Last year, I winter sowed a lot of seeds and had a high success rate. This year, I don’t really need to sow anything but I’m thinking of moving some things around in my garden, adding some new edible wild plants, and I really like the process of winter sowing.
I like to buy and harvest seeds, making and preparing the mini greenhouses, the whole activity is fun. It’s fun just knowing that in a few weeks, little plants will start to grow because you provided the right environment for them.
So, this week, I got some potting mix, aluminum baking pans with lids, cut open some old milk jugs, went through my seed collection and sowed seeds of the following plants:
Wild strawberry
Stinging nettle (yes, we need more!)
Queen Anne’s lace (because I plan to make a lot of Queen Anne’s lace jelly this year)
Chicory (I’m going to put these together with the dandelions instead of a separate bed)
Shepherd’s purse (put these on several different spots in my garden, I just love the flavor of the leaves)
Wild lettuce
Wintergreen (they didn’t do so well last year)
Jewelweed (I’m going to put these where I had my Chicory last year)
Gooseberry
Evening primrose
Autumn olive (husband’s going to be mad lol)
Sowthistle
Dandelion (the more the better)
and I could have sworn I harvested a bunch of Burdock seeds last year for sowing but I couldn’t find the bag anymore, so I walked outside in the snow to harvest some more seedpods. The sun was shining and the light reflecting on the snow was so bright that it hurt my eyes.
I’m going to keep a close eye on my Chicory this year because I really want to grow Belgian endives from their first year roots.
Every book tells me that Chicory is a perennial and that it will not grow flowers in the first year, but all of my chicory plants had flowers in their first year and I couldn’t use their roots for growing Belgian endives. I tried but it didn’t work.
If my new batch starts growing flowers in their first year again, I will sow more seeds by the end of Spring, and see if that will keep them from growing flowers in the first year.
So, when I succeed I will show you how to grow Belgian endives.
