The shapie ink fades with time. I use a pencil and that works well for me.

I have purchased a nursery marking pen from Parks Seeds and markers using the pen have lasted a long time in the garden.

Here is a link that might be useful: Parks Pen

I tried several pens and they never worked over winter for me. I bought a Brother P-Touch label maker and use the TZ tape. Labels I've made this way show no sign of wear after several winters. If you buy the 1/4 tape it will be thin enough to put on your white markers.

I have used sharpies on my winter sowing labels and they fade badly through the winter months. I did know this ahead of time and made sure to check them periodically to see if they needed to be redone. That was fine for one year for me but I would like to do something more permanent. I picked up metal markers and am currently using paint pens. I am happy with them so far. I plan to save up and get an Avery laser printer as I have heard that those last forever.

Thanks for the tips. This is just for the winter and I think I will also keep a list of who is where.

I used a sharpie last fall to mark daffodils in pots and by spring they were badly faded. This was on white plastic markers.

Try the Parks pen BorS. It works great on plastic labels and has lasted several years in my garden with no fading.

Strange, I went to ParkSeeds to see the pen. Tried to add to cart and got a message that due to agriculture laws this item could not be sent to Canada.

I have a bunch of markers lying around and I wanted to know which ones worked and which ones were fading so I could throw out the bad ones.

So I did a test 1 yr ago with the white plastic labels and all my markers. So far the only one faded is the regular sharpie. THe "industrial strength" sharpie and other specialty markers are still fine. I hope I don't lose the test label!

Strange Joan. I know that there are many agricultural products that can't be shipped from the US to Canada or that require phytosantitary certificates to allow it. The certificates can be expensive so perhaps Parks just doesn't ship anything to Canada to avoid having to deal with them and that is the issue.

Interesting test there Wendy. Are you planning to continue the testing to see how long the markers last past the one year mark? I am not really sure I have ever noticed industrial strength markers before. Where did you purchase it and does it look differently from the standard ones?

The industrial strength ones were at Staples. They look basically the same.

I looked again at my test strip and I see the faded one is "Sharpie fine point". That may make a difference. Unfortunately, my test did not include a medium pt sharpie.

I will keep the test up as long as I don't lose the tag - LOL!

I think I should go and date it retroactively b4 I forget. And add a med pt sharpie sample with current date.