Dale - any time you change the environment, the growing conditions, of a growing thing it is "set back", it must adjust. "Changing its growing conditions" includes transplanting at any stage, changing its soil, its air temps both day or night, its sun exposure, its nutrient levels, pinching/pruning, etc. If you are trying to force the blooms for some reason, if by 'better results' you mean faster blooming then the shortest time frame between seed and a bloom is with direct seeding the plant right where it will spend its life. Any other approach interrupts the growth process. Btw, there are many other methods of growing from seed besides the 2 listed above. I.e. winter-sowing with recycled containers, using a greenhouse, cold frame, or hoop house, frost-seeding, growing on a sunny windowsill, etc The 2 methods of growing from seed are direct seeding or growing under cover, what I mistakenly called "indoors". All the other methods you mention are under cover methods and all, even winter sowing, involve a change in the growing conditions. Dave

Flourescent!!! I got that covered! I grow my younger Hippie seedlings under 2 shoplights. These "little clivias" can share with the Hippies then. Oh my...but the hIppies get 14-15 hrs. of light/day. Maybe moving them in the very end of the shoplights would be just right??? Expensive: I will not be surprised of how expensive they can get. They are such slow growers!!! And I saw a pic of the Henglan or Sparrow in bloom somewhere. They do not have a lot of flowers to pollinate and make seeds. Their flowers are just like kinda stuck in between those leaves and not an umbel. Can you imagine how long it will take for a $5 Henglan/Sparrow seed to grow into a blooming size...10 to 12 leaves as you have said. This little things grow like 1 leaf in 6 months!!! Here in my non-perfect growing conditions anyway!!! Thanks for the tips Mike! I surely will "try" to follow them. Geeeezzzz....winter growing space sure will be another big problem this year.

I have a little baby lipstick too that I got on ebay about 4-5 weeks ago. It hasn't grown either, but looks healthy, after losing a few leaves and stems from the shock of shipping. I love them and their beauty, but they have always grown very slowly for me. It may be the same variety that you have, tlbean. I lost the tag. I had an A. radicans, the variegated variety, for years. So pretty! But eventually they start dying on me. I take cuttings, but they don't always root. I wish I could find the variegated radicans again. When they are healthy and full, they are among my favorite of plants.

That's a bed with some potential. "Plain dirt" can mean anything. Your best strategy would be to get a (low cost) lab test done to see what chemical problems it might have and at least get an experienced vegetable gardener to have a look at it and see what the texture looks like. Big difference between a mass of sandy clay and one of loam with good tilth. Winter is a good time to make these assessments, so you can be ready by spring. Does it drain well? That is, if you stick a hose on it, do you end up with a big puddle on top? Is the soil uniform? That is, if you dig down in it, does the the soil look the same all the way down? I've seen beds where the previous owner put a few inches of good looking soil on top of a foot or two of really trashy soil. When you dig down, do you hit any masses of roots that come, perhaps, from your neighbor on the other side of the wall? These are simple things to check that can save you a lot of grief later.