They Have Already Started To Grow.

Good evening,

Last year I bought some petunias from a local garden centre, they were strong small plants and they grew and bloomed from spring till fall.

I decided to collect some seeds from the flower heads as the plants started to die off due to the cold weather.

Taking the seeds from the plant wasn't hard to do, it was a case of looking for the dried up flower pods and popping them open with my fingers.

Once I collected the seeds I popped them in a container and left them in a dark cupboard until 3 days ago.

I did some reading about petunias as I have never grown them from seeds before and I wanted to give myself a fighting chance at getting at least a few of the seeds to turn into plants.

I read they needed to be sown 8 to 10 weeks before the last frost, I thought OK, so who can predict the last frost?
After thinking about it for a while I decided to plant them 10 weeks aprox before spring then this will reduce the chance of frost when I plant them out.

10 weeks is around now, so with my green fingers I went to work sowing the seeds on some compost.

from what I had read, petunias need light to germinate so you don't cover them with compost, it is a case of sprinkling them and pushing them down with my fingers.

I popped them covered on my windowsill after giving them a little water and have left them there for 3 days.

I was washing the pots tonight and I just happened to look through the plastic lid to see some green, I couldn't understand what it could be at first as petunias can take anything from 7 to 10 days to germinate.

I lifted the lid to see that the seeds I had sown only a couple of days ago had started to pop up.

here are some pictures.

To me 3 days is quick going when it comes to sowing seeds, I was amazed at how quick they had popped up, it must be how warm our house is as with having 3 kids the heating is on 22oc all the time and it feels like the tropics, plus with the sunny spells we have been having to this must have helped in the germination proses.

I have planted other seeds in my green house so I decided to take a look at them but still nothing.

The problem I now have is there is so many seeds that have decided to pop up I haven't the space to keep them, I don't know what I am going to do with all these plants I am sure my family will take some.

Roll on spring I can't wait to plant these out and make my garden look amazing.