier plants, for more information on why, how and when to pinch out your young plants have a look at this blog. Keep an eye on your new seedlings as they are a tasty treat for slugs, I’ve already lost a few seedling of Rudbeckia to slugs, its so frustrating. You will probably spot the culprit hiding on the seed tray or pot and chuck the blighter on your compost heap.
My Ammi majus are ready to be planted now too, this was from an early spring sowing so quick to grow.
The Ranunculus beds are bursting with flower stems now, I’m really happy with these plants especially as most are grown from claws that I saved from last year. In fact those ones are bigger than the plants grown from newly bought in claws. I can’t wait to start picking from these.
As far as flowers go in the cutting garden its all about the biennials now, the honesty has been beautiful this year, the patch is mostly self seeders, they have brightened up this part of my garden no end.
The Sweet Rocket is starting to bud now, here with a beautiful Orange Tip butterfly resting on it.
The wallflowers are just getting going.
There are lots of Forget-me-nots dotted around the garden, and still to come the Canterbury bells, Sweet William and Foxgloves. I just need to get going with picking some things now and thats the fun bit! Once the biennials start flowering in your garden its time to get your seeds order ready for sowing biennials for next year. May/June is the time to start sowing them so have plenty of flowers for next spring.
Happy sowing and growing
Higgledy Anne
(I’m on Instagram anne_hinks if you fancy a follow)