Seed storing and planting, and houseplant TLC
by David Tarrant
Winter time for gardeners is dream time – having put the garden to bed we turn to our gardening magazines and all the wonderful gardening books available to make great plans for the season ahead. One good hands-on activity coupled with this planning would be to review your seed collection. Many of us have seeds left over from last spring, or may have some freshly collected from the fall. Hopefully they are all labelled well and safely stored in a sealed container in the crisper drawer of your fridge. Take them out on one of these gray, wintry mornings and make an inventory list so that you will know what not to re-order when the seed catalogues come in January or you check your eseeds list.
If you have some shrub or tree seeds and you are chomping at the bit to play in the soil, fill a few pots with potting soil and sow the hard dry seeds of maples, roses and oaks, to name a few. Bury the seeds about half an inch deep covering them with some coarse sand which will prevent mosses and liverworts from growing on the surface. Label the pots and place them out in your cold frame where they can freeze a bit over the winter months, which will trigger them into sprouting come spring.
With houseplants, one of the most difficult elements they have to deal with indoors is the lack of humidity in the air. So brown tips on leaves become even more pronounced during the low light months of winter. Try standing your pots on saucers of clean pea gravel keeping them topped up with water just below the surface of the gravel. If you are worried about the water going sour, add a little crushed charcoal to the gravel. As the water evaporates it will add humidity to the plants immediate growing area twenty-four hours per day. For the best results the saucer should be one and a half sizes larger than the diameter of the pot. In Europe, it is possible to purchase plant trays to custom fit indoor window ledges. Daily misting from a spritzer also helps. Try to turn your pots around at least every two weeks to prevent them from becoming lopsided growing towards a light source.
Some of us go away for winter vacations and have to leave plants unattended for a week or two. To keep them happy, water each one well, then place them close together inside a big clear plastic bag (the type you get when you bring clothes home from the dry cleaners). When full of plants, seal the top and leave them near a window. The bag works like a giant terrarium and sometimes the plants do better in there than with your regular care!