My biggest lesson was that of plants for sale in the area showing "full sun". After losing a lot of plants, I realized that if it also showed partial shade, it was not a full sun plant in my zone 8. I have learned through the years that I can learn more from people than a book. Their experience was priceless. If you have gardeners in your neighborhood, find the ones that do the work themselves or you see giving detailed directions as their body can't do the work anymore. You will learn the basic soil in your area and hopefully information on your property as to whether the soil was worked or not - composted, tilled, fertilized, etc. You can also find out what grows well in your area. Keep in mind some will only recommend types of plants they are partial to. Just remember what they have to say. Take walks and see what is growing around you. People are proud of their plants and most will talk your head off. Again, as I recommended before, talk to the extension office for information and possibly getting the soil tested if necessary. They will also be able to tell you a little bit about the nurseries and whether a good source for quality plants at a good price. Hopefully, they may even give you some names of gardeners in the area you can talk to. Now last but certainly not the least - PLANT SWAP. In the spring and in the fall there is a plant swap usually in Birmingham. Great people, caring, giving, understanding and lots of hugs. You will see posts here about it. We trade plants for numerous items besides plants. People always need for their garden what you need - soil, potting soil, garden gloves, plant tags, compost, pots - ceramic, clay and plastic nursery pots, garden decor, windchimes, birdhouses and even had a lady trade jewelry she'd made, jams, jellies really just about everything. Just watch the forum around March for info on the spring swap. Now that I've put you to sleep, perhaps at least something I've said helps. WELCOME, sit down relax and have some tea. Lynn

LOL I live in zone 8 and I still start them babies in the house. I may try my hand at doing a few seeds as Jan did this past year. That's how I do my pro.'s, just snap them babies off and plant them next to their mama's. I figure this will make the clumps bigger a lot faster. Jan, my daffs are up and blooming too. I have several beds that are full of paperwhites and the smell will knock you out it's so strong. Ed, I'm so glad you have some more of your seedlings coming up. If you need more space I'll grow some seedlings for you here....if you supply the seeds are small plants. I'll keep photos and records and anything else you would need are want. But I would want one start of each seedling for my own use in my flowerbeds. LOL Well I've got too many irons in the fire right now, I've got to go plant a few more crosses I just got off the L.A. I wish someone would breaker the curser on my computer so I couldn't get on there. Each day I say "I'm not going to buy any more seeds" Each day, I lie to myself and go ahead and click on SOMETHING ON THERE.....lol Berrytea4 me, I sure would like to have a couple of Blue Spruce seedlings to try to grow here. Even if it is too hot, I'd like to try. Do they come up wild there like our pine trees do here in the Piney Woods of East Texas? WE need some new pictures of everyone's seedlings. I don't know how to put them on here or I would. Please don't anyone offer to teach me how. I've tried before and I'm HOPELESS. Happy Gardening and lots of beautiful daylily babies this summer.

Evonne, LOL, hope your greenhouse is firmly staked down now! And hope that you're wrong about April 1st, because that was the day I got my first sprouts. :) Lots of sproutage yesterday! Phlox drummondi, Baptisia, Eupatorium rugosum and coelestinum, Lobelia cardinalis, and Ratidiba columnifera (Mexican hats). Just 1 or 2 little teeny sprout mostly. Expecting more sproutage today with temps close to 70! PM2, you want some photos...okay here are some photos taken yesterday. There's not too much to see yet, most of the containers have 1 or 2 or 3 little sprouts, and there aren't any "true" leaves yet. Still not quite sure how to get real clear close-ups of such teeny little seedlings (yes I am using the Macro feature). Gaillardia aristata (Blanket Flower), love those "hairy" little sprouts - Silphium perfoliatum (Cup Plant) - most of the containers look like this, but I still think it's so exciting! In the bottom left of the photo, you can actually see a seed, which is much huger than the sprout! Solidago speciosa (Showy Goldenrod) - Sweet Alyssum - 'Carpet of Snow' on left, 'Pastel Carpet' on right - Anybody else got any photos?? :)

