EP314- What Flowers To Sow In February Flowers: For Beautiful Blooms Later In The Year

Ready to jumpstart a season of colour without babysitting trays for months? We map out a realistic February plan for ornamental flowers, focusing on what to sow now, when to wait, and how to keep seedlings strong with steady heat, bright light, and measured watering. If you’ve ever lost begonias to cold media or watched cosmos turn leggy on a dim windowsill, this guide shows the simple fixes that change the outcome.

We break down the crucial differences between edibles and flowers after germination, then list reliable annuals to start toward the end of the month: pansies, violas, begonias, busy Lizzies, calendula, cosmos, nigella, and bellflowers. You’ll learn why begonias and impatiens crave about 20°C, how to pinch cosmos to prevent stretch, and the best way to sow sweet peas using deep root trainers to protect their taproots. Watering strategy gets a clear, practical treatment too: keep compost slightly dry, use bottom watering, and avoid cold, wet mixes that invite damping‑off.

Seeds aren’t your only route to blooms. We outline smart alternatives available now, from bare root roses and peonies to agapanthus crowns, plus summer‑flowering bulbs like dahlias, gladioli, lilies, and tuberous begonias. You’ll hear when a potted rose may be worth the extra cost, how long agapanthus can take to flower, and why starting dahlias under cover offers an easy early win. For growers following along since autumn, we also note the timing to pot on perennial seedlings so they hit spring with strong roots.

If your space runs cool, we explain why waiting until March or April can actually simplify care and still deliver abundant blooms. The theme is consistent: heat, patience, and timing beat rushing. Subscribe for more practical, no‑nonsense gardening guidance, share this with a friend who’s sowing too early, and leave a quick review to help others find the show. What are you starting first this month?

Chapters

• 0:13 Why Split Ornamentals From Edibles
• 0:42 Heat Needs For Flowers Versus Veg
• 2:04 Three Ways To Propagate Now
• 2:43 Grow‑Along Update And Timing
• 3:45 Annuals To Sow In Late February
• 5:39 Managing Light, Legginess, And Pinching
• 6:11 Sweet Peas And Deep Root Trainers
• 7:08 Perennials, Biennials, And Natives
• 7:58 Consistent Heat And Common Failures
• 9:11 Watering On The Drier Side
• 10:13 Bare Root And Crowns: What To Buy
• 12:15 Summer Bulbs And Easy Wins
• 13:23 Key Takeaway: Heat And Patience
• 14:18 What’s Next: GLDA Conference Preview

