Many of you might have seed starting on the brain! But, for us far northerners, there’s an art to the timing to keep our seedlings manageable. It would probably be good for us to provide general guidelines on the earliest point when most gardeners should start this task.
For zone 8, January is the earliest point. Zones 5 through 7 can consider February as their starting point. For zones 2 through 4, March is your starting target. And for our coldest zones, 0 through 1, mid-March begins your adventure.
You might wonder why we use growing zones to determine this, since these are typically used “exclusively” for perennials? Well, it has to do with average last frost dates and when your actual gardening season will unlock for you.
For us far northerners, zones 4 and below, this timing is especially critical. Get started too early and you’ll have a jungle of indoor plants on your hands. Get started too late and there might not be enough season to finish out your plants.
We’ll be discussing this much further, but using a seed starting schedule is critical when raising garden starts indoors. The gist is that different plants mature at different rates and the timing you use will determine the plant’s maturity when you transplant into your garden.
In case you didn’t know, we provide the most well researched and extensive far northern seed starting schedule on the planet. Unlike most “generic” seed starting schedules that guess, we specialize in growing in subarctic areas. Link down in the comments!
Lastly, there are always exceptions to the rule. Some growers have vast experience, so they might start their gardens earlier than most. Unless you know you have capacity and can do this, it’s wise to use a more conservative schedule like ours!
We are in the countdown here! Six more weeks until we start slinging seeds and we are looking forward to it!
