Here in the Southern Highlands with nearly three weeks of frost, some severe, the ground is too cold to be doing and direct seed sowing this week.

So this week I will be planting seeds into punnets of Asian greens, Broccoli, snow peas, English spinach, rocket and coriander.

Now the English spinach, rocket and coriander I would normally sow directing into the ground where I want to grow them as they dislike having their roots disturbed- so they will be sown into individual large cell punnets so they can be transplanted with no, or minimal, disturbance to their root system.

In a more temperate climate direct sowing can still be done.

You might ask, if I am planting all these seeds every week, how big is the area I grow in and how am I going to use all this produce.

Never fear, my garden is not that big and I rarely have excess produce because I practice succession/successive planting

For Broccoli, I will only plant 4-6 broccoli seeds every two weeks, I use tweezers to pick up and plant individuals seeds. Some do not germinate and I will discard any that look weak, so typically I end up with 2-3 plants that I then plant into the garden once they are good strong plants.

This way, in 12-14 weeks’ time I have 2-3 heads of broccoli every 2 weeks which I easily use in my everyday meal preparation but rarely have excessive amounts.
There are also plenty of side shoots from previously harvested plants which are great for soups and stir-fries.

Plant small amounts often for a continual harvest.

I do this with most of my vegetables.

See link for how to do this for snow peas http://www.myproductivebackyard.com.au/autumn/getting-your-snow-peas-in-for-the-early-cropping/

Enjoy the weekend and get out and sow some seed.
Happy Gardening
Kathy