Transcript

SPEAKER_00: 0:13

How's it going everybody and welcome to episode 314 of Master My Garden Podcast? Now, this week's episode is the seed sewing guide for February, but it's the ornamental subversion. So I've always done the edibles ones and I've thrown in here and there a few flowers. But to kind of I suppose separate them and give them their own their own individual piece to keep it really concise, I've separated them out into two separate episodes. Reason for that is the approach is slightly different for both. So edibles, once you get that germination stage through and you get up to the first true leaves, then they don't need much heat after that in terms of additional heat. Whereas the flowers are a little bit differently, they're like more consistent and more heat over the over the coming weeks. So February obviously is a month where we can get going, but a little bit like the a little bit like the you know the edibles, we just need to be cautious and make sure that we have lots of heat for the for the ornamentals. But we will look at you know the a nice list of seeds that we can germinate at this stage, uh, but bear in mind that most of them or all of them in fact will need some heat. So that's a case of you're bringing it into your house, you know, you're bringing it into uh your windowsill, or potentially you're in a glass house, or you have a heated propagator or something like that. But it is really important that that that that they have heat. Also in February, it's not the you know, uh seeds is not the only way that we can propagate and produce ornamentals uh in you know in February. We can still get tubers, we can still get um of a lot of perennials actually go through some of those in a moment. And of course, we have bare roots still when it comes to certain nurseries, we'll do bare root ornamentals such as perennials, such as roses, and so on. So you have these three kind of options options to create your own ornamental plants for the coming season uh starting in February. So to have a look at the seeds, and for any of you that were following along on the grow-along, which I know I need to do a follow-on, I need to do the the next stage, which is the potting on of those perennials that we sowed back in September, October. And they need to be potted on now into the next stage of pot for development. So I'll show I'll definitely do that video with it. They need to be done anyway. So I'll do that video in the next week or or 10 days, and that'll be live on YouTube and just show you the next stage. And pretty much a lot of the seeds that we sowed in that grow long are still, you know, are still applicable. We can still sow them now. The only difference with some of them is that you won't get flower in the first year, you'll get your your your plant developing, but it won't flower until the second year, especially with some of the perennials and so on. So a lot of annuals you'll be starting at this stage of the year. You really have to, as I said at the start, you really have to watch for the heat and the constant heat on them at this stage of the year. Um but we'll have a look at those. So some of the some of the annuals that we can grow, think bedding plants. So think of your pansies, your violas, your begonias, if you have really warm, constant heat, like that's gonna need heated propagator. Even a windowsill can be a little bit up and down. You will definitely need um if you're putting it in a windowsill, you'll need to ensure constant heat. So just begonias definitely need a really consistent 20 degrees. Um if they can get that, then they'll they'll they'll germinate and they'll go ahead fine. But more than the other ones, the pansies, the violas, they'll grow pretty well once they get the initial heat and get germinated. But the likes of of a begonia need it a lot a lot warmer. Same too with busy Lizzy's. You would you you could sow them at this stage uh towards the end of the month now for any of these, really. Um little bit early at this stage, not not because they won't germinate, but because especially here in Ireland, when we can plant these out, you know, we're looking at ideally they're not going to be able to go out into the ground in most places until May time. So that gives you February, March, April, three full months of minding before you're getting them out into the ground, June in some areas, depending on your last frost. So just bear that in mind, the length of time that you'll have to mine them. Um, but to get them sowed towards the end of this month is a good thing and get them started, but you will have a little bit of protecting and mining on them. So, yeah, Violas, Violas, Pansies, Begonias, Busy Lizzie or Ampatians. Um we're looking at Canangelas, they're really, really good additions to any garden. Um Cosmos, Cosmos at this stage of the year, because of the light levels that I spoke about on last week's episode, the light levels are quite low, so just watch for Cosmos because they can germinate quite quickly but can get leggy. So as they as they grow, it's a good idea to pinch them out and to allow them to thicken out so that you have a much stronger, much sturdier plant going in when you're planting them out. Um then you're looking at things like Nagelli Love in the Mist, uh, bellflowers, sweet peas. Sweet peas can be sowed this month. Um, the one thing about sweet peas, you won't sow them in the normal way, you'll sow them into something that's quite deep. So a lot of the time you'll see people planting sewing them into toilet roll holders. I find personally find that that's a little bit messy. They break down and they don't stand up as well once they get moisture on them at all. So you can get little little root trainers which are longer, deeper uh seed seed sowing trays, and they're ideal for things like sweet peas and even peas, which don't like root disturbance, and that's that's the reason for this. They put out a long deep root, but they don't like that root being disturbed when transplanting, and it can get a shock. So that's why something like a root trainer is is useful. Um scabiosis is another one that you can sew. Pretty much think of any any of your bedding plants, any of your annual bedding plants. They're all good to be sewing from the sort of mid to end of month onwards. And then, as I mentioned, a lot of the perennials that we covered in the in the grow-along. So arigoron, uh, lavenders, foxgloves, lupins, aquagelias, cornflowers, delphiniums, uh, achilleas, rubeccias, all of those, all of those perennials and biennials that you would that you would sow. You're also looking at, you know, a good few native plants can be sowed at this stage. Again, we included some natives into the into the grow long, things like oxide daisy. They can be sowed this month as well. Again, but you're going to be mining them, you're going to be protecting them over the next couple of months. But that gives you, you know, quite a range of of seeds that you can be sowing. Uh heated propagators or even unheated propagators that can be closed up and you know kept something can be kept warm in your windowsill, they will be really useful and