I feel the need: The need for seed!

October 3, 2012 at 10:34 am (Gardening - Basics, Planting calendar, Seed Saving)
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Okay, we’re well on the way to the middle of spring, and it’s time to plant pretty much everything you might want to grow in the garden. I love this time of year, spring blossoms on the trees herald the beginnings of delicious stone fruits, and Apple and Pear blossoms are not far behind.

This Pear tree is exploding with blossoms, though it’s purely ornamental. Such a waste of space!

But the vegie garden is where it’s all really exciting, have a look at my planting calendar to get an idea what you can plant where you are, but pretty much, anything goes! Knock yourself out. I try to use open pollinated varieties of vegies and herbs, for the simple reason that you can save the seeds from your best plants to grow again next year. Biodiversity is so important in making sure we have enough food in the future, and the best way to preserve that diversity is to grow and save your own seeds.

Open pollinated means that the plants freely cross with each other, there’s no clever methods to follow to make sure they produce good seed, just let nature take its course. But open pollination means they will cross with other varieties of the same plant if they are growing close by. If you have two or more lettuce varieties, for instance, they will cross with each other when they flower, and the resulting seed will grow into a combination of the parents.

If you want to keep a variety pure, make sure it’s the only one flowering. The easiest way is to remove flowers from other plants until your selected plant has finished and produced seed. In my front garden I have a whole heap of different things growing, and I have left some of each to go to seed, Red Osaka Mustard, Tuscan Kale, Chinese Broccoli, Rocket and Black Spanish Radish have all gone to flower, but none of them will cross even though they are closely related.

So many flowers! The pale yellow Rocket flowers in the foreground don’t cross with the pink Radish flowers in the background, but both will produce more seed than I can use.

But Kale will cross with European Broccoli, and Turnips will cross with Chinese Cabbages and Broccoli. It can be a bit tricky. If you are a bit unsure, there are places to buy good, open pollinated seed so when you build up your confidence you can start keeping your own.

One of my favourite seed suppliers has only recently put up a website at Phoenix Seeds where you can view the catalogue and download order forms. Michael still likes to do business by mail, but his seeds are of top quality, all sourced as locally as possible for things he has no room to grow himself. Have a look through, he has vegies, herbs and other fruiting and useful seeds for sale. Give some of the unusual things a go, it’s always fun to grow something you’ve never even seen before.

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I beg your pardon, I never promised you a rose garden

November 18, 2011 at 2:06 pm (Container gardens, Gardening - Basics, Pests and problems)
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The following post is adapted from a workshop given at the Green Renters Expo in association with the City of Yarra, May 17th, 2011

I was challenged by my friends at Green Renters to put together a short talk about food gardening for people with limited access to an established garden. Trying to squeeze in as much as possible into such a short presentation (I really only had about half an hour) was pretty difficult, so I had to pare down the volumes of information about growing plants to the bare bones. This is what i came up with.

Gardening without a garden

Getting by with what you’ve got

Not everyone has a garden, and in the past, only the extremely wealthy could afford lavish gardens. Landed gentry had teams of gardeners on their estates tending to exotic plants collected from all around the world. As the middle class grew, smaller versions of these elaborate status symbols replaced the purely utilitarian vegie plots and orchards in suburban private gardens, and even in government owned properties. Status is fine, if you actually can afford it as the old fashioned lords could: they had their own productive land as well as the extensive show gardens. The average person does not have that luxury. In some cases, a patch of soil is not even available for any kind of garden.

The front yard of a nearby neighbour, every year it's full of vegies.

So, where can we put a garden? As one version of things goes, before all else: Let there be light! A successful, productive garden needs at least 6 hours a day of direct sunlight. There are plants that can grow in less light, but as our focus is on food for people, the less light there is, the fewer meals you will get from the space. Light is essential for plant growth, plants take energy fromsunlight and convert it into chemical energy which we can eat. The light should be preferably in the morning, as the afternoon sun is generally hotter, and will tend to stress the plants a bit more, but in the end, any light is good, as long as there’s enough of it.

