I am glad you enjoyed winter sowing and it sounds like you'll be doing more in the future. :O) Highly addictive once you get going.

Hope your employment situation starts going in the direction your little sprouts are going. Wish you well!!

So glad you stumbled into this, hogan. I don't think you'll ever regret it. I bet you might wonder why you have not done this long ago.

Happy gardening!

Keep going Hogan! You can reuse your containers over and over throughout the season. Try some perennial seed in early summer to have good sized seedlings to plant out in fall. It really is just amazing. And if you need seed, Just let us know!

Psst..look out you'll be doing over 200 containers next year. I know it...It happend to me.

LOL welcome to the club. Its fun its cheap except for soil and Nan alone can supply you with enough seeds to cover a 3rd world nation.... SO if you do need needs hollar... we will be happy to share.

Congratulations and welcome to the wonderful world of seed obsession! Like nan said, we've all got LOTS of seeds to spare so before you buy, ask if anyone has the seed you're looking for to trade. Chances are one of us will have it to spare or know someone who does. If you don't have seeds to trade, just look for SASBE offers--Self Addressed Stamped Bubble Envelope. Lots of seeds for the cost of a bubble envie and lots more than you'd get from a commercial seed pack.
I'm pretty tapped out and don't have as many seeds to trade as I did earlier this year but wait until fall and I'll be flush again. I winter sowed 66 new perennials this year from seed I got in trades. I'm looking at a whole lot of new perennial plants in my flowerbeds thanks to winter sowing. Today I reused containers that had perennial sprouts in them. Since they had their second set of "true" leaves, I potted them up and am reusing the jugs for annuals.
I'm guessing winter sowing is not for everyone. Some don't want the responsibility of umpteen milk jugs/2 liter bottles lined up like soldiers while the snow falls, the wind blows and the ice forms. Others can't be bothered with potting mix in the kitchen in January. Since those things don't bother me, I'll be winter sowing again next year. My 2011 goal is 100 jugs. What scares me is my 2010 goal was 12 jugs and my current total is 472.
Sigh...

Welcome! I am glad you gave WS a try. It took me a few times reading about it before I tried it and now I am gald I did.

I love WS'ing even though my back hurts from planting out sprouts today.

Make sure you share photos!
Karen

Welcome Hogan!! Like everyone said, you'll be sowing over 100 containers in no time. I have to try very hard to stay under 100 which is my real goal now, but I am very near that now and still have some annuals to sow. You'll love it. Good luck with your job hunting!!
Northerner.

Hi Hogan and welcome. I started with two containers last year because I found this site in early March and was skeptical. This year I did about 70 and will probably do more next year because I'll be doing all my tomatoes this way as opposed to half out and half inside this year.

Just wondering what kind of plants you did? Is there a neater feeling than seeing them sprout, especially if they've been through the snow and cold?

Caryl

Well today I noticed one of my planters only has about 2-3 sprouts, I am now wondering if i should plant more seeds (petunia's). The other planter has many more. Should I plant more seeds or try and transplant some from the other, later?

Hogan, I'd give those petunias a little more time - you may see a lot more popping up in that container in the next couple of weeks. If you are in northern NJ, it is still on the early side for a lot of stuff. Nights are still pretty cool, even here in AL.

I am one of the crazy WSers. I won't stop until I've grown one of everything in the world. Maybe not even then.

I guess I spoke to soon. I mean everything looks good,except for the one window box. I just do not want one that looks great and one almost empty.

When should you give up and just get more seed. I don't want to wait and one be so far ahead of the other. Why would one planter(same seed) be so far ahead of another?

Hogan, there are lots of reasons why one container would be ahead. Only the seed knows why, but we can guess. One container might have been a little warmer or cooler, wetter or drier, or had a bit more or less sun. Perhaps some of the seeds sank a little deeper into the planting mix. Some seeds are just "fashionably late" and naturally stay dormant longer. Some of my sweet peas are two weeks later than the rest, and they were planted at the same time in the same bottle. Since you're in NJ, I think you might be getting annual sprouts as late as June, so definitely don't give up yet. If you want to make sure you're covered, go ahead and plant a milk jug or salad container with more petunias. You can put them in the window box later if you need to. I've grown petunias from seed, starting indoors, and they didn't all sprout at once indoors either. In my experience the later sprouts do catch up to the early birds once the weather is truly warm.

Want some more petunias?

{{gwi:379734}}

There are still seeds sprouting in there!

Ditto what edie says ....

PV

Sorry for being paranoid. I am sure you are right about waiting for more sprouts but to plat it safe I did order more from parks.

One more question, how hard is it to transplant from one planter to another and when would be a good time to do this?