Show us your baby pictures!

Coleus Giant Exhibition mix 14 day from sowing, starting to show color on the first set of true leaves!

This is the most fun thread I have come across in a while........yeah for ya'll!!!!! Geminisage...don't be afraid to start pinching hard on your impatiens....they will be prettier and you can take the part you pinched off and propagate that. Although we are living in impatiens land everywhere.....you can never pinch back impatiens too much. Even when they are in the ground, I go by all the time pinching back to make them fuller...great going!!!
The most important thing i want to share is my Angelonia....first time from seed that Parks offered....it is called summer snapdragon down here....the hotter is gets the happier it is....
When I started the seeds back in January, I thought they would never take off.....just sat there for several weeks not even growing....now I know that I need to start pinching but am still afraid I will ruin them!!!
If someone out there is lurking around that knows when to start pinching these babies, please let me know....

I think my babies will look beter uncoverd. Mike

They're stunning. I like how you've made the cups out of paper, very resourceful.

Now that I have acquired all this 'fancy' stuff for germinating, I am finding that everyone is growing like you are Mike!!! I have started using baby dixie cups......

If you could find the dexie cups without the wax treatment, that would be nice, the wax cuts down on the proper drainage, but otherwise works. Mike

My babies getting some outdoor sun!

Very jealous here, it's supposed to snow later tonight.

What pretty babies you have!

Here's a few of the many yet to come for me.

P

Wow! Are you a commercial grower Bigred? Tamara

Tamara,
Just on a small scale to support my habit. *G*More of a hobby gone mad.

P

bigred, I strive to reach your degree of madness!

gem,
It's not hard to do...keeping working on it and I'm sure you'll be crazy as a bedbug just like me before ya know it...LOL I started out selling surplus at garage sales...garduated to farmers market now I do in-store retail and wholesale(to a couple of small indenpendant mom and pop garden centers)...but none of the big stores have anything to worry about from me.
The hub's says I do this just for the excuse to buy more plants. And?SO? Hate it when he knows me so well....LOL

P

Bigred, the madness must be contagious! woo hoo! I have been contemplating have a plant sale at my house this summer since I winter sowed so many plants and I'll never have room for all of them. If that goes well, I'll graduate on to the farmer's market! Tamara

That's a good beginning...and excuse for buying/growing MORE plants*G*

P

Here's my Amorphophallus bulbifer (Voodoo Lily), a week after germination. My first dicot seedling!

I have baby hostas!! This is my first try. I planted them the 6th of Jan. and saw the first one on the 19th. Now I can see about 10. I can't wait till they get bigger. BEV

My first two babies. Twins!!!!

Ooops- I meant my first monocot seedling!!! Time for caffeine...

Say hello to my li'l friends

Some of these Azaleas have buds. I didn't have the heart to remove them all.

Claypa! Are those azalias? Good looking from seeds???? BEV

Softwood cuttings from last summer, not seeds. If they can make it through this cold, they should be fine.

do you have them covered claypa?

Yes, I have a ten gallon aquarium over them most of the time. It fits over a 10 x 20 flat pretty well. It's mostly painted white, with some areas left open/clear. Not too glamorous, but it works. I seldom have to water them.

that was the mistake I made last year with cuttings... no cover.. live & learn.... good news is I found walmart had them on sale for $2.00 and they had really good roots on them ... were about 6" tall

There are definitely some good, inexpensive azaleas out there. I'm not sure if it's the tray in the picture (I propagated a bunch) but it's either a Hino pink or Shamarello hybrid that may have reverted to one of its parent types. I was told it might be one of a kind. Not anymore!

good for you!

I love planting seeds. I love to see new seeds sprouting:) I sow about 10 kinds of
seeds for my spring flower bed in last autum.

"Gilia capitata"
Looks like vegetable for now.

"Armeria"

This is not for flowebed though....
"Aloinopsis setifrra"
A kind of succulents.

I love baby pics! This is a great thread! Thank you ALL for sharing.. it was fun.. I have to wait to take baby pics.. My babiez are almost big kids.. I have seeds, so it won't be long!