If a garden bed already exists, choose it to start with. It’s easier to dig out old plants you dan’t want, and replace them than start a whole new garden. Sometimes, anyway. There are problems, especially with established woody plants, which can cause problems, but in most cases, an existing garden is a good place to begin. The next best place is a lawn area. Lawns require a lot of sun, so a healthy patch is a good indication that there is enough light and water to grow most other plants, including food!

But what if there’s no soil at all? Any open space can be used as a growing area. In the inner cities, large areas have been paved, conreted or covered with hard surfacing like asphalt to reduce maintenance. These places are perfect, if they get enough sun, we just have to consider options for growing in containers, which I will come back to. In actual fact, the ground may not be the only place to put containers, and anywhere there is close-to-level space, such as balconies, roof tops, or even stairways can be considered, taking safety and access into account, of course.

Containers don't have to be "plant pots"

Another thing to consider is access to water. Is there a tap nearby the area you are going to use? It makes it so much easier to keep things going if you aren’t having to lug heavy watering cans up and down stairs or hoist them on to roofs to alleviate the thirst of your garden, and they are thirsty. In summer you may have to water every other day, in containers, maybe every day. There are automated ways of doing this, but a hose and trigger spray nozzle are the easiest.

There are other advantages of inner city gardens such as a potential lack of frost, due to being off the ground, or surrounding bricks and paving keeping things war at night. There are also often lower populations of weeds and pests, due to the absence of other gardens nearby for them to migrate from.

What can you grow? Anything you like, really, the number of plants that can be grown are limited by climate, but in any location, there are hundreds of species of plant that can be grown productively. the first thing to consider is what do you like to eat? There’s not much point growing things that you don’t like, it takes just as much work to grow them, but you don’t get anything out of it. Everything is seasonal, too. Some things will grow all year, but most plants have an optimum time of year in a particular area. This usually means they are in season when they are also cheapest in the shops, so find unusual or expensive things, or things that don’t transport well for starters. Soft fruits, fresh herbs, tomatoes and salad vegies are my first thoughts, but it’s really up to you.

You can grow whatever you want in your space

So how can we grow a garden without garden beds? The first option is raised beds. These can work on lawns, if you don’t want to dig them up, but they can work on concrete or other paved surfaces, they behave just like large containers. Basically, you build a wall around the area you want to use, and fill it with “soil”, but I will come back to this. Of course you can use plant pots, or any other kind of container, polystyrene fruit boxes are easily obtained, usually for nothing, from local grocers, or markets (if you can find one). But really, you can use anything as a container, with a few important provisions.

Firstly, it has to hold “soil”, and I keep using scare quotes, because bringing in actual soil from somewhere else is expensive, and basically unsustainable in most cases, but we can work around that. Cheap potting mix is a good option. Supermarkets and big variety stores have potting mix for less than $5/25 litres. The one thing to note is the Australian Standrad logo. There are two standards for potting mix, Regular, which does not have to contain any fertiliser, and Premium, which contains enough for a few months. The standard means you are sure the mix contains no toxic chemicals, retains water and nutrients, drains okay, allows air down to the plant roots: all the things you need from a potting mix. The container itself must also have holes at the bottom to allow water to drain away, or roots become waterlogged.

Logo for the Australian standard (regular grade) potting mix. Premium grade is the same in red.

You need to fill up the container almost to the top, but not quite, as there needs to be some space, a “reservoir” for water to collect so it can filter into the potting mix. Don’t squash it down too much, either, it will settle when it’s watered in., and too much pressure will squash out all the air spaces in the mix, and suffocate your plants.

But where do we get our plants? If you’re buying plants, seeds are the cheapest way to do it. You’ll get more plants than you know what to do with from most packets of seeds. It’s best to buy things that are “open pollinated” if you can find them, which means you will be able to save this year’s seeds again for next year. But there are plenty of other ways to get plants. Division is one way, there are a lot of plants, like Mint and Oregano, and Thyme, where you can just dig a little bit of the plant from an existing one, and plant it where you want it to grow. A bit more complicated it taking cuttings, where you cut a small stem from an established plant, strip most of the lower leaves off and stick it in some potting mix. Eventually, if the cuttings are kept moist, and out of direct sun in a warm spot, like the top of the fridge, new roots will grow from the base, and you can plant the cuttings out. Rosemary and Sage work well this way.

