Starting Zinnias From Seed - State Fair, Cut and Come Again and Envy Zinnias - June 2025

Last year, I direct-sowed zinnia seeds into the cut flower bed in our sideyard and into the vertical tower on our patio.  And...it...well...worked.  We grew Zinnias.  But, this year I wanted to get them started a little bit earlier (not as early as I should have, though...) and decided to start some seeds indoors.  

I showed the three varieties of seeds we bought this year - earlier this winter/spring;  Envy, State Fair and Cut and Come Again.   

I had some eight-cell packs on-hand from annuals that I put out front, so I filled those with a potting mix and tucked seeds into each cell.  

Pretty quickly, most of them germinated.  

I kept the seedlings in the screened porch and they started to grow up and get taller.  

In an attempt to keep them from getting too-leggy, I moved them outdoors as often as I could - weather-permitting.  Below is a photo showing the two trays out on the patio - where they live all day. 

The first seedlings in the trays are starting to get their first set of 'real leaves'.  That means the next step is to start to think about thining them out.  After the first set of 'real leaves' fill-out, I'll begin to pluck out the weakest one and keep just one Zinnia per cell.

Here's a look at the seedlings growth:

When all-is-said-and-done, I'm hoping I'll end up with close to 50 Zinnias.  My tower can accept up to 48, so we'll fill it up.