saving seed
 

Well, I was very interested in the "How long could you last if ...." thread. But, since it got OT was closed (rightfully so :goodjob:) I would like to concider a point of real interest someone brought up. Saving Seed. If you could only pick 6-8 seeds to save, what would they be? I go back to the old saying..."it is better to know 100 uses for one herb, than to know 1 use for 100 herbs." You know, I usually just toss my seed in the freezer :eek:, is there a better way to preserve them?

Sweet corn would be at the top of the list, as would potatoes, onions, garlic, a dry bean variety (pinto?), cayenne peppers, watermelons and tomatoes.

Sweet corn is especially valuable to the homesteader because it can be relatively easily propagated by hand, dried for winter use as a bread grain (you'd be hard pressed for better pancakes and corn bread than what can be made from dried, ground sweet corn),
the stalks can be thinned for the cows and goats, fed to the same as the roasting ears are harvested, and squeezed for their juice, which could be boiled down for molasses type sweetener.
The cobs make excellent fire starter, tool handles and some of the softer toiletry to be home grown......

All of the seeds mentioned are easy to preserve and maintain, the onion being the biggest challenge in my experience.

Potatoes offer great bulk for the land and time invested, and they preserve well.
Onions and garlic go with just about anything and make the genuine difference between subsisting and living like a king.
Dry beans offer protein and energy in a small, easily preserved package.
The young beans make suitable green beans and beans are easy to grow.
Cayenne peppers offer a tremendous vitamin package for the winter and store beautifully dehydrated, not to mention their value for flavoring.... as do all peppers. Cayennes offer an additional medicinal value, being miraculous in their ability to improve circulation and prevent heart attacks.
Watermelons offer high efficiency in transferring mineral nutrient from soil to body in a most refreshing manner on a hot July or August afternoon. Keep a few in the spring house at all times.... Chickens and cows love the season's leftovers and those are generally available until late November around here.
Of course, there is watermelon wine....
Tomatoes ? Well, they could go to the top of the list as well as anything.
Their versatility is incredible.

That's my take, and my experience.
Though I do wish you'd allowed us more like 50 varieties. :)

6 to 8? Golly.....

Tomatoes, because they are so versatile and easy to preserve.
Potatoes, because it's easy to grow tons of them and they are delicious.
Carrots, good winter crop here.
Green beans, because they produce quickly and abundantly.
Sugar snap peas, ditto.
Kohlrabi, because I just love it so much.
Sweet peppers (I hate hot peppers)
Winter squash of some sort, prolly Early Butternut because it's a vegetable but can be cooked sweet like fruit, too.

If I could add another making it 9, I would choose onions, but as green onions can be found wild here, in a pinch they can be foraged and dried.

Also, a couple of wild greens can be foraged here, so I wouldn't necessarily plant them.

Would a person want some things that come ripe real soon, like peas or radishes or sweet corn, some things that provide flavor, some things that produce a large volume of food like potatoes, some things that store real well for a long winter like carrots (and the potatoes), and so forth.

Seems that is what others are picking. :)

--->Paul

I'm going to cheat a bit and not count a number to save. Lettuce is one that basically reseeds itself for me if I leave it in place. Some other greens will do the same thing for you. If you don't dig up all of your potatoes you will get early potatoes the next spring.

Radishes I just leave a few and then hang the pods and shell them out. I actually have a huge bundle hanging on the back porch right now that I have to get to. Next year I plan on planting a huge plot of radishes just to go to seed. The bees absolutely love the flowers and I think that having blooming radishes early in the summer helped guide the bees to my garden for the rest of the season.

There are plants that are easy to save seed from like beans and peas. I don't have to put in a lot of space between varieties and just need to harvest the dried seeds for the next year. Tomatoes can cross if they are too close to each other and do require a more involved process to retrieve the seeds. My husband rolled his eyes at all my tiny jars fermenting in the kitchen this summer. They don't require netting or building a cage for like some other plants though, so I don't count them in my seed saving rotation.

Saving seed from brassicas and carrots is a little obnoxious. Most of the brassicas need two years and isolation from any other blooming brassicas to result in true seed. With carrots you need to worry about cross pollination from wild carrots like queen anne's lace. I'm trying to save seed from them at least once so that I know I have the skills. Otherwise I wouldn't bother unless the need arose. Various squashes can be a little obnoxious too but their large blooms make bagging and hand pollinating more simple than the same process on a pepper plant. If you plan on saving sweet corn seed (or even planting sweet corn) make sure there isn't any other corn nearby tasseling at the same time. Cross-pollination in corn affects both the current and future crop. We planted field corn this summer and it roasted just as nice as sweet corn would have.

