As a gardener, it is your job to decide which plants to save seeds from. While each situation is different, it’s best to choose the seeds that come from the most vigorous and healthy plants you have. That’s because those are the ones that produce both the vegetables and fruits you love to eat as well as the flowers you can’t stop looking at.
Different seeds to procure
Hybrids
- If there’s one type of plant you want to stay away from, it’s hybrids. These won’t produce productive seeds, as those are sold mainly in garden stores and are created by artificial cross-pollinating cultivars. That’s why you don’t want to save any of the seeds from hybrids. These seedlings are very different from the parent plant and aren’t any good at producing new life. If you see a seed packet with the word hybrid on it, toss it aside.
Open pollinated
- When you’re trying to procure seeds that can produce reliable results, turn to open pollinated plants. These are non-hybrid cultivars that can reproduce through either cross pollination or self pollination. The seed that is saved here from an open pollinated plant will breed properly as long as it does not cross pollinate with another plant of the same species.
Self pollinating
- Then, there are self pollinating plants like tomatoes, peas, lettuce and beans. These plants contain flowers that have both male and female parts. Thanks to this, each flower can be fertilized from itself or a flower nearby that’s on the same plant. When you procure a seed that comes from one of these self pollinating plants, you are practically guaranteeing yourself an identical plant to what you already have. However, keep in mind that there is always the chance here that an insect can transfer a small amount of pollen from one cultivar to the next. If that happens, the seed that was produced from that flower will be completely different from the seed that is produced by all the other flowers on the plant.
When you procure the right seeds for your garden, you will truly end up with the results you were hoping for.
Based on the seeds to procure that we’ve listed, which do you usually choose?
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