I just love cottage gardens, filled with perennial flowers. Lately, I’ve been starting perennial plants from seed indoors – getting ready for spring!

In these bleak days of winter, I’ve been keeping myself busy by planning my summer garden. Actually I’ve been doing more than just planning – I’ve been planting it! I’ve been planting perennial flower seeds indoors. How are you keeping busy this winter?

Our Southern Ontario garden is chock-full of flowers in the summertime – currently it’s covered in snow. But on these snowy days I fantasize about more flowers. Our cottage in “near” Northern Ontario, desperately needs me to plant more perennial flowers next spring – so I am getting ready to head north with another truckload of plants!

Why Grow Perennials from Seed?

It’s true, most people plant garden flowers from plants purchased at the garden centre. I will definitely grab a few more this spring – but I never know what they are going to have available by spring – and I am planning NOW. Every year I miss out on finding the plants that I really want! Plants have become crazy expensive too – have you noticed? I know we were supposed to have had 10 or 11% inflation this year (don’t get me started!!), but I think garden plants had 200% inflation, don’t you?

Starting my perennials from seed this winter:

• gives me a new hobby
• helps me to plan my garden now
• ensures that I have the plants that I want
• theoretically should save some money, but in reality I’ll still buy just as many plants in the spring………

Dividing Perennials

I love that perennial flowers come back every year, and that I can divide them to make more plants. Most nursery grown perennial plants are grown from divisions or “clones”. This means that the new plant will be the same as the parent plant. 

For the last few years, I have divided each and every perennial from my Southern Ontario garden, and brought their clones north to our summer cottage garden. Most of the plants have been successful, but I really need to fill a few acres with plants.

Plants like my hostas for example, have all been divided to the nth degree – and they do take a few years to recover, so seed starting my hostas will hopefully expand my crop.

Open Pollinated Flowers

Perennial flowers in the garden are open pollinated by bees and hummingbirds – so that the seeds produced by each flower may not be true to the parent. That’s OK with me – I love to see new varieties! I collect seeds from my favourite plants in the fall, dry them – and plant them indoors in the winter.

(Open pollinated flowers are pollinated naturally by bees, birds or wind – and may be cross pollinated with other plants in the area)

Disadvantages of Starting Perennials from Seeds

• The seeds of perennial flowers may not be true to the parent plants
• It’s harder to find perennial seeds for many plants because growers can’t guarantee seeds grown outdoors
• Perennials grown from seed may not bloom in the first season
• Perennials grown from seed may take longer to mature
• Seed starting trays take up a lot of room in my house!

But I’m up for a challenge!

Last Years Crop

Last year I grew blanket flowers, lupins, yarrow, coreopsis and wild bergamot from West Coast Seeds. (I also grew herbs and vegetables and lots of other plants. I’ll be starting those again soon – but not quite yet.)

My favourite plants were the lupins and blanket flowers – they both germinated well and survived transplanting – and the blanket flowers bloomed all summer. I am looking forward to seeing what survived the winter and hopefully there will be second year blooms from the lupins!

This Year’s Planting

As soon as our crowd of young adult children left after the holidays – the dining room was taken over by seed starting trays. Sorry family – no more dinners at the table ‘ til spring! I cleaned out all of last year’s seed starting trays with a bleach and water solution and filled with seed starting soil mixes. I can’t say that I’m happy with my soil mixes – Miracle Gro was OK – but has a bit too much bark or coir (coconut fibre) in it – my smallest seedlings have trouble pushing bits of bark out of the way! Fafard Agro Mix for seedlings and sprouts had a little less coir – but it came with moss and tiny weeds – that I assume are alfalfa.

Do you have a favourite seed starting mix?

The Plants:

This year’s perennial starting experiment includes – Coneflowers, Rudbeckia, Coreopsis, Veronica, more Lupins and Blanket flowers, Red Monarda, Dianthus, Maiden Pinks, Maltese Cross, and a few more! I have provided a list of my results (so far) below – with notes! Hope this helps anyone that is interested! 

