How does your garden grow?

I grow from both seeds and also from small, young plants, that are more adaptaple, usually, than larger ones, which often die from culture shock...(the differences in temps and growing mediums between where they were grown and where I transplant them). I don't grow much from cuttings, as I don't have much experience with cuttings, (yet), and am cursed with local (and somewhat "horticulturally challenged" landscapers, hired by our apt. mgrs., who either mow over, chop down, or yank out anything I plant, that they consider "weeds".....
They've chopped down all the lovely lilac cuttings, a friend had sent to me.....

A little bit of everything--I love the selection seeds give me, like the challenge of starting from cuttings, enjoy watching smaller younger plants grow into maturity and appreciate the wow factor of mature ready to flower larger plants when I can afford them. Plant divisions are a great bonus as well, either for another location or for sharing.

The trouble with buying the largest possible plant is that its potential is gone. Buying a plant at the peak of bloom, as the nurseries are always offering, is to watch it begin to fade as soon as it goes into the ground, perhaps to repeat the display next year, perhaps not. I want to buy a young plant with all its potential intact, to open up as I watch.
Tilton hit it dead on the head and I could not agree more ... being a Hosta grower and buying big new plants is heartbreaking to see a costly plant fade away. I prefer watching the bareroot evolve. When i do buy a big plant, be it a perrenial or Hosta I usually cut the tops off before planting. I feel it helps the roots get more established and you get a better plant.

I chose other for "all of the above." Fill up that space with plants, by whatever means!

We still grow mostly annuals (vegetables and flowers) and start the vast majority of them from seed (or tuber or bulb as the case may be). We bought our older home several years ago and it had been landscaped and maintained by many previous owners (we have a big old house in an older neighborhood) so we have not done much in the way of landscaping or tree planting/grafting. Spring remains a lively time at our house with tub after tub of seedlings (started by us from seed) going back and forth from our south-facing dining room windows to our semi-enclosed front porch for "hardening off." Our kids must think gardening involves a lot of carrying. When I win the lottery, a greenhouse is the first thing on my list (well, second, after buying the huge country estate where it will be built...) :)

I have a garden full of volunteers. I purchased small plants that self seed or multiply into large impressive clumps. I divided my hosta and daylilies. My heuchera seeded themselves as did the nicotiana and rudbeckia and columbine. My favorite plants came from friends and neighbors gardens.

I tend to buy sad plants at discount and nurse them back...of course, co-ops keep me overloaded, cause I can't let a "deal" slide...:-)

I tend to not do too many seeds, but can see I'm leaning toward it more and more.

I said "other" also but I don't think we have any more space!!! Now it's time to dig up what isn't doing well here and try it there, plant out a few container plants that were fun for the summer but need a permanent home, try to move the shorter flowers to the front and the taller ones to the back.... I know it seems like it should go without saying but my DH planted a lot of dormant perennials in the winter (seriously) and wasn't really understanding where to put what. It's like rearranging the furniture, sort of.

x, Carrie

I'm big on letting Mother Nature plant native plants in my garden. I allow polk weed to grow because the birds love its seeds. Likewise, calicarpa americana (French mulberry) produces a beautiful purple seed which the birds also eat. I have several blackberry patches for them also. These are mowed every other year with a bush hog. I also allow golden rod to grow. It is now beginning to bloom. I cut it back a couple times in the summer so that it doesn't grow too tall. All these are cut to the ground in the winter and begin all over in the spring. I have magnolia trees volunteer, also. I have learned that the best way to transplant them is to dig them up when small and pot them for a year before planting them in the late fall or winter. I should say that I have azaleas, camellias,and other plants which bloom in the spring and winter. Having done all this bragging, I must admit that age has caught up with me and I now have a gardner to maintain all this!

For future reference: there has to be "all of the above" choice.

I am finding the biggest joy in learning to propagate begonias from leaves................or lots of houseplants sitting out on the front porch can be grown from leaves.................i still like to take cuttings ..................but leaves are a new ballgame for me.

I never get tired of growing from seed. Here are some seeds from Brazil of the gesneriad family..............you can see I planted them too thick................on my first try I didn't know any better................although I should have known. I have grown from seed all my life....................

Same way with collecting streptocarpus seeds from the pods..............now i will have to pull some out or separate early.............