Seed Garden 2015

All in all this has been a pretty good growing season. A couple heat waves and rain seems to come just when we need it most. Things are slightly ‘behind’ in my gardens, but I am happy with how they are growing. Lots of seeds forming.

The hard part about being a seed saver is, you can’t pick all the food coming out of your garden, the fun part, is letting the plants do what they want to to do, to let them grow their whole life cycle & create seeds. Observation is a huge part of seed saving. Here is some observations from my gardens these days:

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Vermont cranberry beans harvested. These were freshly picked, it is best to let the pods dry on the plant when growing for seed

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Peppers starting to come along. Let peppers ripen fully on the plant before picking. You can just cut the seeds out. set them aside to dry & enjoy the fruit

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My wild seed garden. Full of pollinator plants & veggies going to seed

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Striped cavern tomatoes in their stages of ripening. I love these heirlooms. They were the first seeds I saved over ten years ago & still part of my collection

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Lettuce, bolted & started to produce flowers, which whose pods will contain the seeds

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Lettuce, fully bolted & sending out massive amounts of flowers, once bloomed, they will die back & brown & the pods will be full of new seeds to spread and plant next season

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Royal Burgandy Beans. To save bean seeds, you need to let them grow well past the point of eating ripeness on the plants. Here they are starting to loose their colour & swell with bean seed. They will need to brown and dry on the plant. The seeds will rattle inside the plants when ready

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Red Swan Bean starting to swell and produce seeds

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Purple Flower Fava Bean. Long way to go to getting seed as they are just flowering, but they are so beautiful, I wanted to include them here.

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Green Beans swelling and producing seed

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Lazy Housewife Beans. These are new to my collection, happy to see them growing so well. Full of bean seeds swelling!

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I overwintered these beets & replanted them this spring, and now they are going to seed!

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Carouby Peas are just ready to be picked for seed soon. Just need to dry down a bit on the plant first

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Arugula going to seed. It first bolted & produce lovely white flowers & then the pods (pictured in front) grew & filled with seed. Just letting them dry down & brown a bit more before picking

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Tango Lettuce in the bolting stage

 

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