Some tips I have learned about seeds.

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I went over to my blog friend Thyme, and noticed she was doing seed collection.  So I thought I would share how I keep seeds and a few other little tid bits.

A long time ago, I bought seeds in the packet had planted them, put the remainder in a bin and put them in a shed, completely forgetting about them.  The next year, I went looking for them and was really ticked off with myself for losing my bin of seeds and starter gardening items.. like those jiffy seed pellet things.  Went into the shed to grab my gardening tools to aerate my containers a little and there sat my bin.

It was dusty and had vole poop on it, but on the whole, the bin looked pretty good.  Then it dawned on me, my seeds may not grow as it got super cold this year (-40 at one time) and I thought that the cold would have frost bit the seeds.  At the time I was pretty broke and was trying to think of ways to keep my mind off things.  So I decided to see if I could grow my seeds that I had neglected and see what they might do.  Well I planted zukes, cherry toms, sweet peas, lettuce and some beans. 

They all came up, not a single bad seed AND they grew better than they had the previous year.  So I decided to keep doing this “accidental” wintering over.  I have yet not had seeds grow because of this.  But I do know if there is any moisture in a bag.. those seeds are shot.  If you decide to dehydrate the seeds of vegetables or fruit and they are not dry… those seeds will not make it either.  I recommend dehydrating for 12 hours on a low temp. 

Be careful when you grow or germinate seeds in bags with a paper towel.  Sometimes you can actually be growing fungus and mold with them and it can kill your whole crop or harvest.  I know.. the reason the blog is called Gardening Gone Bad. 

Have a good day!