Not too little, not too much, this Apple seedling finds things just right. Maybe I'll call it Goldilocks.

Fertiliser = Plant Food. Plants produce their own energy, but they need certain elements to build the machinery to do it. These come from the nutrients found in fertilisers. The most important are Nitrogen, Phosphorous and Potassium, or “NPK” in their chemical symbols. These can be found in both synthetic chemical fertilisers, or in organic fertilisers. Chemical fertilisers are easy to apply in small amounts to deliver large doses of appropriate nutrients, while organic fertilisers, mostly animal manures, require much larger quantities to be applied for the same result. For this reason, along with the issue of odour, some people choose to use chemical fertilisers. It’s a personal decision, really, it makes little difference to the plants, though organic fertilisers increase soil organic matter and microbial activity, which is a good thing, while chemical fertilisers are much easier to overdose on and produce undesirable effects.

Pests and Diseases are often the cause of much discouragement. Grubs and slugs and bugs can eat away plants literally overnight, but there are simple solutions. Firstly, the best defence is healthy plants, healthy plants seem to be attacked less by pest and disease, so keep them growing strong. Growing many different plants together, mixed up rather than in neat rows, seems to confuse any critters looking for a free feed. Lastly, there are plenty of low toxicity sprays that will knock back the baddies. Just remember they will also knock out any beneficial bugs as well, like ladybugs and hoverflies.

Grow as many different plants as you can in the space you've got, it helps confuse the pests, keep out weeds, and produce more food!

Weeds take up empty space in the garden. If you have weeds, it means you could have more plants you like. Pulling weeds makes more weeds! By ripping them out, you are bringing more weed seeds to the surface, and allowing more sunlight to warm the soil, and more water to germinate more seeds. Mulch reduces weeding and watering, by shielding the soil from the sun, evaporation is reduced, so more water stays in the soil for plant roots. Organic mulches provide some nutrients as they break down, but very woody mulches can use up some nitrogen if you are not careful. Any mulch is better than nothing, even stones or plastic could help stop weeds and hang on to water.

Many plants produce more when harvested, like beans, peas, salad greens, even broccoli, so keep picking! Keep sowing seeds, too, on a regular basis, so plants can be replaced when they are slowing down. Most of all, keep trying, take notes so you can look back on what works and what doesn’t, and don’t get discouraged. No one is good at something the first time they try. Remember learning to cook?

The golden garden rules

  • Light
  • Water
  • Healthy roots = healthy shoots
  • Mulch
  • Plant what you like
  • Keep planting
  • Keep picking
  • Learn from mistakes
  • Have fun!

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Growing the seeds of stuff

October 31, 2011 at 11:53 am (Agriculture, Community gardening, Featured plants, Fruit trees, Gardening - Basics, Pests and problems, Seed Saving)
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So much of what is written about growing food is based on commercial information. The methods of broadscale monocultures are scaled down to home gardens, based on the experience and research of commercial food production. But this may not be the best way to go about growing things in a local home garden.

Fruit trees are a good example of what I mean. In commercial orchards, trees are grown and maintained in a very uniform way. The aim is to get a large quantity of uniform fruit for market, ripening at the same time on multiple trees in plantations of dozens or hundreds of trees. The spraying, pruning, picking and processing of the fruit is streamlined to reduce costs to the grower. The trees all grow genetically identical fruit on selected rootstocks to reduce pest and disease problems. Such problems are concentrated by growing only one kind of plant in such mass plantings as orchards.

These problems for the most part do not apply to home growers. Further, the predictability of known varieties, those which are sold in bulk by supermarkets and grocers, are of benefit to mass production, allowing growers to systematically produce crops at set times of year. The existence of such monocultures are the main cause of chemical pesticide use in agriculture and horticulture. Large scale operations require mechanised simple solutions for economic reasons.

A bit less than a week's worth of seeds from my house, that's dozens of plants, right there.

