Open-Pollinated, Heirloom & Homestead Seeds

Especially adapted for Northern Gardens

How To Save Seed

Start with the easy varieties, ones that are self-pollinating and do not easily cross with other varieties. Beans are an excellent place to start. They don’t easily cross with other bean varieties. They are colorful and large so are fun for children. Tomatoes also do not cross easily although some space between varieties is advised. Peppers are also easy to save. Tomatoes are an excellent choice to start with. Most herbs and flowers do not cross with each other easily but often have tiny seeds.

Only open pollinated, not hybrid, seeds will breed true. (All Good Seed varieties are open pollinated) If there is an F1 designation by the seed variety, it is not an open pollinated seed. The seeds of hybrid seeds will grow but you will not get seeds like the parent seed.

Many seeds are much more complicated to save. You often need a reference book to find out techniques so that they do not cross with other varieties. You certainly need some reference before you save squash and pumpkin seeds. You can get some very interesting mixes and most are not valuable to you. There are all sorts of techniques to get your squash to breed true. Isolation, growing only varieties that do not cross and doing pollination by hand are some ways. You need a reference book or online information to save squash successfully.

Some things to keep in mind are:
When saving greens, it is tempting to save the first seeds to appear. However, those plants are often the ones that seeded (bolted) first and that is not a very valuable trait in greens. You would be better off pulling the first plants to seed and saving from the plants that are slow to bolt. Plants can cross with plants in the wild. Carrots, for example, can cross with Queen Ann’s Lace growing wild near your garden. Plants can cross with plants in a neighbor’s garden sometimes for quite a distance. This is especially true with wind and insect pollinated varieties. Corn which is wind pollinated can blow quite a distance downwind. Melons are bee pollinated and can cross with other varieties of Melons at quite a distance.

Seed saving is like gardening. It takes a little knowledge to begin with the easy varieties and the skills can be gained with time. Start with a favorite bean or tomato or pepper and you may someday be saving squash and broccoli. We include some good reference books and you may want to get one if you get the seed saving bug. You can also find most of the information online.

Good Seed Saving References:

Seed Sowing and Saving by Carole Turner

The Complete Guide to Saving Seeds by Robert Gough and Cheryl Moore-Gough

Seed to Seed by Susanne Ashworth

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