Creating a sowing calendar

Creating a Sowing Calendar

After working on your design and deciding how you are going to place your plants in situ, it's time to get down to the nitty-gritty and sort out your sowing calendar. The simplest way to do this is on a large sheet of paper, divided into blocks of months.

When I talk about sowing, I don't mean direct sowing (sowing seeds directly into the soil outdoors). When I first started out here, I tried direct sowing, but because of the heavy clay soil, I found that often the seed was rotting before it had a chance to germinate. Over the years we have developed much more efficient ways of sowing young plants, including sowing into drainpipes and modules.

Don't plant out basil or zinnias in your garden until you're happy to have supper in your garden.

Dividing up your sowing like this makes the whole year seem much more manageable and gives you a balanced amount of sowing throughout the year.

Sowing Calendar

| JAN & FEB | MARCH | APRIL | MAY & JUNE | SEPTEMBER | OCT & NOV |

|-----------|-------|-------|------------|-----------|-----------|

| | | | Wallflower sowing | Sowing of hardy annuals | |

| Sweet peas | Phlox 'Creme brulee' | | Iceland poppies | Cerinthe | |

| Cobaea | | Panicum 'Frosted explosion' | | Ammi majus and Ammi visnaga | |

| Snapdragons | Dahlias tubers | | Snapdragons second sowing | Scabious | Dianthus 'Green Trick' |

| Malope | | | | Nigella 'Love in the mist' | |

| | Cosmos | | | Euphorbia oblongata | |

Planting Out Calendar

| JAN & FEB | MARCH | APRIL | MAY & JUNE | SEPTEMBER | OCT & NOV |

|-----------|-------|-------|------------|-----------|-----------|

| | | | Plant out Cobaea | | Bulb planting |

| | | | Plant out Phlox 'Creme Brulee' | | Plant out hardy annuals for overwintering: |

| | | | Plant out Panicum 'Frosted Explosion' | | • Ammi scabious |

| | Plant out more hardy annuals | | Plant out Snapdragons | | • Nigella |

| | Plant out Malope | | Plant out dahlias | | • Cerinthe |

| | Plant out sweet peas | | Plant out cosmos | | • Euphorbia oblongata |

| | | | | | • Wallflowers |

| | | | | | • Dianthus |

Growing in a Reduced Space

Depending on the size of your garden or the scale you want to grow on, this might seem like quite an overwhelming number of plants.

If this is the case, I would grow the following plants for maximum impact on a reduced scale.

SEASONS ONE AND TWO

• Euphorbia oblongata
• Calendula 'Indian Prince'
• Salvia 'Viridis Blue'

SEASONS THREE AND FOUR

• Nicotiana 'Lime Green'
• Salvia 'Viridis Blue'
• Ageratum 'Blue Horizon'

With just these plants, you'll still get a bunch or two of flowers per week.

If in doubt about sowing times, refer to the back of your seed packet or look things up online.