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livingontheland - Re: [Livingontheland] aging seed

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  • From: yarrow@sfo.com
  • To: Healthy soil and sustainable growing <livingontheland@lists.ibiblio.org>
  • Subject: Re: [Livingontheland] aging seed
  • Date: Wed, 20 Jan 2010 20:02:19 -0800

At 8:44 AM -0800 1/20/10, Debbie Mcdonald wrote:
If you use older seeds, are the resultant plants inferior? I have some ten year old seeds I thought I could share with strangers if need be? or use some myself but they were not kept air tight or cold, just house temp, not hot ever. They've been dry also. I know not all seeds keep as long as some others. These are heirloom open pollinated varieties.
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If the seed germinates, the plant will be good. Older seeds may be harder to germinate or may have lost vitality, but it depends on the species.

Tomato seeds, for instance, are harder to germinate once they get 5-10 years old, but iirc people have germinated tomato seeds as old as 50 years.

Some references (including Suzanne Ashworth's book, iirc) give guidelines on seed longevity.




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