When European settlers first arrived in Australia, they were forced to select and breed new varieties of plants and animals for the new conditions here. The climate, seasons and soils were so alien to their experience that varieties from “home” were not as predictable or productive as they were used to. Now faced with changes to climate, including temperature and weather patterns, we must begin to select new varieties that can cope with altered conditions.

Luckily for us, nature has a means of doing so quite easily: seeds. Every seed contains a variation on the genetics of it’s parent plant. Sexual reproduction in plants allows them to adapt to new environments and survive, and there is no reason home gardeners can’t take advantage of that natural adaptability. But the only way to do that is by letting those seeds grow. Existing plants can’t adapt to changed conditions in the same way their offsrping may be able to.

Many fruits we eat contain seeds, and there is no reason a home gardener can’t plant those seeds and grow new varieties of fruit which are unknown in the world. The vegetatively reproduced commercial varieties are well known to us for reasons of consumer preference, but mostly for shelf life, transportability, and ease of production by large scale growers. The price of fruit at market is influenced by season, but also by costs to the producers. Home gardeners, by having only one or two of a particular kind of fruit tree can avoid the broad scale pest and disease problems of the commercial growers, and by growing seedlings, could find new varieties with resistance to pests, diseases, or changed climatic conditions, such as lower water availability or reduced chilling periods.

Planting the seeds of the apples we eat, for example, will produce seedling apple trees. If we plant those seedlings in the ground, we find which are best suited to our actual soils and other conditions. The ones that thrive are evidently more suited to our specific location. Leaving them to mature and produce fruit will give us further information about their suitability for particular areas and seasons, and good record keeping will allow us to share that information with others. Finally, when the fruit appears, and admittedly this may be five or more years after planting seeds, we can pick it, and taste it, and decide whether it is an improvement on what we get in the supermarket.

In the vast majority of cases, if the fruit is not to our taste, or without some particular use, it can often be grafted with something more to our liking. The chances of it being radically different from the fruit we first took seeds from is very small, because of the way fruit is grown. The plants that pollinated the apple we bought are virtually identical, so the gene pool is quite small. But other features, such as disease tolerance, could make it a superior plant, even if the taste is exactly the same. But there is a chance it could taste better, be sweeter, have bigger fruit, ripen earlier or later, or any number of slight variations which may be improvements on the original. And no matter what, you get to name the new variety whatever you wish, as every seedling is a new variety, no matter how similar to it’s parents.

WARNING: May contain cases of nuts: I bought these for $10 from the local market, that's almost two hundred potential nut trees from a 1KG bag. To be precise, it's 129 Almonds, 23 Brazil nuts, 25 Hazelnuts, 15 Macadamias and 7 Walnuts. No prize for guessing what's the cheapest nut per kilo.

In the case of nuts, one of the major concerns for growers is uniformity of size, and that is one of the main reasons they grow selected varieties, so they know their harvest will be uniform. This carries over to processors, who often have machinery for shelling specific sizes. If the nuts aren’t the right siz, they won’t buy them. Most of the nuts in their shells on the retail market are “non uniform” for this reason. But if you’re going to sit around at Christmas with a nutcracker opening them by hand, what difference does it make to you?

There are restrictions as far as what will grow where. But when growing seedlings for basically no outlay, you can try whatever you want. Avocadoes and Macadamias grow quite happily in Melbourne, for example, but as far as I know, Brazil Nuts do not. There is no reason not to plant a few and see what happens, though. Sure, the frost might get to them, but then again, you may grow the first frost tolerant Brazil nut in the world. If it can be done, it won’t happen by sticking with the known varieties, that’s for sure, it needs seed-generated biodiversity for changes to happen, and those changes might be needed quite soon.

I’ve mentioned before that some of the most popular varieties, for example Granny Smith Apples, began as chance seedlings. If everyone with a garden grew a few seedling fruit trees, imagine how much genetic diversity would be cultivated in a single suburb, not to mention how much food could be produced. Sure, the tree you grow may not be your favourite orange, or pear, the walnuts your tree produces may be smaller than those in the shops, the mandarins might be seedier than you’d prefer, but surely it’s better than no food at all? And if it costs nothing, there’s nothing to lose.

