The Autumn Garden and What Seeds to Sow Now

Let’s talk about the Autumn Garden and what seeds to sow now. The last few weeks in the garden have been glorious. The Indian summer we’ve been having has made the flowers glow. I’ve been cutting regularly for my ‘Best of the Week’ bunches for Boni Vee as well as working on funerals and planning next years weddings.

It’s been a busy time catching up after the summer holidays and working out which season I should be working in. With a few more weeks of daylight and hopefully a few warmer days to squeeze in, now is the time to enjoy the last days in the cutting bed but also start next years flowers.

Today I’m sharing a few snippets around the garden but also talk you through what seeds to sow this autumn for next years flowers. Even if you have a small space nothing beats a greenhouse or windowsill full of green seedlings to help beat the winter blues. Let me take you through my Autumn seed sowing essentials.

The basics of autumn seed sowing and what seeds to get started now.

I love my little greenhouse, it came with the house and I have brought it back to life. You can see its transformation in this Greenhouse Make Over post. A greenhouse is fab but not essential for seed sowing. I love to use small zippy greenhouse alongside my main one or a windowsill with lots of light will also work.

Seed trays are another essential. I tend to use a mix of different size seed trays  – 40 cell for small seeds (like nigella), 24 cell for scabiosca and flat trays for really tiny seeds like Snap dragons. I do put them all in gravel trays with water in the base to keep them from drying out.

When it comes to seed sowing you want to aim for a mix of flower shapes. These are the varieties and shapes I focus on. I will then layer in my bulbs (tulips and narcissi)  and corms (ranunculus and anemone)

Round – Cornflowers or Nigella

Spires – Snap Dragons (Antirrhinum) 

Movement – Sweet Peas or Scabiosa

Texture – Grasses

Filler – Sweet Rocket

Once you get these going you can start to get curious and add more varieties to your patch. I’ll write more about bulbs and corms when I get to them. I hope this gives you a confident start to seed sowing, you can find lots more on my Instagram page @lottsandlots. Where I give weekly updates about the garden.