All results are without cold stratification or scarification of seeds. Seed trays are in a warm room with some sunlight – no fancy setup!

• Purple Coneflowers – seeds from my garden – germination in 8 days – 20% germination rate – but sturdy, not fussy sprouts – require sunlight to germinate, very shallowly planted – cold stratification should improve rate of germination

• Rudbeckia – seeds from my garden – germination of only 1 sprout in 10 days – require sunlight to germinate and so were shallowly planted – cold stratification should improve germination rate
• Hosta – seeds from my garden – 15 days – 30% germination – I’m pretty excited about these – but the little sprouts are VERY slow to grow – didn’t need sunlight to germinate, could have benefited from cold stratification, would have preferred a finer soil mix

• Blanket flower – seeds from my garden – 90% germination in 3 days – happy little sprouts don’t mind being too wet or dry! – require sunlight to germinate – so very shallowly planted

• Veronica – seeds from my garden – very tiny seeds like dust – broadcast over the surface of the soil – 5 days to germinate in sunlight – very good germination rate of very tiny sprouts – sprouts are no fuss – but taking time to grow!

• Coreopsis – seeds from my garden – 5 days to germinate in sunlight – the seeds like to be pushed lightly into the soil so that they root properly – suffer from damping off if too much moisture
• Red Monarda – seeds from Revival Seeds – in Nova Scotia – I love bee balm and really wanted some bright red ones – and found them at Revival Seeds! – Germination in 6 days – tiny seeds and tiny sprouts but good results!
• Antirrhinum – seeds purchased at grocery store from Mr. Fothergill’s seeds labelled as perennial – these are just annual snapdragons – they are tender perennials in other climates – but not mine – (Note to self – bring reading glasses to store next time!!) – germination in 3 days – great germination rate – lots of little sprouts
• Dianthus – Sweetness Dianthus from West Coast Seeds – tiny seeds and tiny sprouts – germinated in 3 days – some damping off or wilting – not sure which!
• False Sunflower – seeds from my garden – 7 days to germinate in sunlight – not a great germination rate – lots of damping off – but transplanted easily
• Lupins – purchased Russell Hybrid mixed from West Coast Seeds – 1 day to germinate – great germination rate! - first plants to knock the clear cover off of the seed tray and form true leaves! – wilt when dried out but no damping off – a bit tricky to pot out – wait for two or three true leaves and make sure the tap root is not damaged

• Maltese Cross – I wanted to try another red perennial – found these at Revival Seeds – germination in 7 days – lots of little sprouts – but fussy to transplant
• Maiden Pinks – from McKenzie Seeds -4 days to germinate – lots of little sprouts
• Peony – seeds from my garden – no germination yet
• Rose – seeds from wild roses – no germination yet
• Purple Sage – seeds from my garden – 50% germination in 6 days – not fussy sprouts
• Penstemon Rocky Mountain – seeds from OSC – 5 days to germinate and they look sturdy already
• Lavender Vincenza Blue – seeds from OSC – 3 days to germinate – 90% – but they are little tiny things so far. I am hoping to find a hardier variety – as these are hardy to zone 5

I am most excited about growing hostas and veronica from seed – as I really would love to have more of them – and last year I couldn’t find seeds to purchase – so I began seed harvesting from my own garden. I’m also excited to have some new red plants (Maltese Cross and Monarda). So far things are looking pretty green in my dining room, and my husband has caught me a few times talking to the seedlings. The family would probably like the dining room back – but I know they’d probably just put ice fishing equipment out there anyway.

Can’t wait to pot up all of my seedlings – and get started with my vegetable seeds. If you are thinking of starting some perennials from seed – why not give it a try? You need to have some room and a fair bit of patience, but you should have good results. If you have any questions at all – or garden advice to share – I’d love to hear from you!

Take care and happy February! 

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