You folks are my new favorite forum!

15 years ago

OK - My eyes are bleary from reading archive pages and you've all convinced my that I really need to winter sow this year. Thought I'd introduce myself and say howdy.

I live in rural southeast Ohio. We have 15 acres, 8 goats, a cow, two dogs, several big vegetable gardens, 220 five gallon buckets (so far) of vegetable plants growing, and finally this year I've got three big and two small flower garden beds going.

We grow most of our food and the vegetable growing has been our biggest garden priority since we moved to the area in 2002. We've got horrible soil, but a big beautiful compost heap and just this year found a big supply of free five gallon buckets so we finally have a way to get better production and moisture control on our food crops.

That left me with some poor soil, flood/bake/flood/bake again garden beds that I could use for flowers this year.

Between indoor seed starting and outdoor spring sowing (into 3 inch pots) I got myself about 600+ flower plants this year. My priority was heavy flowering reseeding annuals and establishing some flowering perennials that would be beneficial for companion planting with the veggies. The whole goal of this year's flower growing was to get some perennials established, and get some nice stands of annuals set up so I can seed save large amounts of seed.

All of the plants I am most interested in growing seem to be the ones that the winter sowers have great success with! So after reading and reading old post you've convinced me that this is how I need to start my seedlings next year.

In addition to winter sowing, I'm very interested in growing fairly hardy, self seeding, annual and perennials that aren't poisonous to livestock animals. I'd like to be able to collect pounds of seed from my flower garden each year to seed out on the land in late winter/early spring when we have a chance of having enough ground moisture to get plants started there. Sure, the goats and cow will eat most of them - but if I throw enough seed out there I should end up with a bloom or two left long enough for me to enjoy it. :)

I am so excited about winter sowing and about this forum. It's nice to see people in Ohio having such great success with the method. Since we moved here we've been told repeatedly that the weather "isn't usually like this" and it's always either flooding, baking, drought, or the worst whatever sort of weather in 40 years. And Ohio winter sowers are growing stuff in abundance. Wow.

You've all actually given me hope that I might be able to get echinacea started after all. I just stocked up on my flower seeds for next year during the Thompson and Morgan 1/2 price sale a few weeks ago and didn't buy echinacea because of having so many years of no luck with it. I might have to think about one more little seed order before the sowing season starts and winter sow it.

I am really looking forward to having winter sown seedlings coming out my ears next year!

Lynda

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Comments (16)

proudgm_03
15 years ago
Welcome Lynda! You have come to the right place. The people on this forum are the best of the best. Any questions that you have they will be glad to answer. Be sure and save your seeds so that you can join the madness of seed trading! Sounds like you have room to grow whatever you want and with seed trading you can try just about anything!
kqcrna
15 years ago
Lynda: Welcome to wintersowing and the friendliest forum.

Some WSown flowers (echinacea and some ruds is second year, Butterfly weed 3rd year, petunia first year)
{{gwi:418184}}

Karen
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pitimpinai
15 years ago
Lynda
Welcome to the WS forum and the most fun winter activity of all.

Echinacea? Perennials?

Boy, I dug a lot of those out and had to compost more than half of them because my Freeclycling friends could not take them all. I still dig a lot of them out as I get around to work in the garden what with this change of weather and those d... mosquitoes.

If you would like some of those divisions, let me know. I can mail boxes of them to you early next spring. I have all kinds of plants...practically more than half of what Bluestone carries.
carrie630
15 years ago
Welcome and be prepared to be addicted to both this forum and wintersowing! We love newbies - keep posting and we love photos too

Carrie
bakemom_gw
15 years ago
Lynda, those seeds are packed and ready to go. Enjoy!
littleonefb
15 years ago
Lynda,

Welcome to the crazy world of WS and all the fun you are going to have. It's non stop fun on this forum. Lots of info, lots of us are experienced and most of all we love "our newbies".

Start saving all those containers now and stocking up on potting mix for the winter. You will need tons and tons of containers and soil.

Next step, save those seeds and join the other crazy world of seed exchange. Won't take you long to get addicted there too.

Oh, yes, don't be afraid to ask questions, any and all questions. Never feel that any question "might be dumb".
As my grandpa always said "the only dumb question is the one that was never asked."

