DOWN & DIRTY
Seed Saving for a Pretty Spring and Summer Next Year By Julia Graham-Whitt
downanddirty@northcoastjournal.com
J
1001 Main St. in Fortuna
707.725.6734
www.eelvalleyappliance.com
18
ust when we thought it was safe to go into other gardens … well, they are outdoors and as long as you keep your distance, going into gardens is still a great activity to keep the mind from wandering toward more unpleasant thoughts. Perhaps you’ve been on your daily walk or drive, and you’ve admired the neighbor’s flowers, or those at that place on A Street over by Trinity Street. But if you don’t have a lot of money, you might wonder how you, too, can get a beautiful flower garden. Well, this is the time to plan ahead. Saving seeds from the spent blooms of “cutting gardens” can be quite easy. No, don’t steal seeds from your neighbor’s garden or any other yard you happen upon. Gardeners tend to be a sharing bunch and are usually happy to oblige as long as you ask politely for a cutting, some seeds or seedpods, so long as you’re not taking an entire plant. Please don’t take an entire plant. That makes gardeners grumpy. This time of the year, flowers blooming at my place and my clients’ include ornamental poppies (some are known as breadseed poppies), calendula, love-in-amist (Nigella), bachelor’s buttons, asters, Shasta daisies, sweet peas, Sweet William, sunflowers, toadflax (Linaria), carnations (Dianthus), dahlias, cosmos and many more. Many people cut off the spent blooms (also known as deadheading) so the plant will continue to bloom. This is especially true of sweet peas, dahlias and other summer bloomers. Keep cutting those flowers and the plants will put out even more. But don’t cut them all off. Save a couple so they can dry out and produce some seeds. Calendula is a lovely flower that comes in multiple colors, mostly oranges and yellows, and it will self-sow — heartily. It’s a nice plant to grow in a bare spot because
NORTH COAST JOURNAL • Thursday, Sept. 2, 2021 • northcoastjournal.com
it will reseed year after year. Same goes for the ornamental poppies. They produce approximately 8 gazillion seeds from just a few seedheads. How to save these seeds, though? It’s pretty simSaved seeds from cuttings yield poppies, calendula, bachelor’s buttons, ple. I use old toadflax, cosmos and maybe a few surprises. prescription Photo by Julia Graham-Whitt bottles because you can see what’s in the container and, of course, seeds is whether they are from open polyou’ll be marking the container with the linated or hybrid plants. Open pollinated name of the seeds you collected. Right? flowers, such as blue bachelor’s buttons or Mark the container, even if you’re sure pale blue nigella, will be true to type. Not you’ll remember next year. Because you so with hybrid flowers. It’s entirely possiwill not remember next year and an awful ble that the gorgeous breadseed poppy lot of those smaller seeds look identical. If you’ve saved seed from was cross-pollinatyou’re not blessed with seasonal allergies ed in the yard or garden. You may end up and don’t have any loose prescription with a completely different color flower bottles lying around, you can always use next year. envelopes. One last reason to not cut all of the The easiest way to save some of these spent blossoms back on your plants is to future beauties is to place the container provide food for wildlife, especially birds, or envelope under the dried bloom, then chipmunks and squirrels. I discovered that shake the seedhead vigorously. If it’s a my laziness in not cutting back the cow poppy, you’ll end up with about 3,000 parsnip blooms means their dried stems seeds. (You think I’m joking. I’m not.) If it’s provide a lovely feast of bugs for woodcalendula, you’ll get about 10 to 12. peckers. Store these seeds for next year in a You can toss some of these seeds in cool, dark place. A closet in a cooler part your garden once our winter rains start of the house works great — if you have and again in the late winter to early spring. a basement or cellar, even better. If the As long as they get a chance to outcomseeds are completely dried, you can also pete the weeds, you’ll be amazed at what store them in an airtight container in the comes back up. ● refrigerator or freezer. Again, make sure they’re labeled, though a mystery flower is Julia Graham-Whitt (she/her) is owner always kind of fun. and operator of the landscaping business One last thing to consider when saving Two Green Thumbs.
