A Seed Saver's Garden

[flowerbug]

...
Probably a good idea to steer clear of astrantia seeds, I read that they are a giant pain in the *utt to start cause they need stratification.

as a general hint usually if a plant's seeds need stratification that also means the seeds may persist quite a long time in the soil seed bank so it may take many years to remove them if they're a problem...

i think i may have stated that too strongly, so perhaps i should have written it more as a hypothesis...

of course, then i wander off and look to see if anyone had done any experiments looking into this angle and did not find anything specific and i also ran out of time to look further.

but i did enjoy reading this paper:

Vertical distribution of soil seed bank and the ecological importance of deeply buried seeds in alkaline grasslands - PMC

Soil seed banks play a central role in vegetation dynamics and may be an important source of ecological restoration. However, the vast majority of seed bank studies examined only the uppermost soil layers (0–10 cm); hence, our knowledge on the depth ...

pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov

and then of course... i can't resist one last peek in:

https://www.jstor.org/stable/24078382

"artificial stratification allowed the emergence of a larger number of species from the soil seed bank, but natural stratification improved estimates of the seed bank density." which is a hint of support for my hypothesis.

arm-chair science at its best... i feel a nap coming on... don't quote me on any of this...

 

[ducks4you]

You know we keep coming back to, "What can I grow that will spread Just Enough to suppress weeds, but won't become invasive?"
I keep coming back to turnips, and oats, and wheat.
Wherever they pop up I Don't have weeds, but I can pull them out pretty easily.
If you don't have sidewalks that portion off growing areas, you cannot contain Anything that wants to spread.

 

[heirloomgal]

as a general hint usually if a plant's seeds need stratification that also means the seeds may persist quite a long time in the soil seed bank so it may take many years to remove them if they're a problem...

i think i may have stated that too strongly, so perhaps i should have written it more as a hypothesis...

of course, then i wander off and look to see if anyone had done any experiments looking into this angle and did not find anything specific and i also ran out of time to look further.

but i did enjoy reading this paper:

Vertical distribution of soil seed bank and the ecological importance of deeply buried seeds in alkaline grasslands - PMC

Soil seed banks play a central role in vegetation dynamics and may be an important source of ecological restoration. However, the vast majority of seed bank studies examined only the uppermost soil layers (0–10 cm); hence, our knowledge on the depth ...

pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov

and then of course... i can't resist one last peek in:

https://www.jstor.org/stable/24078382

"artificial stratification allowed the emergence of a larger number of species from the soil seed bank, but natural stratification improved estimates of the seed bank density." which is a hint of support for my hypothesis.

arm-chair science at its best... i feel a nap coming on... don't quote me on any of this...

I can personally guarantee that anyone in my climate won't have a problem with astrantia, ie dormant seeds etc. This is the most well behaved perennial I've ever grown aside from maybe peony and clematis, which behave the same. They generally don't multiply, not aggressively. This is actually why the hort society gifted me with it when I hosted them, they know NOBODY wants travellers! lol It's a testament to astrantia's loveliness and good behaviour that when I got rid of 95% of my perennial garden I couldn't part with it. She's real lady.

 

[heirloomgal]

You know we keep coming back to, "What can I grow that will spread Just Enough to suppress weeds, but won't become invasive?"
I keep coming back to turnips, and oats, and wheat.
Wherever they pop up I Don't have weeds, but I can pull them out pretty easily.
If you don't have sidewalks that portion off growing areas, you cannot contain Anything that wants to spread.

I love beans and peas for this, and they convert unusable soil to usable soil. DH grew up on a farm built on clay, they would plant peas for 2 or 3 years over a newly turned over section and it was in good shape for planting when they were done.

 

[heirloomgal]

Re: current weather trends.....

 

[Branching Out]

I let the basil I grew this summer for seed dry out really, really well - I find those little seeds so hard to thresh from the pods if they aren't ultra brittle. I only broke the seed pods open today. Wow. SO hard to separate the seeds from the chaff. I'm sure I lost 75% of my seeds for the Siam Queen basil to the sink. So little in the bowl when I was done. The West African basil for some reason was a bit better, there was less chaff mixed in for some reason. I usually love winnowing seed, but this one was a let down! Ugh, all those beautiful, almost hydrangea like blossoms on the Siam Queen plants and yet so little seeds that I harvested. I wonder if those blossoms inhibit good seed development? For all that bulk of dried flowers I crumbled there seemed so little seed, and some of them were not black like they should be but brownish.

In the past I attempted to save seed from basil, but the very few little black dots that I ended up with never germinated. Is it supposed to be this tricky to collect basil seed, or are we doing something wrong?

This year I hope to try again, primarily because I think I may have a cross in the Piccolino Basil that I'm growing. Six plants are typical, kind of like miniature privet shrubs with tiny leaves-- but one has leaves that are much, much larger. That plant is still like a small shrub, but a tad denser. Maybe it would be a good idea to try to root some cuttings as well, in case the main plant perishes.

 

[Zeedman]

Re: current weather trends.....
View attachment 72037

Those snow peas won't grow themselves!!!

 

[heirloomgal]

In the past I attempted to save seed from basil, but the very few little black dots that I ended up with never germinated. Is it supposed to be this tricky to collect basil seed, or are we doing something wrong?

This year I hope to try again, primarily because I think I may have a cross in the Piccolino Basil that I'm growing. Six plants are typical, kind of like miniature privet shrubs with tiny leaves-- but one has leaves that are much, much larger. That plant is still like a small shrub, but a tad denser. Maybe it would be a good idea to try to root some cuttings as well, in case the main plant perishes.

It's a good question. I had a much better time with a different basil species, Ocimum americana. It is so very like Italian basil, but with a more dessert oriented flavor; the seed yield was quite good considering how tiny basil seeds are. I think this Siam Queen may be one of my first real attempts at seed saving with a common species basil.

I've always grown multiple species of basil once I started saving the seeds as I had read same species basils are guaranteed to cross. However, most seed saving information leans toward excessive caution (some bordering on false) so I wonder how much they actually cross in reality. If you only see one plant that looks off type than I'm guessing it may be the case that basil doesn't cross quite so readily. Interesting.

One thing I feel like I've observed - the more breeding and tinkering the species has gone through, saving the seeds can get more tricky alongside that. Even some beans have domestication syndrome. Not that common, but I've seen it. That one bean variety is so darn good though it's worth the trouble, lol.

 

[flowerbug]

In the past I attempted to save seed from basil, but the very few little black dots that I ended up with never germinated. Is it supposed to be this tricky to collect basil seed, or are we doing something wrong?

i don't know anything about basil growing or their setting of seeds but you can nose around and check for things like what temperature conditions they may need during pollination, or if they got too dry or too wet or...

if you can keep a journal of the weather around those times when they are flowering it might also help you spot patterns.

and then it might also be that they are best pollinated by certain insects or ...

 

[digitS']

Basil flowers are very popular with the bees.

We usually harvest them at such a rate that they don't flower.

The exception is Thai basil. Since we are ordering seed of other types, its standard practice to order that one as well. The seed lasts for years.

Steve