A Cheap & Easy Way to Start Flowers

Having flowers around us profoundly changes our mood and enhances our lives. Everyone deserves access to them. But unfortunately it can be hard to fit a weekly cut flower purchase into every budget.

In order to help ease the gap and help create flower equity we are exploring low/no cost ways of getting more flowers in your life.

This first one is timely to the season- it’s winter sowing!

You’ll Need:

• Transparent plastic jugs or bottles (light has to be able to get to the seedlings)

• Potting soil (soil from your garden or compost will not work well)

• Seeds (Suggestions below)

• Scissors or a sharp knife (to cut the jugs)

• Duct Tape

Start with the bottles

Take the clean, trasparent bottle and cut it in half, so that you have a top and bottom.

And stab some holes in the bottom for drainage. I like to do a few on the bottom of the jug and one on each bottom corner, so that if the jug is sitting on the ground it can still freely drain.

It’s easier to tape them back together if you leave the top and bottom connected a little bit.

Wet your soil

If your potting mix was anything like mine it’s super dry and hydrophobic = it actually resists water at first.

Take your time and get your potting mix nice and wet. Seeds won’t germinate in dry soil.

If you water the jugs after you sow the seeds you will displace the seeds.

Fill the jugs with soil

Fill the bottom of the jugs/bottles with moist soil, or moisten the soil in the jugs as I did.

If you moisten the soil in the jugs and your soil is super dry be sure to stir the soil- the top layer will get wet but the rest will likely still be surprisingly dry.

Sow your seeds

Before sowing your seeds read the instructions on the packet- some seeds want to be covered, and others do not.

This is critical information, usually the seeds won’t germinate if they aren’t getting this fundamental need met.

When covering them only use enough soil to just cover them.

Press the seeds gently into the soil for good contact.

Great overview

Here is a great overview of the process from Sandia Seed Company.

I love their insight about melting holes with the hot end of a glue gun.

What we’re Winter Sowing

We are winter sowing the things that dislike our tender care and affections = that don’t start well for us inside.

• Ammi (Dill)

• Bells of Ireland

• Bupleurum

• Nigella (Love in a Mist)

• Orlaya (White Lace Flower)

But I hear of people starting things like tomatoes this way too! There is a great Facebook group for Winter Sowing, those folx are pros.

Questions? Insights? Results you’d like to share? Tag us on social media, @tova.cotton or send us a message! ♥️