A Pocket Full of Seeds

By Ozhene @papaver
At last, the season has well and truly turned, frost is not such a threat (not impossible, but less likely) and the soil is starting to warm up.  Apparently farmers in th'old days used to test the temperature of the soil with their bare bottoms to gauge if it is was warm enough to plant yet.  Only a cynic might think that this was an excuse for when they got got caught, caught short, in the fields.  You will be relieved to know (but no where near as relieved as my neighbours) that this is not a practice I have tried.  I have, nonetheless, commenced sowing.
I sowed a few packets of seeds a couple of weeks ago and the propagator is now in full swing.  There are few things as magical as a propagator as they encourage seeds to zoom into life.  Today was a 'sow in the greenhouse' and 'direct sow outside' day.  It is not the last of the sowing days, but it is the peak time.  As you can see I had Esme helping me, she was on Bruce's bed but thankfully he did not notice.
Seed sowing is always a voyage of discovery, when I start to sort through the seeds I find the ones I have completely forgotten about.  I also find the ones I thought I had forgotten but thankfully had not. I find the paper bags like this one that contain a nameless seed pod.  Whilst the pod is nameless I do know exactly where it came from as it was from a plant my daughter bought last year from Crug Farm Nursery.  It is a nice plant and if these seeds germinate I shall be very happy and I shall make the effort to find out what it is.
This year I have direct-sowed more seeds into the borders than I usually do.  I am hoping that this will be successful.  In the past I think I have cossetted seeds that did not need cossetting and I suspect I have ended up with inferior plants because of this.  I will report back on how successful this has been. After a day of sowing I end up with a pocket full of seed packets.  I do this so that when I sit down at the end of the day I can record what I have sown, where and who I bought them from.  I can keep track of how things have done, I will record the successes and failures and this will inform next year's seed list.  After emptying my pockets of seed packets, I usually find I have a pocket of mixed remnant seeds, this does not make me so happy as I would rather have sowed them.
You might be wanting to ask what have I sown, well lots of stuff.  Mainly annuals. some very ordinary and some (I hope) a little unusual.  If the expected stars do become stars I will let you know. There is only one thing more exciting than sowing seeds (ok, lots of things, but in relation to seed sowing I mean); and that is the moment they germinate. All these potential blooms for later in the year, these little green sprouts just bursting with potential.  Let the season commence!