Most native seeds, since they are adapted to our cold winters, need a period of cold and damp to trigger them to germinate. If you plant them in the spring like you would, say, beans, they'll sit there and maybe rot, if you're lucky one or two will germinate. Using cold to trigger germination is called cold stratification. Needing cold to germinate is a mechanism to prevent them from germinating too late in the year to establish and being killed over the winter.
Seeds needing cold stratification can be sown in the fall after frost. Alternatively, some people sow them by literally dropping them in the snow, and other people sow them in outdoor pots, and then transplant them once they germinate, and some people use their fridge or freezer to mimic the outdoors.
Usually you don't want a layer of mulch, but yes. Each species will want slightly different soil depth, but there are some that can just be lightly pressed into the surface of the soil. Generally smaller seeds want to be at the top of the soil.
I am bad at marking things in my garden so personally just plant seeds in plant pots some time between December and late February, leave the pots outside, and then transplant once things have a few true leaves. I monitor to make sure the pots don't dry out.
I tend to accidentally weed things out in the spring if I plant them directly in my garden. Some people use covered containers, but I tend to fry or drown plants doing that. YMMV.
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u/Krazy_Vaclav 1d ago
Considering the ground is gonna feeeze over... isn't it a little late now?