Seeds for 2019

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There must be gardeners who never grow things from seed, just like there are gardeners who don’t compost stuff. If gardening is about growing stuff you simply cannot get more engaged with the process than by sowing and growing seeds.

I have a list of the seeds I hope to be sowing in 2019. It divides neatly into vegetables and ornamentals. No doubt some of the vegetables would look good in the ornamental garden and I imagine some of the ornamentals may be edible but it’s not why I’m growing them.

Vegetable growing for me is firstly about getting decent crops. You can get hung up on heritage vegetables, or open source seeds or organic seeds, I have dabbled and feel mildly guilty for not embracing some or all of it more enthusiastically and there’s always next year and if it ain’t broke don’t fix it so I keep coming back to mainstream suppliers.

Ornamentals are more of a dilemma. There isn’t a lot of room in my garden so if I want a new plant I will almost always start with just one. If it proves itself I may propagate it or buy more. Buying one well established plant will cost more than seed but makes sense, the plant performs from the off and is much less likely to be a failure.

There are of course, many things available as seed that are not available as plants. Raising plants in significant quantities is cheaper from seed too. It’s not why I do it. I just love the sense of satisfaction that comes from producing a growing, flowering plant from a seed. It fascinated me as a child and it fascinates me still. If anything, the more I learn about the inner workings of plants the more of a miracle it seems to be. My list of ornamentals then is diverse. There will be failures but with luck there will be very rewarding successes too.

Here then is my 2019 seed list.

Vegetables, mostly from Kings or Seedaholic.
Beetroot Boltardy
Beetroot Barabietola di Chioggia
Beetroot Flat of Egypt
Beet, Leaf, Perpetual Spinach
Beet, Leaf, Rhubarb Chard
Broad Bean, Masterpiece Green
Broad Bean Bunyards Exhibition
Broccoli Rudolph
Cabbage Delight Ball F1
Cabbage Kalibos
Cabbage Red Drumhead
Calabrese Ironman F1
Carrot Marion F1
Carrot Resistafly
Celeriac Asterix F1
Celery Golden Self Blanching
Chicory Radicchio Palla Rossa 3
Courgette All Green Bush
Cucumber Carmen
Basil, Purple
Kale Redbor
Leek Blue Solaise
Lettuce Lollo Rosso
Lettuce Oakleaf Navara
Lettuce Salad Bowl
Onion Armstrong F1
Onion White Lisbon
Parsnip Tender and True
Pea Hurst Green Shaft
Pea Mangetout Shiraz
Pepper Long Red Marconi
Pepper Apache
Pepper Jalapeno
Pepper Orange Habanero
Radish Scarlet Globe
Radish Diana
Rhubard Glaskins Perpetual
Squash Walnut F1
Sweet Corn Earliking
Tomato Sungold
Dwarf French Bean Borlotto Firetongue

Ornamentals.
Own seed.
Dahlia Orange Cushion
Dahlia Kalinka
Dahlia Penlea
Lathyrus grandiflorus
Clematis recta purpurea
Primula prolifera
Primula japonica Apple Blossom
Cytisus Moyclare Pink
Hibiscus trionum
Arum italicum
Salvia ‘Royal Bumble’
Erodium manescawii
Habranthus brachyandrus
Pelargonium sp (ionidiflorum?)

Jelitto
Tulipa sprengeri
Erythronium dens-canis
Actaea pachypoda ‘Silver Leaf’
Corydalis solida
Primula sieboldii

Hardy Plant Society
Campanula rigidipila
Lychnis coronaria magenta
Papaver atlanticum
Crocosmia ex Lucifer
Francoa sonchifolia
Actaea pachypoda ‘Misty Blue’
Arthropodium cirratum ‘Matapouri Bay’
Campanula takesimana ex ‘Elizabeth’
Clematis viorna mixed colours
Codonopsis thalictrifolia
Corydalis solida mixed colours
Dactylicapnos ventii
Dahlia merckii
Epimedium ex ‘William Stern’
Euonymus cornutus var quinquecornutus
Ipomaea purpurea ex ‘Grandpa Otts’
Notholirion macrophyllum
Pelargonium dichondrifolium
Pollia japonica
Roscoea scillifolia f atropurpurea
Semiaquilegia ecalcarata
Sinopodophyllum hexandrum
Tagetes ex ‘Cinnabar’
Tropaeolum speciosum
Zephyranthes macrosiphon ‘Hidalgo Form’

Australasian Plant Society
Bulbine glauca
Libertia ixioides
Darwinia citriodora
Atherosperma moschatum
Astelia alpina
Stylidium laricifolium
Patersonia fragilis
Verticordia plumosa
Calytrix tetragona
Allocasuarina nana
Phaerosphaera hookeriana
Bulbine semibarbata
Diselma archeri
Arthropodium minus
Milligania densiflora

That should keep me busy.

Published by Jim Stephens

Gardener, no-dig allotmenteer, camellia enthusiast. I love colour, it cheers me up. Retired nurseryman.

11 thoughts on “Seeds for 2019”

  1. How funny that you mentioned that straightway. I happen to grow many things from seed in my own garden, just because it is so much easier and practical. I mean, there is no point in planting seedlings of pole beans or radishes (although they are actually available in nurseries). However, nothing at the farm is grown from seed. Everything there is cloned. Many people do not understand why or how, as if it is a completely foreign concept.

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      1. I am not presently working at the farm. I intend to get back, but it is so difficult to leave the work I do now. I enjoy it so much. I should have never left the farm.
        We grow only horticultural commodities. Rhododendrons had always been our main crops; but there are more camellias now. We grow what is suited to our particular situation, and grew rhododendrons for so many years because the deer do not bother them. We have been growing more camellias because the area is fenced now. Everything is cloned. We grow nothing from seed.

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      2. Right, all is now clear. With ornamentals over here, it is always a nursery, no matter the crop or the scale. I do grow some camellias from seed, mostly to use as stocks but also out of curiosity. Very few will set seed here.

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      5. What is the point of grafting them onto other Camellia reticulatas? We graft them onto Camellia sasanqua understock for better stability. If they could be grown on their own roots, I would just grow them from cutting like the other camellias. I suppose there could be an Camellia reticulata with good stable roots that I am not aware of.

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      6. The retic hybrids will root fine but the Kunming types, like Songzilin and Captain Rawes won’t. I thought the usual given reason for grafting onto sasanqua was that it was more resistant to Phytophthora. I have a copy of the propagation section of a book that the Kunming Institute produced and they seem to mainly use seedling reticulata in China.

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      7. So, those that will not root are grafted onto those that will. That makes sense. Phytophthora had not been a concern for us so far. For us, it was just a matter of the quality of the root system. I really do not know how stable the majority of the Camellia reticulata root systems are, but some of those that we grew on their own roots for our own stock plants are very wobbly. They are not the sort of plants that we would want to sell.

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