Skip to Content.
Sympa Menu

homestead - Re: [Homestead] Seed saving questions

homestead AT lists.ibiblio.org

Subject: Homestead mailing list

List archive

Chronological Thread  
  • From: Clansgian AT wmconnect.com
  • To: homestead AT lists.ibiblio.org
  • Subject: Re: [Homestead] Seed saving questions
  • Date: Thu, 11 Jan 2007 12:47:38 EST



> Assuming I plant them, what kind of germination
> should I expect from seeds that old...it's a variety of stuff,
> everything from corn to tomatoes to cukes and squash...
>

Assuming that the seeds were kept cool, dry, and dark, you can expect pretty
good germination. Different vegetables have longer seed shelf life. Peppers
are the first to go, then tomatoes. All this means is that the % of
germination goes down.

I had saved nearly a quart jar of a favorite type of pepper, Tequila Sunrise,
and the following two years were very, very bad for peppers and I matured
none to replentish the seeds. Finally in the fourth year from the saved
seeds, I
planted a whole flat with them and got 0% germination. In midsummer I dumped
the entire quart jar on a seedbed, covered it with a little compost, and got
six plants to germinate out of, oh, 100,000 seeds. Out of those six plants
three managed to ripen peppers before frost and I have a good tablespoon of
renewed seed.

I've had beans germinate after 30 years. When my grandfather died in 1981, I
emptied a barrel of corn in the crib and halfway down the barrel was a packet
of papers he'd hidden there, says the dated note, in 1923. The corn below
that was planted and had more than 70% germination rate.

OTHH I left a sealed box of seeds in the greenhouse too long last year where
the temps got to 100 degrees and it did in every seed there.

Dark, cool, dry. I got my hands on a supply of dark amber glass jars
(medicine jars so the lids seal tightly) ranging from 50 ml to 1 litre.
That's what
I'm storing my seeds in now .... in the basement ... in the dark.




Archive powered by MHonArc 2.6.24.

Top of Page