really important because the the consistency of heat required to grow flowers, especially over those first few weeks, is a lot more than your veg. Your veg is that little bit hardier while it needs the temperature to give the germination initially. It doesn't need as high a temperature typically. I know there are exceptions, but typically they don't need as high a temperature, and the temperature required for the first few weeks is less than what is required with flowers. So that's where that's where a lot of people kind of fail with flowers, is that if you're going into a tunnel or into a greenhouse that isn't heated and you're not getting that consistency, you can get very sporadic results around you know around uh germination. The other thing, as I mentioned last week as well, is when you're growing them on, particularly with veg, or particularly with flowers, should I say, particularly with flowers, you're looking to grow them once they've germinated and once they start to put out this first true leaves. You're looking to grow them a little bit on the dry side. So while obviously they need the moisture to grow, you're not going to have them sort of very wet at any stage because that's where you can pick up diseases that can be prone to disease, they can be prone to stagnation even when it's too wet. So we're going to grow them a little bit on the drier side and allow them to push on, but on the drier side. That means a little bit more sort of hands-on in terms of looking at them and and and monitoring them over a week-to-week basis, but it's worth it because if you water them and water them heavy at this stage, you just end up with cold growing media that the seeds just don't like growing in. And you're definitely better to grow them on the drier side and allow it to really go searching for any moisture that's there. Obviously, as I said in that episode, we need enough moisture for them to grow, but we're still going to grow them slightly, as I say, on the drier side. But sowing seeds is not the only way that we can we can generate perennial or ornamental plants at this stage, as I mentioned. We have loads of options around, you know, if you look at any of the bulb suppliers, any of the garden centres, they will all have a selection of perennials which will be available now bare rooted in crowns, you know, bare root crowns or bare root root roots. And what they're looking at, things like agapanthus, um peony roses. A lot of I can't think of all of them offhand, but there's loads of them available as bare roots at this stage of the year. And the earlier you can get those and get them into your grown media, the better. Uh they will sit there probably for the next while until we start to get decent temperatures and then they'll start to move on. Things like Agapanthus, you won't get flower off them for maybe a couple of years. They do take, they're quite slow to establish, but once they establish in your garden, then obviously you get great colour for many, many years to come, and they're tough and they're hardy. Just at this stage, at that kind of bare root stage, they're they're small and they're young, so you're not going to get seed very or get flower very, very quickly off that. But it's still way quicker than sowing them from seed, which you can do, of course, as well. Uh obviously you get can get bare root roses, it's it's you know a huge time deer for bare root roses. They tend to be very economical versus potted roses to buy them in a in a bare root format. And the only thing I would say is that sometimes if you're not buying many, you're still always better to get the potted version because you'll just get quicker, stronger establishment from a a potted rose as opposed to a bare root. But if you're you know sure that you have good ground, you know what you're doing, you're able to look after them over the coming months, then bare root is perfectly fine and will do really, really well. But they're all options at this stage of the year. So you can grow ornamental plants from seed, from tubers, from bare roots, and then the other thing at this stage of the year, and it's a it's a it's a category that's kind of overlooked a little bit, is your summer flowering bulbs. So the spring flowering bulbs, which is your snow drops, your croces, all of those, they're a huge category of bulbs. But then the summer flowering ones, there are lots it's a lot smaller of a category in terms of you know the demand for them. But things like dahlia is so easy to grow from your uh tubers at this stage of the year, uh gladioli, yeah, lilies, the the tuber spagonias, you know, either the upright ones or the or the hanging ones, they're all really easy to grow and really easy to be successful with from tubers and root zone or root tubers and and bulbs at this stage of the year. Gladiola, I think I mentioned as well. So there's loads that you can that you can do and loads of ways to produce ornamental plants at this stage of the year. Um yeah, so that's kind of an overview. It's pretty much any of the perennial or the biennial flower seeds you can start to sow towards the end of the month, and again, pretty much all of the annual ones as well. I've only covered some of them here, but generally speaking, any of those can be sold at this stage of the year. But they do like, and that's the the key message through this episode is that flowers sown from seed prefer they need more consistent heat over a longer period of time than your veg and your own and and your edible plants. So that's why we're we're looking to use things like heat propagators and so on. So it's still easy to grow them, but if you're not going to be able to give them supplementary heat or additional heat, then wait another little while. Next month would be a much better month. And even into April, for a lot of them, it'll still be loads of time. The nature of the annuals, particularly, is that they're designed to germinate and to grow and to flower in one season, and you know, even so on in April, you're still going to have great crop or great flowers over the coming years. So just again, as much as I say on the on the episode on vegetables and edibles, go slowly, tread carefully. It's double that message down for flowers and ornamentals because it is a little bit slower. Um definitely you can sew, but we're looking for, as I say, those warmer temperatures and more consistent temperatures for those. I hope that helped. It's uh yeah, that's the first time I've done uh you know a sewing guide on ornamentals. So yeah, we'll see how they go over the coming weeks. But we'll definitely continue to do them, especially over the next early part of the year, the first couple of months, they'll be vital in terms of keeping people reminded of what they can do at that stage. Um, but I hope that helps. And next week's episode is a good one, it's covering the GLDA conferences coming up. It's always a really important conference struck seminar, and again, some really good speakers and a very, very good topic on it. So we'll hear all about that next week. But that's been this week's episode. Thanks for listening, and I'll tell you next time. Happy girl.