Sowing aquilegia seeds for seedlings or how to get friendly shoots
Beautiful round aquilegia bushes with high peduncles on which charming bells hang can be seen almost everywhere. Some buy them in the form of already grown seedlings, but most prefer to sow aquilegia seeds for seedlings. This is a more affordable option, because for a small amount you can get a couple of dozen plants. Whereas on the market it will be just a couple of bushes. What is worth knowing and doing to make the seeds happy with high germination?
Do seeds need preliminary preparation and how to do it
In aquilegia, the seeds are very small, moreover, they have a rather strong shell. Very often, when sowing them straight from the bag, the results are not happy. Seeds sprout for a long time, and even then in a single order. To guarantee good germination, they simply need to be pre-prepared by subjecting them to a stratification procedure.
This can be done in several ways:
- Moisten a piece of cloth, put seeds in it and send it to the refrigerator for a month. Care must be taken that the fabric does not dry out.
- Pour sand into the tray, moisten it, scatter seeds over the surface. Cover and refrigerate for 3-4 weeks.
- Collect a light substrate in a container, spill it with potassium permanganate for disinfection. Sprinkle the seeds, cover and refrigerate for a month.
- Repeat steps from point 3, but dig the container in the garden.
- If the seeds were harvested more than 2 years ago, they should be pre-treated with Epin. Then alternate between cold and warm stratification. First, seeds placed in sand or soil should be kept for 3-4 days in a heated room. Then take it to a cold room for a month, and then return it back to a warm house.
To facilitate germination and break the shell, seeds (especially old ones) can be scarified by rubbing with sandpaper.
Sowing aquilegia seeds for seedlings
For growing seedlings, it is better to prepare sufficiently tall containers with drainage holes. Aquilegia grows a long root already at a young age. In small bowls, he simply does not have enough space.
The soil for planting should be light and nutritious. For example, an equal mixture of sand is suitable, humus and sod land.
The sowing of aquilegia seeds for seedlings itself is no different. Seeds that have germinated but have not been planted are simply scattered over the surface of the soil without deepening. It is enough just to spray them abundantly from a spray bottle and they will go deep under a stream of water. Until emergence, crops should be kept under a film, placing them on a light and warm window.