Growing in the New Year

Snug beneath a blanket of snow, springtime plants await their moment to burst forth in glorious bloom. But inside, spring has begun!

New Year’s Day was seed starting day. Yes, you read that right: January first I sowed my Lisianthus seeds and just two weeks later, I am rewarded by the appearance of tiny new plants I will coddle and fuss over for the next 7 or 8 months until they bloom. Of course, getting to blooming stage all depends on the weather and sooooo many other variables. There are no guarantees of success, that’s for sure.

You may be wondering if any flower is worth so much time and effort. For me the answer is an emphatic yes, and I think most flower farmers would agree. Lisianthus is a gorgeous ruffly creature many mistake for a rose, has an astonishing vase life of 10 (or more!) days, and comes in loads of ravishing colors. This one I grew last season is called “First Love”.

Spending 8 months on one crop just isn’t practical for bigger growers, so most flower farms buy plugs, perfect baby plants produced commercially on a huge scale, and shipped directly to the farm at the right moment for planting, which is a much better use of the farmer’s time.

I, however, have the time and the room on my heat mats and under my lights to make growing from seed workable. Plus, I like a challenge. So let me take you back a couple weeks to when I started my “lizzies” and catch you up to where they are today.

Lisianthus seeds are tiny, so they come covered in a coating (pelleted) that makes them much easier to see and handle. One by one, each tiny seed is transferred to a soil block via toothpick. The pellet must be dissolved before germination can happen, so the process begins with misting the seeds with water. To keep the humidity level high, the trays are covered with plastic wrap and then moved to heat mats and under lights until they germinate, which could take as many as 20 days. Each day they will be misted to continue to break down that pellet coating.

By about day 10 I start looking for signs of germination. By day twelve I think I see something but I literally have to get out the magnifying glass to check, and even then I’m not 100% sure because they are just that tiny. By day thirteen I can see impossibly small flecks of green and the magnifying glass reveals that yes, those are actually little leaves. That big wooden thing you see is the tip of a toothpick, for scale.

Day 14 reveals most seeds are germinating, which always strikes me as miraculous. The lizzies will stay put under the lights but no more heat mats since now those baby plants want a nice long cool period to grow gorgeous roots. Only 8 months to go!