Sown #12 answer

The solved garden

The seeds: R1C3, R2C8, R3C4, R4C2, R5C9, R6C7, R7C5, R8C1, R9C6 (R = row, C = column, counting from the top left). Every row, column and plot holds one seed, and no two seeds touch, not even diagonally.

A hard garden: Saturday's puzzle. The hardest idea it needed was several plots that fill the same rows or columns between them. 100% of players finished it.

How to crack it: the first moves

1. Every free square of the slate plot is in row 9, so the plot's seed must go there. Nothing else in row 9 can have one.
2. The sand plot still needs one more seed, and only one free square is left. Sow it.
3. Every free square of the teal plot is in column 7, so the plot's seed must go there. Nothing else in column 7 can have one.
4. A seed in the square in row 6, column 5 would leave the pink plot without enough room. So it stays empty.
5. A seed in the square in row 6, column 6 would leave column 7 without enough room. So it stays empty.
6. A seed in the square in row 6, column 8 would leave column 7 without enough room. So it stays empty.

Plots are named by their colour in the picture (sage, sunflower, lavender, coral, sky, pink, teal, sand, slate). Every Sown garden can be solved this way, one deduction at a time, without guessing.