So, keep your seeds in a paper bag, maybe even in the fridge, then plant them out in spring. Except Avocadoes which can go in any time, really, though they may not grow until the weather is warm. Give it a go. Even if you don’t have space for a Walnut tree, you could always sneak it in to the nature strip somewhere.

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Green-age wasteland

May 19, 2011 at 11:09 am (Container gardens, Featured plants, Fruit trees, Gardening - Basics, Seed Saving)
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A lot of people probably don’t realise, or at least don’t stop to consider, that when they buy fresh fruit and vegetables, they are often buying the means to generate more fresh fruit and vegetables. Every time you spit out pips of any fruit you eat, you are probably throwing away the means to grow whatever fruit is your fancy. Of course, most commercial fruit comes from carefully selected varieties, nursery propagated by grafting a well known variety on to disease resistant rootstock to grow in a large plantation which will produce uniform fruit of consistent quality under well known conditions at a predictable time of year. Any seed grown from such fruit will not be exactly the same, due to the wonders of sexual reproduction, and resulting natural genetic recombination. But then, why does that matter?

If you want a well known variety of fruit, and you can grow it in your garden, chances are it will be cheapest in the shops when your tree is laden with fruit. That’s how the market works. But if you have a tree in your garden that has different fruit to any other tree in the world, which is quite conceivable, then nobody else will have it for sale. Sure, it won’t be much different; after all, if you save a seed from an orchard grown fruit which was surrounded by genetically identical trees when it flowered, the gene pool is  small to begin with. But every now and then, random recombination combined with natural variation means something new and unusual will spring forth. It may have a different flavour, or colour, or more disease resistance, or better nutritional content, or prettier flowers, or larger fruit, or any other possible variation. The world renowned Granny Smith apple, for example, came from a seedling out of a compost heap in country New South Wales. And if you do get something worth spreading around, you obviously have the right to immortalise yourself, though I don’t think Maria Anne Smith referred to herself as “Granny”.

Some sorely neglected Citrus seedlings. You know how mechanics' cars are always falling apart?

Some fruit produce seeds that are poly-embryonic, meaning they are capable of growing more than one plant from each seed. In the case of Citrus species, one of the embryos is asexual, meaning it’s a clone of the parent plant, along with one or two “normal” embryos. I used to peel the seed coat off citrus pips and stick them in my mum’s indoor plants. They usually grew, but I never took it further than germinating them as a kid. There’s no way of knowing which of the seedlings is the clone, obviously, until they fruit, or you have a genetics lab handy. And seedling trees take longer to fruit than grafted, nursery propagated fruit trees, possibly up to seven years, as compared to two or three. But seedlings are free, and if after a few years waiting the fruit turns out to be not to your liking, you can always graft on something you do like. Even commercial trees have this done as consumer tastes change.

Sprouting Garlic cloves, ready for planting (pic courtesy of shonky photo, inc.)

Okay, so fruits are all good, but what about vegetables? In some cases, they are fruit anyway. Tomato, Pumpkin, Melon, Capsicum and Chilli seeds are easy to identify for example, and Eggplant too, though the seeds are a little harder to extract. But often we actually buy whole or almost whole plants. The onion family is the best example of this. Onion and garlic bulbs are basically dormant plants. Each individual clove of garlic is capable of producing a whole bulb of garlic if you stick it back in the ground. Just look for clove that are already starting to push out a leaf, and bury them pointy end up, just below the soil surface. Onions will regrow if planted, though not as deeply, and they usually just flower, which gives you a seed supply at least. Onions that have divided into separate bulbs may be able to become multiplier onions, this is where Shallots originally came from.

Look ma! Growing Garlic!

Leeks are also a whole plant, though they are usually trimmed of excess leaves and roots before they arrive at the market. But you can use the leek as normal in the kitchen, and then replant just the base, which will re-grow. Again, you may only end up with a flowering stalk, but they do look attractive, like pink pom-poms, and again, you will be able to collect plenty of seeds. Pretty much anything that comes with a root attached, for example bunched herbs, can be replanted and grown again, though the shock of harvest and transport may mean they simply flower quickly and produce seeds. But you may get some foliage, which is what you want from herbs, and at the very least you will get seeds.

