I’m not a big fan of winter. I don’t ski (too clumsy), I hate being cold (I’m a Californian - we don’t do cold), and, most of all, I love to garden, which is extremely difficult when the ground is frozen. And really--frozen ground? What sort of hellish concept is that? Apparently I live on Pluto. So my challenge every winter is to keep from going crazy until I can play in the dirt. I do that by: - Reading garden porn (gardening books, magazines, and seed catalogs, preferably glossy and colorful, preferably read while in the bathtub)
- Playing in the snow
- Planning next year’s garden (the triumph of hope over experience)
- Walking through the garden department of every big box store in town and staring at the empty shelves with a pathetic look on my face, then checking for the 59th time to see if they have any seeds in stock yet
- Looking at the Flagstaff gardening calendar for the 812th time this winter, trying to find something fun I’m supposed to be doing in January (watering evergreens and sharpening shovels doesn’t count as, “fun.”)
- Dreaming up garden projects for my long-suffering husband to do when the weather is better (he doesn’t know it yet, but he’s going to help me dig a pond in the spring)
- Complaining about being cold
- Moping
When I lived in Portland, I had a greenhouse, so I could play with plants in the dead of winter. I had a greenhouse here in Flagstaff for about 3 weeks till it was destroyed by a dust devil (Yes, really. It was reduced to a pile of plexiglass rubble. So was my soul as I stared at that pile of shattered dreams.) I also tried winter sowing when I lived in Portland, and it worked pretty well. So, since I’m tired of complaining and moping, I’m replacing those two items on the list above with winter sowing.
What is winter sowing? Glad you asked! I’d hate to think I’m talking to myself over here. It’s a method of sowing seeds, usually perennials and hardy annuals but some trees and shrubs too, in miniature greenhouses in the winter. Then you put those miniature greenhouses--usually made from containers like milk jugs--out in the rain and snow and leave them there till spring. The seeds germinate when they’re ready, and you have a garden full of plants that cost you very little.
This is my first year winter sowing in Flagstaff. It may be trickier here than in some places, because we have some pretty wild temperature fluctuations in the winter. We’ll see how it goes. If you’d like to try it (hey, it beats moping and complaining), here are some resources to get you started:
- How to Winter Sow Seeds Outdoors, by Trudi Greissle Davidoff, who is credited with inventing this method. There are a bunch of other useful articles on her site too. This is the place to start if you’re new to winter sowing.
- Winter Sowing 101, by Kevin Lee Jacobs
- Winter Sowing FAQs from GardenWeb - an outstanding resource and the place where I first learned about winter sowing
- Winter Sowing--A Step By Step Guide - from Get Busy Gardening
I managed to sow a few things today: lupine, chives, and two kinds of milkweed. I’m using the patio table on my deck to store them. I hope to have it full of containers by spring, but it looks kinda pathetic now:
If you’re going to winter sow, you’ll need seeds. You can buy them, save them (from your own plants or a friend’s), check out a local seed library, or--my favorite--trade with other gardeners. Try hosting a winter seed swap with your gardening friends or trade seeds with people online. GardenWeb has seed swap forums, and some members of the Winter Sower’s Facebook group post their trade lists. If you’d like to trade seeds with me, just leave a comment on this post. Here are my current trade lists:
You'll also need containers. The sites listed above will give you lots of ideas for those. Right now I'm using containers from restaurant takeout and the Safeway deli. When my stash gets low, we'll probably start eating takeout or supermarket fried chicken for every meal--just so I can have the containers for winter sowing. Gotta love my priorities.
Good luck staying sane this winter, and just remember: spring is coming.
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