Gardeners are often looking for seed storage ideas for storing those precious garden gems!
Our plants give us so much. They bring joy in the starting, growing and tending of them. The birds, bees and pollinators love and need them, (and vice versa). The fruit and vegetable plants give us food, and then they give us their seeds so that we may grow more… into perpetuity!
Seed saving and storing is an annual ritual for many gardeners. Many gardening families have a tradition of passing down heirloom seeds through the generations, and also gifting some to others. There’s something really special about planting seeds that came from generations before us.
Seed saving is another form of family legacy to pass down with each generation growing good crops from proven winner seeds.
Have you ever received heirloom seeds from a friend or family member who’s into seed saving from the best of their garden? Those seeds packets are often carefully opened and handled reverently. The gardener has taken special care in harvesting seeds from the best produce of the best plants, then storing them to remain dry and protected.
Saving and storing seeds is an art and tradition.
Seeds are like gems in the hands of a gardener.
~LeAura Alderson, GardensAll.com
Seed Saving Tradition
In times past, it was common for every gardener to save seeds. In fact, it wasn’t just tradition, it was survival.
Easier to Buy Seeds?
Over this past few decades, many had found that it’s easier to buy seeds than to save and store them. It does take time to patiently harvest, label, and properly store seeds. So with the ready availability of inexpensive seeds, plus lots of interesting new hybrids to try, more often than not people haven’t been saving seeds.
The result is that a lot of seed preservation knowledge has been lost to many people. However many today are getting back into the tradition of harvesting, storing and saving seeds and the sales of heirloom seeds are steadily climbing. Especially now.
“Heirloom seeds” averaged 27,100 monthly internet searches in September of 2020 and, and also in March of 2022, as we’re updating this article. But in September of 2019 there were just 8,100 monthly searches.
That’s a 235% increase in interest in heirloom seed searches in just one year’s time, and it has stayed strong for the past two years now into March 2022 as this article is being updated. That’s good news because it means that more new people are adding to that search volume as they also coming on board with gardening.
Internet searches for the term “heirloom seeds” increased +235% between 9/2019 and 9/2020, and continuing that new high rate into March, 2022.
~GardensAll.com
Another Reason to Harvest and Save Your Seeds
With the 2020 Covid-19 pandemic, garden seed companies experienced a sudden onslaught of orders. The largest companies were mostly able to carry on. Many smaller seed companies had to close temporarily, and some, altogether. The seed companies that remained open experienced extended delays in order fulfillment, and LOTS of out of stock inventory.
So while it’s takes extra time and space to harvest and store seeds, it’s an important hedge against dire times, and we’ve all heard that warning bell.
Vegetable garden seed storing is preparedness survival insurance.
~GardensAll.com
The Best of the Old, Plus Some New Seeds
You don’t have to be a breeder or own a plant nursery to save your own seeds. Seed savers keep on saving seeds from their best plants year to year, though most gardeners also delight in ordering new seeds to plant something new they’ve not tried before.
Cucamelon, for instance. We tried these “Mexican Gherkins”. Have you heard of it? And if you have, have you tried it yet? We really like them. They’re like a pleasing tangy and juicier cucumber, they look cool in salads and on your plate and they make great healthy travel snacks in their sturdy self-contained, miniature watermelon speckled skin.
Seeds are to gardeners what words are to writers.
They hold within an entire story waiting to unfold.
~LeAura Alderson, GardensAll.com
Survival of the Fittest Seed Saving Tips
Seed saving is the science of common sense. When it comes to seed saving, you want to save seeds only from the strongest plants. But more than that, you don’t even want to leave the smallest producing plants in the garden else they will compromise future generations through cross pollination
Before we get into sharing more seed storage ideas, let’s review seed saving tips.
Golden Rules for Seed Saving Success
- Save seeds from healthy plants, non-hybrid plants.
- Dry seeds before storing them
- Store in a a glass jar in a cool, dry place.
Seed saving is the science of common sense.
~GardensAll.com
Save the best seeds from the best producing plants.
