Last week on the podcast we talked about which seeds we should be saving from the garden, how mature the fruits need to be when we harvest seeds and a bit about how to dry and test them. This week, we’re focusing on storing them properly.

When we get seeds from a catalog or other seed supplier, they’ve often gone through a set of steps that we may not be duplicating at home with our own saved seeds. Seed suppliers are required to test their seeds not just for germination percentage, but also for diseases and moisture content. These tests ensure that we’re not brining outside diseases into our gardens and make sure the seeds we get will maintain their integrity in storage without spoiling.

Today on Just Grow Something we’re going to talk about how we can achieve the same results in our own seed collection. If you garden where certain diseases are prevalent you certainly don’t want to saving that disease to plant again with your seeds the next year. We also want to be sure our seeds remain intact in storage and we don’t open up a fuzzy, moldy mess when it’s time to plant in the spring. Let’s dig in!

Question of the Month: What was your biggest success in the garden this season?

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Vegetable: Hot Water Seed Treatment | Center for Agriculture, Food, and the Environment at UMass Amherst