(happy guitar music) - I'm Erik with Landscape Garden Centers and we're gonna talk about seeds.

Okay guys, this is interesting, interesting stuff to know, how to read a seed packet.

Basically, on the front of the seed packet it's gonna show you what type of vegetable you're gonna be buying.

Now, they might have really fancy pictures and they might have just a really general picture, and it's basically their sales tool.

The thing that you really wanna pay attention to is the variety of plant that you're gonna be getting.

In my hands right now, I'm holding a pepper and also a tomato.

Now, on the back of these, it's going to talk about days to emerge, seed depth, seed spacing, row spacing, and then thinning and maturity, kind of a step-by-step of what you're going to do.

When we look at seeds and when we're gonna be planting them, this would be something to be planting, starting indoors.

If you want to wait until the ground warms up to be able to actually just start a garden from scratch, out in the garden, actual garden from scratch, you're gonna wanna wait a little bit longer and then you might be limited in how much produce you get because it's just gonna take that much longer.

In general, the reason why people start with seeds is they can get the exact variety that they want.

And then what you can do is grow those inside and then move them to the outside.

Seeds are the most economical way to go when you're trying to grow vegetables.

You can get quite a few plants, quite a bit of produce out of a plant.

In a lot of these packets, like this one, for instance, will have 30 seeds.

Well, 30 seeds for a couple bucks, you divide that out, you can have quite a bit of things to harvest.

One thing I can't stress enough is mark what seeds you planted where.

A lot of these things, right when they start to emerge, are gonna to look very, very similar.

But make sure that you mark what seeds you're using and what plant.

You'll thank me later on for that.

When you're planting your seeds, you're gonna get them in, if you're gonna get them going indoors, follow the directions, and you're gonna wanna keep the seeds moist, kind of in a protected area.

I see a lot of people will just put them in a plastic tray with a light on them and turn the light on and off throughout, just like it would be a regular day length.

But they'll put a piece of plastic over it, just to kind of give it some humidity, so the seeds don't dry out.

That's gonna be one of the most important things to do is make sure that the seeds don't dry out and then you just basically have to wait.

And then once they get up to basically have about four leaves in most cases and transplantable.

When the plant is about ready to go outside, what we like to do is, you wanna bring it outside a couple of different times for cooler temps, bring it outside and then let it acclimate, and we call that hardening off.

It just turns out, you end up with a better plant, a stronger plant.

Once you take your plants outdoors, you're gonna wanna make sure that you're past the frost state.

Typically, for our area, we always say, May 5th, May 1st, the 1st of May.

Watch the weather, make sure that you're kind of paying attention to that.

It might be May 15th, you can plant it, but then you might have to cover it up if we get some cooler temps.

For peppers and tomatoes, which is more of a warmer season crop, expect to see something, oh, probably around that July, August period of time, that you'll start to develop fruits.

But it all depends on when you start because everything has a maturity date which will be on the back of that packet.

The USDA Hardiness Zone is the best place to look for your last frost state, along with what zone you're in.

Typically, like in the Sioux Falls area, we're around that 4a, 4b.

The best time to plant is when that ground temperature warms up, especially if you're planting into the ground.

So there's lots of different things that you can start from seeds.

Tomatoes and peppers are ones that you can get really good plants for.

Things that you're gonna probably want to get as a seed only, mostly your cool crops.

Cool crops meaning is that they start earlier and you're gonna actually have something in a very short period of time.

Lettuces would be good, a good one, peas, carrots.

Carrots are another good one to get those going, and you're gonna wanna put those in the ground.

Some different tricks of putting them in the ground, 'cause some of those seeds are really tiny, is just even using some masking tape, flip it upside down, and then sprinkle the seeds on there, and then you can take it out and lay it into the garden, press it in, and just let it, watch it grow.

I'm Erik with Landscape Garden Centers, keep it growing.