Simple Suggestion #286... Save seeds

I can't believe I've gotten this far into these Simple Suggestions without moodling about seed-saving. Though I do love the seed catalogues that come every January, even better is planting the seeds I've saved myself because they cost me -- and the planet -- nothing. They don't have to be shipped across the country, and they're guaranteed organic when they come from my own backyard.

To me, it's just fascinating how life perpetuates itself on this planet, and how many different ways plants have of presenting their seeds to the earth. In my experience, the only things needed to save seeds are curiosity, a willingness to wait for them to mature, and a way to dry them well.

Granted, there are many different methods of saving seeds, some of which involve all sorts of chemical processes and fungicides. But the thing to remember is that our ancestors didn't have hi-tech ways to save their seeds from year to year. They simply dried and saved what they had, perhaps supplementing their caches by trading with neighbours.

So here are the seeds I'm saving this year:

14 different varieties of tomatoes.
I just spread the seeds on labelled paper napkins,
dry them, and pull them off the paper to plant next spring.

Five varieties of pepper seeds,
taken from the insides of this year's peppers.
Peaches and cream corn seed, 
dried on the last cob of the season.

Purple, yellow and green bush beans,
purple peacock and scarlet runner pole beans.

Snow peas (above) and snap peas (already put away).

Purple and white onions.

These seed pods are so cool!

Garlic cloves, and tiny onion bulbs
that barely got started this year
but will be full grown onions next year, hopefully!
I'll plant my garlic from this year's cloves in the next few weeks.
 

There are lots of other seeds yet to come -- pumpkins and squashes, cucumbers, sunflowers and annual flower varieties. About the only seed I've had a hard time saving is carrot and some of the other root crops, and I wonder if that's because the varieties I grow are hybridized beyond the ability to produce seed in the usual way, or if our season isn't quite long enough for the seed to mature here. I keep trying -- there are a couple of Chantenay carrot seed heads out in the garden that I hope to dry and try again next year. I guess we'll see!

The real trick with seed saving is to ensure that seeds are viable so that we don't miss out on the early part of next year's growing season because things refuse to sprout. I like to check my seeds in the spring by soaking them overnight and seeing if they'll start to show signs of life between paper towel kept damp and dark under plastic. (That's what paper towel gets used for in this house -- otherwise we use regular rags). I also like to store my seeds in the charity return envelopes that come in the mail since most of our charitable giving is now done online.

There's nothing like growing your own food... but even better is growing your own from seed you've saved yourself! If you have any questions, don't hesitate to ask! That's what the comment section below is for.

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