Three leeks and a celery. Not pictured: Ted Danson

Whole bunches of celery can also be a source of planting material. I usually pull off the large outside stalks of celery until the pale, tiny leave in the centre are all that’s left attached to the base of the plant. That base can be planted either in the garden or in a pot, and will grow new leaves and roots, which may either be harvested, or left to produce seed for next year.

The pale, sickly looking celery heart. This was indeed a dark day for flash-free photography. Happily, the celery made a miraculous recovery (see above)

These are just a few examples of how your grocery basket can be a way of filling up your food garden as well as your fridge. If something looks like it will grow, give it a try, you never know your luck. I am currently eyeing a pineapple top in my compost bin. I will get back to you…

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For ev’rything, turn turn turn, there is a season, turn turn turn

February 11, 2011 at 3:44 pm (Gardening - Basics, Planting calendar, Seed Saving)
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What a year we have had, and it’s only six weeks old. In the late summer, the vegie garden should be in full production. Tomatoes should be ripening, zucchinis doubling size overnight, and all in such abundance your neighbours will be sick of them, if not you bringing more. And a lot of plants will be producing seeds.

The obvious seeds are those you can see directly, the little golden seeds in the tomato pulp, the slightly under ripe seeds in the beans to should be harvesting by the bucketful, the barely-there seeds in the tender squash and cucumbers that are ready for eating now. But there are other seeds coming on now, too. Some of the spring sown cabbages and greens will be flowering, the Apiaceae, including Carrots, and Parsnips, and a number of herbs. And right now my Mint is flowering and producing seeds, though whether that is a good thing for that hardened garden invader is a matter of opinion.

Carrot flowers in various stages of maturity

So it’s a good time to think about keeping some of those seeds. First of all, don’t worry if you don’t catch all of them. They will probably ripen over a period of time, some falling off before others on the same flower head have barely formed. That’s good for the plant’s survival, obviously, avoiding as far as possible having all its eggs in one basket, so to speak. And it’s not so bad for us, either, as it means you will have volunteers springing up in your garden, competing with other plants, let’s call them weeds, that we have no real use for.

Volunteers can pop up just about anywhere, like the Parsley on the right. I'm still not sure I'd be keen to eat it. Anyone have a rabbit?

Volunteers are plants that find their own place. Seedlings that pop up in odd places we’d have never thought to put them, like cracks in the concrete, and gaps in the garden beds. That’s fine, it means the plant likes it there, and has enough to keep it going. Such plants may provide an element of toughness to the garden gene pool, even if they are not the most productive of specimens. And anything is better than having those places filled with grass or other pest plants. Though even they are just showing there are niches we are not using to their full potential.

Parsnips in flower, some only just, some already forming seeds.

So, don’t worry about losing a few seeds here or there, but when the majority of a seed head is ripe, and even starting to dry, cut the stem as close to the base of the plant as you can, or at least, where it branches off the main stem. Stick the whole thing head first in a paper or cloth bag. Even an old pillow case will do, and hang it somewhere dry and shady if you can, but at least out of the rain. Then forget about it. All the remaining energy in the cut stem will go into the seeds, further ripening them.

Mature, ripe Parsnip seeds, ready to be collected

In a few weeks, go back and check, a lot of seeds will naturally drop off by themselves and collect in the bottom of the bag. The pods of the Brassicaceae family, the Cabbages, will split open and drop their seeds as they dry, as will beans and other things. Often all you will need to do is give the stems a shake and pull them out. There may be a few seeds left attached, but there should be more than enough seeds in the bottom for you to plant next season, and some to spare for swapping with friends.

Store the seeds in an airtight container. Commercially they sue plastic ziplock bags, which are perfect, but anything airtight will do, even old glass jars. You might want to put in a sachet of silica gel, which you may find in all sorts of packaged products, from food to shoes, labelled “do not eat”. This stuff helps keep the atmosphere dry, and prevents mould and bacteria as well as possible insect pests from spoiling the seeds. You should also label the seeds with what variety they are, and a date of collection, just so you don’t lose track.

