Gardening

#30 · Poke holes in soil for seeds

Create consistent seed-depth holes across a tray or pot before sowing. Clean, quick, and much better than your finger.

The outdoor cousin of the seed-tray dibber. For beans, peas, squash and anything else sown direct into a bed, a chopstick makes a clean hole at a consistent depth far faster than trying to press seeds in with a thumb.

How to do it

Water the bed thoroughly the day before, not the day of. Soil that is damp all the way through holds a hole; soil watered an hour ago is wet on top and dust underneath.
Push the chopstick vertically to the depth on the packet.
Space the holes along the row before you sow any seed - it is much quicker in two passes.
Drop a seed in each and cover, firming lightly so soil touches seed all round.

Why it works

A pushed hole has compressed walls that hold their shape, so the seed falls to the bottom and stays at the depth you chose. Seed scattered and raked in ends up at every depth from zero to five centimetres, which is why germination from broadcast sowing is so uneven.

Tips & warnings

Use the blunt end for big seeds like beans - it makes a wider hole they will actually drop into.
Two seeds per hole for anything with unreliable germination, then thin to the stronger one.
Leave a chopstick standing at each end of the row so you know where to expect seedlings and what is a weed.