How to Harvest, Process and Store Vegetable Seeds
Instead of buying vegetable seeds in packets from the supermarket, why not grow your own? It is cheaper and also helpful in preserving certain varieties of vegetables that are no longer available from many seed catalogs.
Follow these suggestions about gardener seeds in harvesting, processing, and storing vegetable seeds.
Harvesting
Before picking the fruit of your plant, make sure it ripens fully. You will know it is ready if you notice that the fruits have shown resistance to harmful insects, produce foliage completely, and its fruits are the largest and healthy-looking. You may need to wait some time before this happens, but be careful not to wait for too long. Otherwise, it will begin to rot and you'll have no choice but to dispose it.
Next, you'll have to cut the vegetable into halves and remove its seeds. Wash off the pulp of those seeds. For tomato seeds covered in gel-like substance, it is best to keep it in a glass of water for several days but not longer than a week. This should then allow the seeds to break free from the gel and be ready for drying.
Processing
Next, place those seeds in a dry container and bring it outside to dry. You could either place it on a sunny windowsill or any place that's warm and will allow the seeds to dry completely in the shortest time possible. Afterwards, the only thing left to do at this time is to wait. Probably, two to four days is enough for the seeds to dry fully.
You'll know they're ready if they sway quickly and easily across the container and do not stick to each other.
Storing
The final step is storing those seeds. Commonly used are papers and plastic packets or envelopes. Basically, it's only a matter of preference and you may choose to store it wherever you'd like to. There's one important thing to follow though, if you opt to store them in plastics, the seeds should be very dry, if not, any moisture in the seeds will be moved to all seeds inside the plastic packet, it will then cultivate mildew and decaying which you do want to happen to your seeds.
To get the maximum results, you could also take your packets and seal them in a brown paper bag, label the package and store them in your refrigerator.
Continue to store it for 2 or 3 years and then take it out from your refrigerator and heat the seeds for up to 100 Fahrenheit for about an hour. You can use the over for that. But be careful not to overheat it as it may burn the seeds. Finally, allow a few minutes for it to cool then seal it again in a packet and bring it back in the refrigerator. This is a great technique that you can do for a longer seed life.
And that's all there is. It's a great delight to grow your own vegetables from them but most importantly, the fruits of your "no-so-hard" labor will continue to reward you and your family for a long period of time.
Kevin Payne is gardener enthusiast, and enjoys helping others get started in this amazing hobby. The newest eBook, "Herb Garden Kits," teaches gardening and everything you need to know about Gardener Seeds. If you need to know more info starting and maintaining a thriving herb gardening visit http://www.herbgarden-kits.com/.
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