“All the flowers of tomorrow are in the seeds of today” - Author Unknown

If you’re willing to pay attention and catch seed before it’s taken on the breeze, you’ll be rewarded with a thriving garden year after year.

West County is notorious for its microclimates, but when you collect your seed, it’s already been acclimated to your specific garden, guaranteeing great success.

September is the perfect month to begin selecting seeds from your star performers. For greens, root veggies, brassicas, onions, and most flowers, leave a couple to produce seeds. For some plants that you’re eating the seed (e.g., peas, beans, and corn), you’ll need to leave some on the plant to fully form and dry out to ensure the viability of the seed.

For flowers, choose a plant with large flowers and no abnormalities. I adore Lauren’s Purple Grape Poppies (Papaver Somniferum), and it took only one seed packet to find myself ten years later with poppies still popping everywhere. I’ve nicknamed the seed heads nature's salt shaker because not only do they resemble one, but you can take one large seed head and lightly “salt” your soil, and you’ll be rewarded with gorgeous purple blooms in early spring.

Other suggestions for flowers that do well sown directly and compliment the vegetable garden are sweet peas, bachelor buttons, nasturtiums, strawflower, calendula, honeywort (a fave!), cosmos, marigolds, zinnias, and sunflowers. In months past, I’ve discussed the many benefits of growing flowers amongst your veggies, so if you don’t have many flowers in your garden this year, definitely visit Harmony’s wall of seeds, or the Sebastopol Hardware Store, to add some diversity and attract more pollinators.

Abalone Shells are great for drying seed

Now, to efficiently collect in the garden, I like to keep a stack of paper plates and a Sharpie handy. As seeds or pods are ready to harvest, I grab a plate, label it, and place the seeds on it. I usually have multiple plates, so it’s easy to stack and carry inside to a cool location for further drying. You can stack one plate on top of another to easily bring them indoors and ensure proper drying. Any bit of moisture will cause the whole batch to rot, so make sure they are bone dry before placing them into any long-term storage container, such as a jar or a simple ziplock bag.

To collect seeds inside the fruit, I use the same paper plate method, but I scoop the seeds as I’m preparing them for a meal. This works great for cucumbers, squash, etc., because you can taste the produce and ensure its deliciousness.

I hope you will be inspired to save seeds from your garden this year. If you’re new to it, you’ll likely find a lot of joy just figuring out where the seed will come from. Flowers are especially clever at hiding their seed. While, I haven’t grown everything from seed, I’ve come darn near close, so if you have any questions, don’t hesitate to reach out. Happy Gardening!