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  • From: VAN DELL JORDAN <vdjor AT yahoo.com>
  • To: homestead AT lists.ibiblio.org
  • Subject: Re: [Homestead] Seed saving questions
  • Date: Thu, 11 Jan 2007 13:54:10 -0800 (PST)

Is it feasable to plant a few of each kind each year?

Raising enough seeds to keep a good supply on hand.
I'm guessing it would take too much time?
Van Dell


--- Clansgian AT wmconnect.com wrote:

>
>
> > 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.
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