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Experimental gardening: saving seeds simply |
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Written by Marilyn Ostergren
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Wednesday, 03 December 2008 14:28 |
For the past 3 years, I’ve allowed many of my vegetables to go to seed and replant themselves. Kale was first. I enjoyed watching the birds eat the seeds and the following spring the bed was full of new kale plants.
The next year, since  I was expanding my garden and wanted to rotate crops to balance the nutrient demands on the soil, I was a little more proactive. I pulled out kale and parsnip plants that had gone to seed and laid the intact stalks on freshly prepared beds. That worked quite well – I didn’t weed, water or even think yet had both kale and parsnips to eat.
This year, I did the same with lettuce, chard and leeks. I now have dense clusters of 3 inch-tall lettuce leaves in the beds where I laid the stalks 3 months ago. One cluster is bright green (see photo), another purplish and the third mottled, just like their parents. I noticed that the stalks seemed to protect the seedlings as they emerged; despite the dry weather and crowded conditions, they remained healthy. The chard took longer. Clusters of chard seedlings are just now emerging (see photo). The adult plants produced an enormous number of seeds. It took a long time for them to mature (the entire summer, it seemed, though I have a terribly memory and don’t remember precisely). I’m less optimistic about the leeks. They produced beautiful heads of seeds, but were still green and plump when I cut them and laid them on the beds (unlike the dark and dry little seeds that come out of a seed packet).
I would be fun to hear about other people’s experiences with seed-saving strategies.
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