These are the easiest seeds to collects, but next week I will tell you how to get seeds out of fleshy fruits, like Eggplants and Tomatoes. Happy seed gathering!

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Sex, flies & adhesive tape: saving seeds

January 15, 2010 at 12:01 pm (Seed Saving)
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Now that summer is in full effect, and we’re exactly halfway to autumn according to the calendar, it’s time to start thinking about harvest. Hopefully you have been harvesting already from your garden, if you’re organised enough. Tomatoes, Lettuce, Cucumbers, salad greens, Broccoli, Cabbages, green Capsicum, Chillies, even Eggplant if you got them in early enough. But that’s for you to cook/eat/preserve/use in floral arrangements. But there’s another kind of harvest you should think about, too, that will save you money, and hopefully improve your success in the garden.

Collecting your own seeds from plants you have grown is the single best way to ensure improved plants every year. By selecting the plants which do the best in your own garden, you are selecting the individuals that are best suited to your exact growing conditions. This is like natural selection, only in the case of garden plants, we don’t measure the success of a plant solely by it’s ability to survive and reproduce. We’re also interested in the abundance, size, flavour, colour and texture of harvestable products for our consumption, as well as the disease resistance and general performance of the plants as a whole. Obviously this varies according to the individual crop we’re talking about, as does the method of harvest/protection of the seeds themselves, and I will go over some of the basics here. Some plants are self pollinating, some are pollinated by wind, and some by insects, birds or other animals, and this may be an issue when trying to save seeds in the garden. I’ve broken it up by family, but if I’ve missed anything important, leave a comment, and I will address it. Here we go…

Cucurbitaceae

This family of plants includes Cucumbers, Watermelons, Rockmelons, Zucchini, Summer Squash, Pumpkins and Marrows, as well as things like Choko. The family is generally insect pollinated, and fruit will not set without pollination. On isolated plants, hand pollination with a paintbrush may be necessary, taking pollen from male flowers, and depositing it on female flowers, as they are separate on these plants. The female flowers are easy to spot, as they have swellings in the shape of small versions of their fruits directly beneath the petals. The male flowers have no such swelling. Personally, I don’t use a paintbrush, I rip off the male flowers, remove their petals and apply them directly to the female flowers. It’s quicker and I can do it whenever I’m walking past.

Select the plant that has the best characteristics that you prefer, obviously this varies quite a lot between species in this case. For example, you may choose your most productive Zucchini plant, your juiciest Watermelon, or a particular plant with an unusual colour variation, or particular resistance to mildew. Select a female flower that is fully mature but has not opened yet, and tape it shut with adhesive tape. Do the same with a male flower. After watching your plants for a while, you will know which flowers are only a day or so from opening, and which are immature. Then when they are ready to open, remove the tape and apply pollen from the male flower to the female and tape it shut again. If the pollination is successful, the fruit will begin to swell, and the flower will drop off. Leave this fruit, labelled if necessary, until the plant dies of it’s own accord. This will ensure the maximum number of fully ripe seeds to collect for next year.

Apiaceae

These plants are the Carrot family, including Parsley, Dill, Fennel, Coriander, Parsnip and Celery, among the most commonly grown plants. These are insect pollinated, the family name deriving from the Latin “apis”, meaning bee. These need cross pollination, as flowers on an individual plant are unlikely to produce viable seeds, due to the pollen being produced before the female part of the flower is receptive. The easiest thing to do is just leave a few of your “best” plants to flower and go to seed. Once seed heads are produced, you can probably remove all but a single champion from which to save seeds, though of course diversity is preserved the more individual plants are allowed to continue. Things to look for are resistance to bolting, mainly, that is, plants which are the latest in sending up flower heads. Obviously things like flavour, and for carrots, root size/colour/shape should be considered, too. This may mean leaving your “best” carrot in the ground to flower!

