[Cathers_99]

Hi!

Second year of my allotment, we bought seedlings last year, so thought wed grow from seed this time round!

So, I have my seedling pots and compost, and am raring to go.

I've read the packet instructions, but they aren't especially helpful with regards to the following:

I have the compostable little square pots. How many seedlings can go in each? I realise this depends on the seed size and plant. But generally speaking, I have got broccoli, calabrese, cucumber, lettuce, spinach, spring onion, rocket, sweetcorn.

Bar the sweetcorn, I've got between 200-1000 seeds in a pack!? I planted around 5 per pot of the broccoli, and quickly realised I was going to run out of pots. I've used about 5 pots for the calabrese. So I am confused. I don't want to over-seed and give my plants no chance, but equally I don't want to waste my pots!

Also in my mind is why are you given 1000 seeds in a pack?! Once opened I didn't think they kept well, but I really don't want to waste them, nor do I want to be over run with veg!

So, if you can help that would be great!  Thank you

[Totty]

Save those pots for things like sweetcorn, you can then just plant them out, pots and all. Regarding the brassicas, I would get some seed trays or even better, modules. There is not really any pot size ideal for all seed sowing. The brassicas I sow two or three in each module, thin to one, lettuces, spinach and rocket the same, if single plants are needed as apposed to cut and come again, in which case sow thicker where they are to crop. Cucumbers  I sow in a three inch pot of gritty compost. Sweetcorn straight into yo peat pots.

It's all a learning curve and you wil, over time, settle on doing things your own way.
 There will no doubt be people that do things differently to me, not to say either way is right or wrong, just horses for courses.

Totty

[BabbyAnn]

It works out as one plant per pot - but you can sow say 3 seeds and take out the weaker 2 leaving the strongest to grow on.

As for seed quantities - not all seeds will germinate so there will always be a surplus, but yes you are right in that they go overboard.  Many seeds will in fact keep for 3 or more years depending on the plant - for example, cabbage and broccoli will keep for about 5 years but some like parsnip have a rapid decline in viability and many people prefer to buy fresh every year (that is not to say all the seed are dead after one year)

Some vegetables are sown in succession - that is, sow a small row then wait 2-3 weeks and sow another small row usually starting in spring to about June/July so that you will have fresh veg over a long period rather than a glut in a short period    So the extra seed will come in useful.

As for how many plants you need, it comes with a little bit of experience - you realise after a year or two that you've either sown too many or not enough.  Not very helpful advice for now.  What you do need to do is work out the space needed between mature plants and how much area you can devote to a single crop.  Most cabbages and calabrese need about 18in - 2 feet apart (depending on the variety, the outer leaves of cabbages can spread out quite a bit)  Rocket, spring onions, lettuce and spinach can be squeezed in and probably better if sown direct rather than grown in a tiny pot.  This is where excess seed comes in useful when you thin out to give more space to the growing plants - you can use the immature plants as baby leaves/veg so nothing is wasted.

[mumofstig]

Here's a seed longevity chart, most seeds will keep for years if stored correctly
http://www.allotment-garden.org/vegetable/general/seed-storage-life.php
As already said most people use modules like these
they can be reused over a few years, and you can get them cheaply in places like Wilkos.


As for deciding how many to sow, think about how many of each you use - how many winter cabbages, say, do you actually eat over the winter months? That's how many you need to grow

[compostqueen]

You might be able to get some free trays and pots etc from Freecycle to get you going.  You can use those clear plastic fruit punnets from the supermarket to start your seeds off  (handily they come complete with drain holes) The mushroom placcy boxes are good too (you have to make holes in those with the scissors  )  Bog roll middles are great plant pots for the bigger seeds that like a long root run such as broad beans, sweet peas, corn etc and you can stand them up in the freebie mushroom boxes

So, you don't have to lay out much dosh for seed sowing 

Have fun with your sowings. Don't go mad and sow too many in one go though 

[Stree]

With regards to the high number of seeds in some packets:
I have been thinking about perhaps getting 2 or 3 other gardeners involved in a buy and share type arrangement.
IE: a pack of say Nicotiana with 1000 seeds would easily share between 4 people, and if the germination rate was for example 75% then there would still be just under 200 viable plants each given optimum conditions.
Same principle for seeds with smaller amounts, a pack of 25 capsicum seeds could still mean around half a dozen plants each, if more are needed by some members then buy 2 or more packets.
Work out the amount of packets required in total, split the cost 4 ways and that way with any luck there will only be one lot of shipping to pay for too....again divided 4our ways. All the more to spend on seeds!
Of course this would work for plug plants too, the larger amount are always cheaper per plug, but often far too many for a lot of gardens and gardeners.
Could work with bulk buy compost etc as well.
Anyone doing this already? I would be interested to hear how it works out in practice.