Sowing your seeds: How to sow them

All three types of seed can be sown straight away.

Three-quarters fill your containers with a mixture of peat-free compost and sharp sand.

The sand helps drainage.

Place your seed on top of the mixture and then cover with a thin layer of sand. If you’re using a rolled up sheet or a small container, only use a few seeds.

When sowing the birch seed, try to spread the seed evenly across the top of the compost before watering.

The alder and pine seed can be placed more accurately by hand and you might only put, for example, one or two seeds in a paper pot.

Write out a label and put in the pot so you don’t forget what you’ve sown!

Experiment with sowing

As well as sowing your seeds directly into pots, you could try experimenting by taking some of the seeds and treating them in different ways.

For example, you could soak your seed before sowing.

Keep the seed in water – preferably in a fridge – for 48 hours. Remove the seed, drain off any excess water and sow it.

Alternatively, remove the seed from the water, remove the excess fluid and return the seed to the fridge for a week or more.

This seed might germinate quicker than directly-sown seed.

Next step...

Now click on ‘Looking after them’ on the left of this page to learn about caring for your pots full of new life!