Looking for your posts here and your trades on the seed exchange.

Fran
caavonldy
15 years ago
Lynda, welcome to WS. I have learned that these are the nicest people of all the GW forums. I was a newbie this year and I was treated so well. You won't believe the wonderful "newbie" packs of seeds that bakemom sends out.
Donna
wendy2shoes
15 years ago
Amaranth! (That's all I have to say).
Wendy
p.s. I have lots of seeds. The big red doofus in my garden.
{{gwi:418186}}
lynnencfan
15 years ago
Lynda - welcome to the wacky wonderful world (our very own WWW) of WinterSowing - once you experience it you will never look at gardening in the same way again. Everyone here is so willing to help, share and encourage - it is great. Post pictures - we LOVE pictures

Wendy - what is the name of that Amaranth?? - Marvel Bronze?? - it is gorgeous - what a great background plant.....

Lynne
lgslgs
Original Author
15 years ago
You all are so pleasant!

I love the photos of your gardens, and spent this morning getting some photos of mine to show you all. They aren't winter sown, but I figure that the future site of winter sown seedlings is not too far off topic.

I'll start a new thread an let you all enjoy the grand tour.
evonnestoryteller
15 years ago
I love that Amaranth too! I have little summer pointsettas growing, but they are apparently very tasty to something!!!

I enjoy this forum too. It is always hopping!
loveofmylife680
15 years ago
I wandered on this forum at the end of winter and love it. Still learning alot so I do not post much here[just lurk]. Love all the info and pictures of everyones success.
Jill
vera_eastern_wa
15 years ago
Welcome!!

Just thought I'd drop a list of some toxic plants to livestock:

Lupine (all livestock)in cows it causes Crooked Calf Disease.
Amaranthus ...large amounts of older leaves can have toxic amounts of nitrates in nitrogen rich soils and oxalates in calcium rich soils; all species of Amaranthus.
Nicotiana (Flowering Tobacco)
Foxglove
Larkspur
Delphinium

All I can think of from the top of my head :)

Vera
lgslgs
Original Author
15 years ago
Thanks for that list, Vera.

I knew about some of those, but it's sure good to see what else to watch out for.

I've got seedling nicotiana going now, so those plants, seeds, and end of season trimmings will be ones that we keep outside of the fenced part of the land. I've also got a pack of lupines in the seed box so we'll be sure to be very careful about where those get planted and how we handle any yard waste from them.

Two that we have that aren't on your list are Four O'Clocks and rhubarb. I'd love to be able to free range both of those, but they are going to have to remain "outside the fence" plants for us.

Oh - and there's rhododendron. That one is so horrible for goats that we won't even have it outside the fence. It's an "eradicate on sight" plant for us. It has the double whammy of being very toxic, and also being the only bright splash of leafy greens in a winter landscape. A lot of people with goats have tragic things happen if they have rhododendrons anywhere that a goat can spot them.

Lynda
caroline_2008
15 years ago
Some time ago some one said moonflowers were toxic to cattle
littleonefb
15 years ago
here is a partial list of toxic plants that I had when my kids where little.
This list has a toxic list number of 1 meaning that it is major toxicity.

By googling toxic plants you will get a mass list of links to check out but this one in particular I like because of it rating of toxicity with each plant listed

angel trumpet
azalea
belladona
carolina jasmine
cardinal flower
chinese lantern
datura
delphinium
flowering tobacco
foxglove
heather
healiotrope
hydrangea
jimeson weed
lantana
larkspur
lily of the valley'
lobelia
love in a mist
love lies bleeding
lupin
monkshood
morning glory
night blooming jasmine
pampas grass
periwinkle
rhodedendron
tomato non fruit part
vinca

This didn't mean that I didn't grow any of these plants when my children where young, it's just that I was super careful about where they where located and planted them in areas that my kids would be near only with supervision.
I also didn't have pets or livestock that could get into them.
The kitty was and still is always a house pet. Too many wild animals around in the woods that would love to have her for a meal.

Fran

Here is a link that might be useful: UC Davis list of toxic plants

You folks are my new favorite forum!

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