Master Gardener Volunteers Seed Starting at Spooner Ag Station

With this years plant sale canceled due to COVID, North Country Master Gardeners will once again put our energy into the Teaching and Display Gardens at the Spooner Ag Station. We will be starting seeds for many of the plants used in the gardens right here in our greenhouse at the Ag Station while other seeds will be started for us at Madison. We are excited to be getting started and are now in the planning and gathering process.

The Seed Starting committee met on March 4th to lay the groundwork for this year's efforts. Links to the minutes and documents of their meeting can be found on the Members/Committees page.

Some of the planning details outlined in the meeting minutes can be helpful for those of us who start our own seeds at home.  Planning our gardens and planter pots ahead of time will help determine what seeds will be directly sown into the soil and which seeds need an indoor head start. Acquiring seeds and determining a timeline for when to start each type is important. Gathering pots, containers, seed starting mix and fertilizer, sterilizing pots, and preparing these ahead of seeding can save time and help insure success.  

The Display Garden theme this year for the All-American Selections is Diversity in the Garden. While we will not be competing in the AAS contest this year, we will be keeping this theme in mind while planning our garden beds. Members will adopt a garden space to transform so that by August we will be able to offer our Twilight Garden Tour, if not in real time, virtually as we did last year.

Follow our progress on this blog. If you are a master gardener volunteer but are not on the committee, your help is always appreciated--check out the minutes for places you might fit in in the seed starting process. If you are not a master gardener volunteer but have been thinking about becoming one, this will give you some insight into what we do and how much fun we have!

Display Gardens Layout
Seed starting chart

article by Pam Davies

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