How to Sow Gazania Seed: Timing, Warmth, Darkness and Thinning

What the seed needs

Gazania seed is small, dry and finished with a tuft of fluff like a miniature dandelion, which makes it awkward to handle but is no barrier to germination. It wants three things: steady warmth of around 65-70F (18-21C), darkness, and a compost that is moist but never wet. Given all three, most seed comes up in seven to fourteen days.

The darkness requirement is the one people miss. Unlike many small daisy-family seeds that need light, gazania germinates better covered. A shallow layer of compost or vermiculite over the seed, or a sheet of newspaper over the tray until the first seedlings show, makes a clear difference to the germination rate.

Seed saved from your own garden plants germinates just as readily as bought seed but produces a wide mix of colors and markings, because garden gazanias cross freely. Sow more of it than you need and select the plants you like when they flower.

Cover the seed and keep the tray dark until seedlings appear. Gazania germinates poorly on the surface in bright light, which is the opposite of many other small flower seeds.

Sowing indoors for a full season of flower

Indoor sowing is the standard method in any climate with a real winter, because it gives plants large enough to flower from early summer rather than from late summer. Aim to sow eight to ten weeks before your last expected frost date.

1. Fill and firm the trays Use module trays or small pots filled with a free-draining seed-starting mix, ideally with extra perlite or sharp sand mixed in. Firm the surface lightly and level it. Water the compost before sowing so you do not have to water heavily afterwards.
2. Sow two seeds per cell Place two seeds in each module, or space them about an inch (2-3 cm) apart in an open tray. Handling is easier if you pinch off the fluffy tail first. Sowing two per cell lets you keep the stronger seedling and avoids transplanting seedlings.
3. Cover and darken Cover with about an eighth of an inch (3 mm) of compost or fine vermiculite, then put the tray somewhere dark or lay newspaper over it. Check daily from day five and remove the covering the moment the first seedlings show.
4. Keep it warm and only just moist Hold the compost at roughly 65-70F (18-21C). Mist or water from below only when the surface starts to dry. Standing wet compost at this stage causes damping off, which takes seedlings out overnight.
5. Move to strong light immediately As soon as seedlings emerge, move the tray to the brightest position you have or under a grow light kept a few inches above the leaves. Gazania seedlings stretch and flop very quickly in dim light and never fully recover.
6. Thin and pot on Snip out the weaker seedling in each cell at soil level rather than pulling it. Once two or three true leaves have formed, pot up into 3 in (8 cm) pots of gritty potting mix and grow on cool and bright at around 60F (16C).

Sowing direct where they are to grow

Direct sowing works in warm climates and gives tough, deep-rooted plants, but it costs you several weeks of flowering time. Wait until the soil has warmed to about 60F (16C) and all frost risk has gone, then rake a fine seedbed on ground you have deliberately not enriched.

Sow thinly along the row or scatter into a patch, cover with a scant quarter inch (5 mm) of fine soil, firm gently and water once with a fine rose. Keep the surface just damp until germination, which takes ten to fourteen days outdoors, then let it dry between waterings. Slugs are the main threat in this fortnight and can clear a whole sowing overnight, so protect the patch while seedlings are small.

Thin in two stages: first to about four inches (10 cm) apart once seedlings have two true leaves, and then to a final ten to twelve inches (25-30 cm) apart. Crowded gazania seedlings stay damp between the leaves and are the classic starting point for mildew and rot later in the season.

Hardening off and getting them into the ground

Gazania raised indoors is soft and will scorch or check badly if it goes straight into a hot exposed bed. Harden off over about ten days, starting with an hour or two outdoors in shelter and building up to a full day and night. Plants that have been hardened properly barely pause after transplanting.

Plant into the leanest, sunniest ground you have, ten to twelve inches (25-30 cm) apart, with the crown at or slightly above soil level. Water once to settle, then keep them just moist for two or three weeks while they root, and after that leave them alone. Resist the instinct to enrich the planting hole with compost; that is the single change most likely to give you a leafy plant with no flowers.

Expect the first flowers roughly twelve to fourteen weeks from sowing, sooner in a hot summer. From then on the plant should carry flowers continuously as long as you keep deadheading.

What to write down at sowing time

Record the sowing date, the germination date, and roughly what proportion of the seed came up. Gazania seed loses viability over a few years, so a poor germination rate is usually the seed's age rather than anything you did, and having the numbers written down stops you blaming your technique and re-sowing the same tired packet.

Note the date you planted out and the date of the first open flower, because the gap between them is the number that tells you whether to sow earlier next year. If you sowed saved seed, write down what colors actually came up and which plants you liked, so you know which ones to take cuttings from in late summer rather than trying to remember in six months.