Jerry sorry about the delayed response hee hee been way to busy to remember where I post, lol. Some things that need a warm cool warm season like helebores I started those in september but I wonder if I was to late for those. Most of my containers I have started on december 21st to february. I have several things I need to get going but sometimes life just gets in the way, hopefully I will have time this weekend to get in the dirt. As for information the winter sowing forum has a ton of info under the faq's and then Trudi has a website also it is called wintersown.org. There are a ton of people willing to help with any question you may have in regards to winter sowing for the first time, though pretty much you have the concept down. I use water bottles but most use milk jugs. I use whatever I have, whether it be cottage cheese containers or grated cheese containers to water bottles or juice bottles. I think I have in the picture one of those rotisserie chicken containers that is in use also even an ice cream bucket. I use my containers as I would a starting seed tray, just make sure there is plenty of drainage and of course ventilation. For the water bottles we just toss the lid for the cottage cheese or rotisserie chicken containers we just cut some holes in the top. I have even used a lasagna pan inside a comforter bag. I have drainage holes in the bottom and I cut ventilation holes in the top. This is the most recent picture I have of the lasagna pan, I think it was taken a few weeks back. As for the pictures I know there is a link somewhere how to add pictures. Though a simple way to tell you is upload your pictures to a third party photo client. I have been using photobucket some use flikr. They will provide you with an html code and just simply copy and paste the code into the message box. inside the brackets > insert height="500" width="600" for the size of pictures here in this message. I sure hope that helps. People on the wintersowing forum are extremely eager to help and extremely friendly, they love questions don't be afraid of them. They will welcome you with open arms!! Oh and there are several from canada that winter sow!!

Alright, I finally got one of the Walmart lights for $10.97. All my violets are Optimara plants so I figured that they didn't need as much light as the fancier types to perform well. I placed the fixture above a 2'x1' shelf above the kitchen sink instead of above the fridge. It is 9.5" above the top of the cups that I grow my plants in and I draped a piece of foil over the fixture to help direct more of the light downwards. I may remove the plastic cover/diffuser once I get the light more securely attached to something since it is just resting on deli containers right now. I started off at 8 hours of light, but moved quickly to 12 hours. I will keep extending the photoperiod until the plants flatten out and/or start to bloom. If 16 hours of light isn't enough to get them going, I'll get another light. The plants are still reaching up for light at this point, but I can already tell that they are growing much faster than they ever did prior to moving them. Here are some pics. All the plants are the variety except the plant in the top left corner.

If the issue is low light, then a bright fluorescent will certainly help some, but for such a large plant I don't think it will be enough. I prefer to use one of those floor lamps that are used to treat seasonal affective disorder. They seem to throw bright light out there very well. And if I get "blue" in the winter, I can try to take in some light as well! Where was the plant before it started to suffer? Was it moved from a brighter location? Usually when my leaf tips turn brown it's low humidity, but that would be nearly impossible this season in SC. Is it too dry? Or are you watering with softened water?

OK. I am going to try to post a picture directly into this post. The picture is of how I plant my seeds. I fill a clear plastic shoebox sized container with about two and a half inches of seed starting mixture and level it out. Then I use the eraser end of a pencil to punch in 8 to 15 equally spaced holes about 3/8 of an inch deep into the soil. Then I put an equal number of seeds into a small dish of water and wait until they get wet enough to sink. Then I put one seed into each hole. The wet seed will stick to the pointed end of the same pencil for dropping them into the small holes. Then I cover the seed with a thin layer of pure vermiculite, put the cover on the container, put it on a heat mat or into my oven where the pilot light keeps it at around 85 degrees, and wait, usually four to eight days. As soon as the first seed sprouts I remove the cover and immediately put the container, sprouted and unsprouted seeds alike, under my lights or outside on the patio in direct sunlight if it is over 50 degrees outside.