Garden - seed saving
Wednesday, January 14, 2009
When I started gardening last year I knew that I wanted to practice sustainable gardening. Meaning organic, frugal, freecycling, composting and seed saving where possible. Obviously initially for the first season there has to be some seed purchases, and there will likely be more plant purchases for the upcoming summer season but where possible I am saving seeds. So far I've saved tomato, zinnea, basil, coriander/cilantro and marigold.
I've been quite surprised at the ease of saving seeds, if I can do it, anyone can! During my last batch of seed saving, which was for marigolds I took some photo's :)
Ideally for flowers you want the driest heads possible, sometimes that's not always possible but the flower heads should be dry, and wilted. I knew we had rain coming which would render these mouldy and useless so I pulled them off the plants, let them dry a week or two more then pulled apart the seed casing.
I've been quite surprised at the ease of saving seeds, if I can do it, anyone can! During my last batch of seed saving, which was for marigolds I took some photo's :)
Ideally for flowers you want the driest heads possible, sometimes that's not always possible but the flower heads should be dry, and wilted. I knew we had rain coming which would render these mouldy and useless so I pulled them off the plants, let them dry a week or two more then pulled apart the seed casing.
You can see the seeds on the right in the top photo. They fly everywhere, which is their purpose for propagating. I collected a TON of these. Marigolds are great for gardens as they are reported to repel some garden pests. Plus they attract bees and butterflies :) a gardeners allies!
One of the main crops I saved seeds from last year was tomatoes. All but two of my tomato crops this year will be from saved seed. Not really knowing what I was doing to save tomato seed I looked it up online (fabulous internet!) and got to work:
- Cut tomato, scoop out seeds and put in small glass dish
- Fill dish with water
- leave for about 5 days, the water will turn yukky and a bit mouldy but that's ok!
- pour off the water and rinse seeds in seive.
- Dry onto paper towels in a dry place for about 2-3 days, ensuring they are VERY dry for storage
- Store in paper packets.
Didn't take pics of the first parts, but here are some of my tomato seeds drying :) It really is an easy process. I saved seeds from 4 types of tomato last year!
And so looking forward to the Summer season, and hoping for better harvests, more crops, and more seed saving! Remember to save seeds from your crops!
Di
Di
Posted byDi Hickman at 10:00 AM
Labels: frugal, gardening, seeds
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