You're welcome for the help. :) You're starting on a fun adventure, if you can just not lose faith. Try to look at the "non-successes" as just that, and not failures. Look at them as learning experiences and just keep going, trying again, not giving up. If you start small and don't count your chickens before they hatch (as tempting as that may be...), it'll be LOADS easier to do that. I'd try starting a few cuttings of everything you have, even if you don't have any rooting hormone, soilless mix or a greenhouse, and use it as a learning experience. Rooting things is really easier than one may think. All you really need is a cutting with atleast two nodes (one below the soil level for roots to sprout from and one above for leaves), some type of light soil/media to stick it in and water. Once rooted, it'll need more sun and some food of course, but just to get them rooted you don't need much. Things like rooting hormone, a heated greenhouse, bottom heat, extra-light soilless media to start them in (like peat, vermiculite or perlite), etc., do help speed things up a good bit and increase the percentage of cuttings that actually root (some people get as much as 95% or better using all the above), but you can start some things without all that. You just have to be more patient since it takes longer, and also be okay with maybe having only half of the cuttings actually root. Some plants are harder to root than others, so some you won't get any to root while others you may get 80% rooted. But if you have more time than money, that might be what you have to do to get started. If you don't have a greenhouse, set up a makeshift coldframe on the ground up against your house so you can start now (or as soon as it gets warmer than twenty degrees ~ BRRRRRR!) ~ something as simple as some stakes in the ground to hold some clear plastic up off the cuttings a bit would work (clear or "opaque" builder's or painter's plastic from Home Depot ~ just be sure to check it often for brittleness and replace it once it starts getting that way or it'll fall apart and you'll have thousands of little pieces all over your yard). You'd be getting ambient heat from the ground and your house. Just keep an eye on the temps inside it so you don't cook them (it can get over 100 degrees in there quicker than you think). Once sprouted, you could even put your seedlings in there. If it's hard for you to bend over that far, maybe you could put some old boards across some cinder blocks to raise them a bit. In your zone, it'd probably still stay warm enough inside without having to run a heater. Just remember that the taller it is, the cooler it will be since the heat from the ground and the house will have to heat a larger area. "I also do have cranberry hibiscus that produce seed, are easy to grow, and are edible. Another good choice maybe. I really like the pepper plant idea too, but do they have a long life span?" Hibiscus are always popular, so I'd say yes, they'd be good. Pretty and/or edible is usually always good. Peppers are tender perennials (will live as long as they aren't subjected to a killing freeze). Most people grow them as annuals in the veggie garden, letting them die when frost hits, but some ornamental peppers are kept in pots for years like houseplants. "Please tell me more about being a seed starter? Would I basically sell seedlings?" If you want to. It's up to you. You can sell them as three inch tall plants in 2" pots or six-packs, or you could grow them to fully mature plants. It all just depends on how long you want to keep them. I'd start out selling as soon as I had plants that I could honestly and sincerely say, "I'd pay two bucks for that." Or whatever price you plan to put on it. Be critical. Go check out what the competition's selling and make sure yours look as good or better (preferably better) for the price. For the cuttings, I'd atleast grow them until they have rooted well enough to have put on a lot of new foliage. I wouldn't ever try to sell a cutting that doesn't have but a few new leaves ~ that's too soon to be relatively sure it won't die soon after transplant. Your buyers are only buying from you because either they don't know how to propagate the plant themselves or, most likely, they don't want to have to baby the plants themselves. They want to be able to take it home, plop it into the ground or a pot outside and have it grow. So make sure yours are big enough to handle that. The ones that don't sell, I'd pot up in larger pots as they grow and put a higher price on them. At the end of this year, you'll likely have a few plants like that. That'd be nice since you can offer a wider selection to your customers. Over time you'll find out what plants sell better in larger sizes, and can plan accordingly for the next year ~ start them earlier to have them that size at the beginning of the year. Start collecting larger pots now so you'll be ready for that. You can ask at nurseries (keep in mind some, like WalMart, have to give them back to the grower, or atleast hold on to them until they can be counted/verified by the grower), landscapers and landscaped places like golf courses. Maybe even your local freecycle. Ask gardening clubs, too. To avoid bringing home pests and diseases, keep the pots separate from your growing area and dunk them in some clorox water before you use them (I use a big trashcan and put the entire stack of pots in it, letting them sit and soak for a while to make sure the clorox gets in between each pot). Other things you can collect now are any type of irrigation supplies. Hoses, hoses, hoses. Sprinklers are good as well. It's nice to have those professional misting/watering systems, but if you don't have the money, a regular yard sprinkler set up on a couple of cinder blocks set in the middle of your grow area will do the job okay for now. If you notice the plants getting beat up too much or getting funguses, you may have to resort to hand watering, but even that's not too bad ~ I use the time to plan out what I'll do the next day. Hit construction sites and ask them for any castoff lumber to build propagation beds with. Nail them into bottomless "boxes" on the ground (like raised beds), fill with compost and/or potting soil, and stick some cuttings in those for rooting (once rooted, just transplant them out into bigger pots) ~ in winter, just put some stakes at the corners or pipe hoops across them, cover with plastic, and keep going. If you get lucky and find lots of lumber and some old windows, you can even get fancy and build some cold frames like this one, or use plastic or plastic corrugated roofing sheets to make them like this one, or these. Start collecting mother plants as well ~ any plant you find easy to propagate. Build a nice flowerbed and fill it with plants to grow to take cuttings from later ~ two of each in case you lose one. If you start from cuttings now, you'll have a nice cutting source in a few years. If you can't put them in the ground, keep them in pots ~ plastic food grade barrels cut in half and holes drilled in the bottom work well, last forever and are cheap ($10 or $15 apiece ~ keep watching the classifieds in your local paper, and Craigslist). Like I keep saying, just start small and be patient. Don't give up, and five years down the road you may be sitting in your backyard looking at half a dozen propagation beds, a dozen cold frames, a couple thousand pots lined up in rows and a little greenhouse ~ all filled with growing plants. Nice thought, isn't it? :)