Growing from seed needn't be intimidating: we humans have been doing this for thousands of years. Remember that experimentation and trial-and-error is a part of gardening and farming, even for the most experienced amongst us.
Having some basics down before you begin can help make it more fun and rewarding. Here's a few of our favorite guides to starting plants from seed.
For the most local information, check out our very own How To Grow Our Seeds guide for dates on when to start vegetables and herbs indoors or direct sow outdoors. This guide was created specifically for the Methow Valley.
Having some basics down before you begin can help make it more fun and rewarding. Here's a few of our favorite guides to starting plants from seed.
For the most local information, check out our very own How To Grow Our Seeds guide for dates on when to start vegetables and herbs indoors or direct sow outdoors. This guide was created specifically for the Methow Valley.
Below are some other resources we have found useful, we hope they are helpful to you too!
Susan's In The Garden
Susan's In The Garden
Susan Mulvihill is a Master Gardener, author, columnist photographer and creator of a YouTube channel with over 400 videos. Susan’s garden is in Spokane — Zone 5b just like us here in the Methow Valley!
Check out Susan’s seven-part series Seed Starting Demystified. Thank you Susan for making all these important and valuable skills and expertise available to us all.
Seed Starting Demystified: Part 1 (embedded below!)
Snake River Seeds
Our friends and colleagues at Snake River Seeds share a variety of resources to help folks get started growing from seed:
Read: The Snake River Seed Cooperative Guide To Indoor Seeding
A straightforward and easy to read introduction to starting seeds indoors.
Download: Zone 3b - 5b Planting Guide
While our How To Grow page shares growing instructions and tips specific to the Methow Valley, the Five Valleys Region Zone 3b - 5b growing guide from Snake River mirrors our guide reasonably well and offers a more visual format.
Seed Saving YouTube Series
We're getting a little ahead of ourselves (the first goal is to start those first seeds!) yet we wanted to share this series on seed saving as it's an aspect of growing very near and dear to us.
While our friends at Fruition are all the way across the country in New York, they’re also in Zone 5, just like us. (Note, however, that their growing season is much longer than ours.)
They’ve developed a (free!) Seed Starting Academy course that will answer most questions you have about starting seeds.
The course is methodical, thoughtful, and encouraging — kinda feels like you’re learning from that favorite teacher, the one who believed in you.
Also check out Fruition's Organic Seed Starting YouTube playlist ~ topics covered include direct sowing, an easy and economical potting mix recipe, and garden planning.
Also check out Fruition's Organic Seed Starting YouTube playlist ~ topics covered include direct sowing, an easy and economical potting mix recipe, and garden planning.