If someone is actually considering the process of seed saving I would start out with easy plants and then tackle some of the tougher ones once you have some confidence and experience. I know that a lot of people recommend a book called "From Seed to Seed" but I haven't read it so I can't say much about it.

Kayleigh

And your point is........?

What is the typical way that thread stalkers are handled here at HT ?

Well, he is actually correct, and not raising side issues about it. Some people ask questions with that amount of detail required, so I can understand.

That means we can save potatoes, and not count them as one of the 6-8 in our list. :)

One will have strawberries, rasberries, and some types of onions - many other garden items one has, but doesn't need to save seed for - they come back or reseed themselves in one form or another, as mentioned.

--->Paul

I suppose we do have to allow for the experience as per the lowest common denominator.
Forgive my assumptions in generality.
If we can't have potatoes or garlic, I'll just stick with tree bark....obviously only from trees that can be propagated from seed. :)

He's right. OP only mentions seeds and storing them in a freezer. That can't be done with garlic and potatoes. Unlike some others, he gave most appropriate answers.

Martin

You just havent quite figured out this site have you John?

Must be the winter solstice that's bringing out the "best" of everyone tonight!

MARTIN

Well in that case I'd better jump on the bandwagon. I thought the intent was 6-8 seeds of any one crop, not 6-8 different crops.

Spring is now a few hours closer.

Maybe, I think this poor guy just hasnt figured out that this is actually a very laid back and friendly site and doesnt realize how he is coming across (in several threads just today). Its easy to come across different when you post than what your thinking or trying to write.

John you have a nice web site, just lighten up a little.

I've started doing a little true potato seed breeding work. It takes time, but I believe that potatoes will adapt and naturalize to the conditions and climate in which they are grown. Garlic is well known for its ability to naturalize. I often grow garlic out from the bulbils in the seed head. It is a cheaper and easier way to obtain a quantity of new to me garlic. It is not the quick way but it sure is interesting.

John, there's something strange that happens in HT whenever growing potatoes are mentioned. Seems almost automatic. Happens about every 6 months or so. Usually results in a few people never showing up again. It's totally unexplainable. Just happens!

Martin

If I was going to save 6-8 different types of seeds, they would include squash (yellow and zucchini), watermelon, cucumber, tomato (big and grape and roma), peas, beans, and corn.

These are all easy to harvest and usually produce very well here in the hot, humid summers.

As mentioned, definitely white corn. Locally is was a typical garden crop for white corn meal, homney, moonshine and livestock feed.

Some folks still winter plant turnips. Use only a fraction of them and then till down the rest in the spring as a type of green manure.

One bag of 19 Bean Soup Mix would give you that many variety potential in a quite small space (and need not be refrigerated).

John:

I don't think your statement is completely accurate. Check out a seed catalog and most seem to have non-hybrid varities of sweet corn. Admittedly not many, but some.

Check out Hickory King sweet corn. Know as a giant as the plants, ear and kernels can be quite large.

And I recognize there is a debate whether the Hickory King, widely available today, is the same as the Hickory Cane old-timers remember. My specualation is HC was crossed with another sweeter white corn and has stabilized as HK.

Wow i was the one who said we would have to save some seed to plant.Just reading these posts sure makes my point about comunal living and everyone doing a job and providing for the common good of the homestead.Here is what i think i would need for us to survive.Green Beans(Top Crop),Sweet Corn(Gloden Bantam)Tomatoes(Roma/Rutgers)Field Corn(Non Hybrid)For stock feed Carrots(NantesType) Turnips,Cabbage(Late Flat Dutch/Early Market More)Soy Beans(NonHybrid) For Stock and as a high protien food.There are more if we think about it but we will after a few years be able to share our seeds with others that have different ones.You know people tell me i'm crazyand a homestead wont work out like this in time of need because people some wont work for the common good of the homestead,they will want there stuff for themselfs.This could be true and you would have to pick very wisely who you brought in and even then as i can see it may not work.I still say five familys each with a different skill to bring can raise there familys and live well on forty acres.It would be work but very do able. John

I wonder why in saving seeds we can only pick 6-8? My point in savings seeds is so I can have a LOT of variety.

Here is my list
Beans - eat them green, dry the seeds for dried beans
Pumpkins
Greens - spincah, kale, etc - vitamins, multi-cropping, colder weather croping
Broccoli
tomatoes
melons
corn

John, that is a great answer, and much more appropriate than your first. While your first reply was "legally" correct, I suspect everyone knows that it is hard to grow potatoes from potato seed (while it does exist). The answers concerning potatoes were in the spirit of the thread.... not in the spirit of correcting others that may not be completely scientific in their answer.