This is a great thread! When I started reading it I didn't realize how old it really is! I have stuff potted up, but no seedlings yet ~ like you, ZZ.. A couple of years ago I got **hooked** on African Violets. My husband built me a "heck for stout" plant stand with lights (it could be taller but I didn't complain). So this time of year the violets get "transplanted" throughout the house and I use the lights for my seeds.... I do have one seedling, come to think of it! It's a seedling from some Lunaria I harvested last fall. And most of the rest of my stuff potted up are brugmansia seeds. They will take a bit longer than most. Also, I was happy to see someone had success with the climbing snapdragon ~ I just harvested some seeds last weekend and have been excited about getting them started indoors! So, pic to follow, hopefully soon!

Sanna

Claypa, Iam jealous! Man, I would love a tray full of Azaleas.. I have some Exbury's, would those work? Did you use one of those cloning machines or any special equipmant?

Golden, those plants are soooo cute. I love the one that looks like a bunny rabbit!

Sanna, Those climbing snaps are tough to do inside...imagine this: You have a vine that needs a vertical support, but the support sticks up & keeps the lights too far from the plant. I really had to to jiggle and juggle things around lastyear so the stick I used as a support went between the light flixtures I had set up. The plants were always off center and I had to keep redoing it to rotate them. Hard to explain, but you'll understand when you get into it.

Suzy

Thanks for sharing your experience Suzy! Perhaps I'll not try indoor sowing, and just wait till things warm up a bit and start them where I want them. I just love the seed pods!

Sanna

Suzy, as far as I know, any rhododendron or azalea can be propagated by cuttings. As onewish1 pointed out, some kind of cover is a big help, whether it's a plastic bag or an old glass fish tank. (Or a mist system, which I don't have)
I did use rootone rooting hormone.

There's LOTS of info on the web:

http://www.macars.org/propagationcutting.html

http://www.azaleachapter.com/propagation.htm

http://pubs.caes.uga.edu/caespubs/pubcd/B670/B670.htm

http://www.donaldhyatt.com/ARSPVC/articles/azaleacuttings.html

http://nativeplants.wcu.edu/2004/presentations/CreelProp.pdf

http://www.freeplants.com/homemade-plant-propagation.htm

Yeah, I kow that *in theory*, I was just wondeing if you had any special equipment. Sounds like something I could do.

Suzy

I am going to try air layering my rhododendron this year... didn't have luck with the cuttings two years in a row

onewish, I've had great luck layering both azaleas and rhodies. Actually, they did it themselves! You can get some bigger starts that way.

Suzy, I ran into the same problem with starting vines. They would tangle so fast I injured them keeping them from going where they shouldn't. Hmmmm...I wonder if 2-4' shop lights installed vertically, facing each other would work? Not sure whether the inclination to climb would win out over the inclination to move toward the light, but it seems like mine will head straight for the space between the shop lights and grow over the top. That may warrant an experiment!

Oh, Lord, You are way ahead of me on that one! You'll have to experiment because I have to keep all my seed sowing stuff in a low key and ultra organized, not necesarliy clean, but organized, fashion. If Mr. Clean saw shop lights on end, it might push him over the edge. All he could think of is all the gas inside pooling at the bottom of the bulbs and being inefficient (or something weird like that -- the man knows a lot about a lot of different things!)

I had 2 over head fixtures, side by side, and put the pots a little off center with the stick going up through them. Of course every time I had to move things around, for whatever reason, those sticks would bump the lights and nearly dislodge my seedlings.

I only did a few vines last year, and am already dreading doing more than that this year. Right now, everyting is fine, the problem is in March and April when all the seedlings in the communal pots need a little cell pack, or pot, of their own. I never have enough lights, even when I buy more, there are just never enough! So I end up keeping the lights on 24/7 and pulling flats on and off the racks (in and out of the light) and that's where my problems are - the moving around of pots and flats.

I did buy one of those plastic "greenhouses" last year, so maybe that will alleviate some of the space problems under lights, but probably not. Just an excuse to sow more, I'm afraid. :))

Suzy