THE SEED-BED
CHAPTER V
THE SEED-BED
The possessor of a garden, large or small, should have a seed-bed, where seeds of perennials and some of the annuals can be sown and grown until large enough to be permanently placed. Not only will this bed give great pleasure in enabling one to watch the plants from the time the first tiny leaf appears, but also when laden with blossoms in fullest beauty. The knowledge that you have raised them gives a thrill of pride in the result which no bought plants, however beautiful, can impart. It is not necessary to prepare the seed-bed over a foot in depth, but the soil must be very light and fine, as well as rich. It is best, if possible, to have a portion of the bed somewhat shaded from the sun for a part of the day. If this combination cannot be had in one bed, there should be a second for plants that want less sun. Biennials must, of course, be sown every year, as they bloom but once, then die.
Every year some perennials will disappear, killed by severe winters, by pests of one kind or another, or dying without apparent cause. To keep up the supply, therefore, some of each variety should be raised every year.
Foxgloves and Sweet Williams, if allowed to go to seed, will sow themselves and increase rapidly. The same with Hollyhocks, but, except on the edges of shrubberies and in wild borders, it is better to cut the stalk just before the seed is ready to fall, and save it to sow in the seed-bed.
Foxgloves—seedlings ready for final transplanting
September twenty-ninth