Seed Saving

Do you remember what it was like to eat a ripe, homegrown tomato as a child? Warmed by the sun, fragrant from the summer garden, each bite was full of sweet flavor that dripped juice down your chin. Oh yum!

So why is that such a distant memory for many people?  It may be that they have to buy their tomatoes from a store or are planting tomato varieties that grow fast in our climate and are bred to resist disease. These tomatoes are hybrids, carefully grown for decades, in some cases, to meet the demands of American agriculture. My childhood tomato was an old variety grown by my father from the previous year’s seeds: it was an heirloom vegetable, grown for flavor and stamina.

My dad grew up in the Depression so his motive for saving garden seeds was financial. But I do it to save money and to get the same plants that I enjoyed last year. Of course, hybrid plants have many special qualities like disease resistance or high-production so I know I may have to do a little more work to get the best from my heirlooms.

For seed saving, you must start with non-hybrid plants: only heirlooms will produce “children” plants exactly the same as the “parent”. If you save hybrid seeds, you’ll get a new plant without all the qualities of the hybrid parent. Look at the original plant tag or seed packet, the grower will proudly tell you if it’s a hybrid. Organic plants aren’t always heirlooms.

In the vegetable garden, you can easily save tomato, pepper, eggplant, beans, peas, and lettuce seeds. But you won’t be happy with the plants grown from saved seeds of most vining crops like squash and melons since they often cross-pollinate – your buttercup squash might be pollinated by the neighbor’s zucchini and you could get a disappointing mongrel squash next summer. Carrots and cabbages are biennials: they don’t produce seed the first year so the plants must be grown a second year just for seed saving.

In my garden, I like to save some poppy seeds every summer

Poppy seeds

and I’ve had good luck with hollyhocks although wind pollination can alter my original flower color. Other heirlooms include nasturtiums, calendula, violas, snapdragons, and runner beans. I started with blue cornflowers (or “bachelor buttons”) and over the years they’ve cross pollinated into plants with blue, pink and white flowers – not what I planted but always a delightful surprise to see in mid-summer.

I've listed links to several Extension Service publications that list the best plants to grow for seed saving and the techniques to save the seeds. But here are some quick tips:

• Save seeds from only the best plants in the garden; 
• Harvest the seeds when they’re brown and dry;
• If necessary, put a paper or cloth (not a plastic) bag around the seedheads to protect the seeds while they dry. This works well for plants like lettuce since the seeds will blow away as soon as they’re dry or sunflower seeds which will be eaten by the birds; 

  

  Paper Bag Enclosing the Seedhead

• Biennial plants can be mulched the first winter and seed collected the second season.

Seeds collected from fleshy fruit like tomatoes need to be cleaned. Once the pulp is removed, dry the seed for about a week & store it in a dry, cool, dark place to prevent sprouting or rot. Use moisture-proof, airtight containers such as jars, foil or waxed packages & label them with the variety and the date. Most annual seeds will remain viable for two or three years if stored well.

Check out these publications for more information:

WSU Spokane County Extension Service: C166 Seed Saving  (http://tinyurl.com/ngf4mpt to download pdf document).

OSU Extension Service: FS 220 Collecting and Storing Seeds from Your Garden (http://tinyurl.com/mdan94l to download pdf document).