I would go with
Tomatoes.
Potatoes (from seed) after the first year I would save tubers.
Field corn (non-monsanto)
Wheat
Onions
Swiss chard
Basil

John: I apologize. I thought shQ was a typo. Haven't see the term befoe.

On potatoes 'seed' may be a misnomer. A seed potatoe is one which has been saved for that purpose and cut into sections, each containing at least one eye (sprout). Back in about 1952 my folks grew a very large patch. I remember mom sitting there cutting up potato after potato after potato. Wondering how they do it on large potatoe farms today. Anyone know?

I grow potatoes from the seed balls that form at the top of the plant. Heirlooms produce the most but so will hybrids (like Yukon Gold). One sowing of seed can give me many different looking and porducing plants. Most all will produce potato tubers. From those I can continue to select for the plants that have the characteristics I desire. Potatoes take longer to stabilize than other veggies and that is what keeps it interesting. It is practical as part of a long term sustainablility project but less so in an emergency food gathering situation.
If you are interested in learning more, checkout the breeding work of Tom Wagner, potato seed breeding specialist.

You asked about storing seeds. I put mine in large Plastic containers with desiccant in the Refer. Then when my storage area gets cool enough , the get moved to there.

Yes, actually I do know and have even owned such a device. In 1987 I attended a potato farm auction with the intent of purchasing a small potato digger.

The equipment fascinated me as I had never seen potato growing equipment nor none since. The grower had supplied potatoes to the chipping plant in Wichita.

At the end of the auction one piece of equipment sat in the yard unsold, that being a size sorter/cutter to produce the seed pieces. While I had no use for such an item it did have 4 or so good electric motors on it and many other pieces that I felt I could use/salvage. That said I offered the guy $50 for it and he accepted it just to get it out of his yard.

The machine was 4-5 feet wide and about 10 feet long. Potatoes were dumped into a low hopper at one end and then they traveled down a conveyor of rollers/chains. The openings of the rollers/chain changed spacing as the line moved along. The small potatoes would drop off first, then larger, then still larger, and finally the largest potatoes simply dropped off the end into a bin for hand cutting at a knife station by manual operation.

Each of the sorting points save for the last had automatic cutting. The larger the potato the more blades that cut it into sections with the end result of all seed pieces being of similar size.

I decided the machine was too valuable to waste for salvage and began to inquire around as to replacement rollers as they were rubber covered and hardened with some split.

I learned the mfg. had been out of business several years and that no replacement parts were readily available. Still feeling that the machine needed put to use than salvaged I contacted a vegetable equipment buyer and seller that advertised weekly for equipment to purchase.

I told the buyer what I had, the machine needs, and he offered me $200 via phone. From $50 to $200 for simply bringing the machine home and testing it with a 10# bag of potatoes worked for me. Even though I lost the salvage value of the motors and other parts I preferred to see the machine put back to its proper use rather than junked.

Too bad that I didn't at least take a photo of the machine or better yet have some video taken during the cutting of the 10# test.

This video on YouTube shows a machine that is much larger than the one I had. It doesn't show the cutting operation but does seem to show the size sorting and end product.

TPS is a topic which I do not think has ever been discussed on this forum. And there are many who haven't a clue as to what it is. For certain, were one to preserve potatoes in either a freezer or Svalbard, that's the only way. There is the small forum TaterMaterSeeds dedicated to mostly just potatoes and run by a person who creates hundreds of new varieties annually. I'm happy to note that I'm not the only one here familiar with Tom Wagner's work. One can visit it at: http://tatermater.proboards107.com/index.cgi?

So far, mostly good selections for what could amount to a small Doomsday stash. Originally I would have included a good lima bean or butterpea but a dual-purpose would give more meals in the end.

Martin

Thanks Windy in Kansas, I had never thought of it before ken's post but it had me wondering too. Too bad you didnt take a picture.

Heirloom corn should be on top of everyone's list, since the bee population is slowly dwindling...

Yes ago I had friends in the Dayton, OH area who tried a potato tower concept which, I believe, was in TMEN. They obtained about a dozen old tires about the same size. Seed potatoes planted in one. When plants started growing they would add another tire and a planting/potting mixture. Continued until they ran out of tires. Disassembled one tire at a time. As I recall they got what they considered to be an excellent harvest in a small bit of space.