Valley Green Tips: Saving your seeds

Every year, I can’t resist buying petunias, peppers and tomatoes. I might pass by the pretty pinks and purples and glorious greens once or twice at the beginning of the season, but inevitably, I’m coming home with petunias, peppers and tomato plants.

Because I’m a novice gardener who has had limited time and attention to perfect my art, it never occurred to me until recently that I might save the seed of a particularly pretty petunia flower, to grow it again the next year. I’ve known about tomatoes and peppers having composted pulp and hulls with seeds that bore me surprise plants. Still, I never considered the cost-saving and “plant variety preserving” benefits of trying to do this on purpose, until this year. A helpful lady at a garden shop told me about how she saves the seeds of her favorite petunia plants and grows them again the next year. So I tried it, but evidently didn’t properly dry and store the seeds. A moldy mess by spring, I planted it, but to no avail.

According to a host of gardening and online sources, saving seeds can be easy so I’m going to try again. “You just need to know a little about the type of plant you’ll be seed-saving with,” sources say. Sounds fresh, but ask yourself: “Is the plant an annual, biennial or perennial? Will the plant self- or cross pollinate?” The answers will affect how you save the seeds.

Saving petunia seeds is easy. When the petunia flower production has slowed, seed pods will dry. When you’re sure the pods are as dry as they can get, clip the stems. Open the pods and shake gently or rub the seeds off over something like a pie plate where you can both collect and further dry the seed before putting in small paper bags, labeling the bags and storing in a dry cool place until spring.

Pepper seed-saving isn’t much harder. Cut the pepper as you would to eat it, saving the hull with the seeds that you can then hang or place on a plate and turn to dry. When the seeds are dry, you can flake off the seeds, dry some more, then store as described above.

Saving tomato seeds requires a vastly different approach. You will cut the tomato at “the equator” center, scoop out the gooey center with seeds and put it in a jar, pour several tablespoons of water on top and cover with a piece of plastic over it that has a small hole punched out to allow for transpiration. For a couple of days, stir this goo periodically to help it ferment to protect the seed against disease. When the seeds start to fall off, you should thoroughly rinse and strain the seeds, then dry for several days, turning the seeds periodically. After completely dry, you can now store the seeds. Some people save their seeds in glass or plastic which can work as well as bags so long as the seeds don’t have a drop of moisture.

One of our valley gardeners said she finally tried drying seeds for the first time last year with great success, although she did all the super easy ones — pumpkins, sunflowers, acorn squash and butternut squash — just to see if she could do it. She simply spread them out on cookie sheets (rinsed the slime off the squash seeds) and stirred them once or twice until she was sure they were dry. She then stored them in reused bags and labeled them with a sharpie. She stored them in the garage over the winter and they all grew beautifully this year. The easiest were the sunflowers, her kids did those and had a great time getting them out of the flower, amazed by how many seeds are in one flower. You can find all of these seeds growing beautifully in the Washington Street Valley Community Garden.

These are just some tips for novices like me. To learn lots more, attend the free seed saving workshop at 11 a.m. Saturday, Aug. 20, at the Valley Community Garden at 397 Tasker Hill Road in Conway, on the left, eight-tenths of a mile from the intersection of Route 153.

To learn more about extending the growing season, the public is invited to a cold frame construction and use program at 11 a.m. Saturday, Sept. 17, at the Tasker Hill Valley Community Garden site.

Valley Green Tips is brought to you by the Mount Washington Valley Green Team, a non-profit group dedicated to greening the Valley through programs including Valley Community Gardens, education, recycling programs, and Family Funergy events. For more information and other Valley Green Tips, visit www.mwvgreenteam.org.

The Green Team is supported by Charter Sponsor Cormack Construction Management, Inc.

For more information about Valley Community Garden programs, email mwvgardens@gmail.com or call (802) 299-6269.