As the seeds often drop off when they are ripe, paper bags may be placed over seed heads to catch any falling seeds, tie them securely with string, or tape them up. Alternatively, wait until seeds are going brown, then cut the whole flower stalk and place it where you want the seeds to grow. This is my method of propagating parsley, and I have never run out. The only issue to be wary of is contamination from wild plants. The weed Queen Anne’s Lace is the same species as the domesticated Carrot (Daucus carota) and will contaminate future crops if allowed to cross. In a similar vein, wild Fennel will dilute the purity of Finocchio, or bulb Fennel (Foeniculum graecum) if it is growing nearby when flowering occurs. The flowers of these plants also naturally attract many predatory insects, such as lacewings (species of Neuroptera) and tiny Trachogramma wasps to feed on their nectar, which lay eggs in the eggs, young or adults of many pest species. Gruesome, but helpful to us.

Solanaceae

Tomato, Capsicum, Eggplant, Potato, Chilli, Cape Gooseberry and Tomatillo are some of the more (or less) commonly grown members of this family. Their flowers are, for the most part, self fertile and will produce seeds that will grow the same kind of plant and fruit as the one they are collected from (in other words they are  “true to type”) without much help. But insects will carry pollen from one plant to another, so if you are growing several varieties of tomato, for example, you may wish to bag a few flowers before they open, especially if they are grown close together. Label the flower stalk if you do bag your flowers, and collect fruit when it is fully ripe to save seeds.

Brassicaceae

The Cabbage family includes all the Cabbages, Broccoli, Cauliflower, Asian Cabbages, Rocket, Turnip, Radish and Mustard to name a few (highly important) crops. It is also the source of Canola oil seeds, though rarely grown in the home garden, the name derives from Canadian Oil, as the modern species were developed in that part of the Commonwealth, and it is much more easily marketed than Rape, it’s older common name. The Brassicas are a tricky one to save, as they require large numbers of plants to achieve good seed set due to self incompatibility of the flowers. This means pollen from one plant has to be taken to another separate plant to produce viable seeds. The higher the number of plants, the greater the likelihood of prolific seed production.

The other problem is that the most commonly grown western Brassicas are all the same species (Brassica oleracea), as are many of the Asian varieties (Brassica rapa) which is also where the Turnip rightfully belongs. This means that each variety must be caged separately while flowering to ensure no cross pollination, or only one variety saved each year, the others being thoroughly removed before flowering. Certain weed species must also be controlled to prevent contamination. The seed pods are also dehiscent, which means they open (or more accurately explode) when they are dry and ripe, spreading the seeds far and wide. Old pillow cases may be the best option for preventing this, applied after flowering has finished, and tied securely.

Of course, if you like novelty, you may be quite willing to grow and eat a hybrid cauliflabbage, or a Broccles sprout, if you so desire. It may even prove popular.

Fabaceae

The Peas and Beans, our nitrogen fixing friends are quite easily the simplest seeds to save. Just leave a few pods on the plant until the plant dies, et voila. The flowers are “perfect” meaning the have both male and female parts, unlike the Cucurbits, and they self pollinate before opening. They are occasionally cross pollinated by insects such as bees, but you can simply bag them with paper or cloth bags and tie or tape them closed before the flowers open to prevent this. Picking peas and beans encourages greater production, so this should be towards the end of the growing season. This includes French Beans, Runner Beans, Broad Beans and Peas.

Asteraceae

Though you may not realise it, one of the most commonly grown garden vegetables, Lettuce, is in fact a daisy. As are Endives, Artichokes and Sunflowers, the latter more obviously. These flowers are adapted for insect pollination, and are far more productive when it occurs. If more than one variety of a single species is grown, which is unlikely except for lettuce in most gardens, you will have to cage or bag individual groups of plants separately to ensure separation of pollen.

Chenopodiaceae

This includes Silverbeet, Spinach, Beetroot and Sugarbeet. They are wind pollinated, so simple bagging of flower heads wil prevent crossing of varieties of the same species. Bear in mind that Silverbeet or Chard is the same species as Beetroot when saving seeds of either.

I will make another post on seed collection and storage a bit later in the season, I think that’s enough to think about for today.

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