My failed attempt at growing alpine strawberries from seed took 4 months

I tried starting alpine strawberries from seed back in February thinking it would be a quick project. Turns out those tiny seeds need cold stratification and light to germinate, which I completely missed at first. I waited 6 weeks with nothing happening before I looked up what went wrong. After putting them in the fridge for 3 weeks and then onto a sunny windowsill, only 5 out of 30 seeds actually sprouted. The seedlings grew so slow I thought they were stunted for another month. Finally got a few tiny plants big enough to transplant outside just last week. Has anyone else had this much trouble with starting tricky seeds from scratch?

2 comments

2 Comments

grace_white17d ago

Oh man I feel your pain so hard on this one. I tried growing lavender from seed once and it took forever, nothin happened for like a month and I kept watering it like a dummy. What finally worked for me was getting a heat mat under the tray and using a spray bottle to mist the soil so it didn't drown the seeds. I also learned the hard way that some seeds just need light to pop so you don't bury them deep, just press em on top. Once I got those two things right my germination rate went way up, still took forever but at least I got something growing. Those alpine strawberries are super finicky but once they get going they're worth the wait.

johnson.daniel17d ago

Heat mat is a game changer. I did the same thing with my lavender, kept the soil wet for weeks thinking they were just slow. @grace_white once I switched to bottom watering with a tray and gave them a heat mat I got sprouts in like two weeks. Also figured out the light thing the hard way, now I just scatter tiny seeds on top of moist soil and dont cover them at all. Worked way better for finicky stuff like strawberries and thyme.