Topic: Seed Saving Circle 2024

[ruud]

Question can i make some members happy with older seeds.I have to many variaties tomato and peppers to keep them vital.So i ask for help to keep the seeds fresh.

[galina]

Peppers more than 2 years old are a problem, tomatoes at 5 to 8 years old are still viable.  If the packets are a little bit larger to account for lower germination,  slightly older seeds are ok.

[JanG]

I completely agree with Galina that peppers are much more of a problem than tomatoes. And a certain amount depends on conditions the seeds were kept in as well.
Personally, to help keep varieties going, I’m very happy to try to germinate some older seeds. If they don’t germinate, nothing is lost. We can try to germinate them on damp kitchen roll or something like that, so that there’s not even a risk of wasting compost.
Tomatoes should be easier. Quite old seed might well germinate. If you could mark which packets are older, ideally with the year if you know it, then that would be very acceptable. Thanks Ruud

[markfield rover]

Love a germination challenge me !

[ruud]

oke,i will send some of my older seeds.

[galina]

Ruud, please add the year you saved them to the packets. 

By the way, this does not apply to any commercial seed either.  Because seed companies test and pack if seeds pass their germination tests.  But the seed itself could already be years old when they get put into packets.  Just that at that stage their older seed was still viable.  So what I said above  o n l y  applies to home saved seed and, as Jan said, only if it was stored cool and dry in the meantime. 

Generally, we take part in the seed circle with fresh seed saved this year, or with seed that is from last year if it had to be held over, not really with much older seed.   But as Markfield Rover said, we love a bit of an experiment in addition to that. 

[galina]

I had an opportunity to have some seeds hand carried and posted for me.  Had to be earlier varieties, but they have now arrived at JanG's.  So we are all good. 

Lettuces Bologna and Pink

Runnerbean Celebration

Purple tomatillo

Tomatoes Alpatieva 905 A, Borgo Celano, De Pinto

Peas Sugar Lord (snap),  Latvian Soup (shell), both tall,  and shelling pea, crown pea Salmon Flowered

Beans Frank Barnett Cutshort, Ruth Bible both tall


More info and photos to follow.

[galina]

Purple Tomatillo

[galina]

Lettuce Bologna  cos type

[galina]

Crown pea Salmon Flowered 

[galina]

Runnerbean Celebration pink flowering, sets well in hot weather 

[JanG]

It’s a great selection, Galina, and wonderful that you managed to get the seeds safely carried and posted. The pink flowering runner bean looks very appealing. There is the more commercially available pink- flowered runner bean, Sunset, which I did grow many years ago, but Celebration looks a deeper, prettier pink from your photo. Crown pea salmon-flowered also looks lovely - two special features in one. And a lettuce called pink too. Pink is quite a theme in your selection!

The tomato varieties are all new to me. I look forward to hearing more - or finding out by growing.

A great start to the Circle. Thank you again.

[JanG]

Some brief notes and photos for some of the tomatoes I'm going to be including

Artisan Gold Bumblebee is a good-sized cherry tomato with attractive red and yellow striping. It is reasonably productive.Seed originally from a commercial source.

Black Plum is very productive. Seed originally from the Seed Circle (2019?)

Blue Gold Berries. I love the cherry tomatoes this produces. It's not as productive as some but I've fallen in love with the fruit. Seed originally from a swap

Dancing with Smurfs. Similarly a lovely looking dark cherry tomato. Seed originally from commercial source

[Vetivert]

Wonderful contributions as always folks, and many thanks for your kind words of encouragement.

It was easy to forget the suggestion is two packets of seeds, and I certainly didn't mean discourage anyone from participating if they want to contribute this number - I've got so accustomed to a theme of over-abundance due to our avid seed-saving over the years  :)

JanG, I did grow Quedlinburger Speck (which I also managed to spell in a unique way  ) last summer. They were stringless and the pod walls were soft - something I was searching for as a candidate in a pending breeding project. I didn't get to taste any though! Did you?

For circle contributions I'm hoping to add:

Tomato, Dreadnought;
Celery, Chinese Pink;
Rakkyo bulbs;
and a few peas and beans, varieties TBC.

Anyone have a clue how to clean phacelia seed?

[JanG]

Great that you’re alongside ,Vetivert. Sounds like a fully generous contribution but, as you say, two is what we ask for so anyone is welcome another year who can contribute two or three varieties.

Can you say a bit about Rakkyo bulbs?

I did sample Quedlinburger Speck (can’t write it without checking the spelling now!). It was a good snap bean when young. I didn’t get to try it when it was more mature so can’t vouch for how long it stays tender, but I was certainly struck by how nicely it dried down.

I’ve no idea about Phacelia cleaning. I imagine there’s a lot of dry husk to somehow get rid of. I have a similar challenge with hemp.

[galina]

Climbing French Bean  Frank Barnett Cutshort. 

My source was MacMex via Vetivert (thank you for sharing).  A bean from Kentucky, cutshort refers to the beans that are squashed so tightly into their pods, that the ends square off.  Clearly some of the beans in my photo are almost rectangular.  https://www.heirlooms.org/store/p21/Frank_Barnett_Cut-Short.html

MacMex on his seedsaving group pages, has a chapter on this bean too.   In one of his posts, he makes a very poignant statement about sharing seeds, also the reason why he has sent samples to be grown and shared in Europe too.    "This is a very very nice variety. I'd say my seed stock had a close brush with extinction this year. This is a good illustration of why it's so good to share seed with others. It spreads it around and is a way to insure against permanent loss."  https://seedsavingnetwork.proboards.com/thread/569/frank-barnetts-pole-bean-seed

Mine were early, a typical Appalachian bean, that grows bean seeds inside the pods at the same time as the pods themselves develop.  Very different from the green beans we are used to, where the seeds develop when the pods themselves are past their best for fresh eating.  These bean pods get eaten together with their beanies inside.  They will stay tender until the beans inside are practically mature enough to shell for seed saving.  A different bean, which makes for a more substantial eating experience, than our more juicy green bean pods or our dried and reconstituted beans.  This is a bit like having the best of both types in one.     

[galina]

Borgo Celano tomato.  Indeterminate,  fairly short plants that definitely need staking.  Don't sideshoot, treat more like determinate varieties.    https://bountyhunterseeds.com/product/borgo-celano-tomato/

My source was a seedsaving friend from Maine, USA.  Her family roots are Italian.  The Bologna lettuce is also from her originally. 

My photo of the group shows some yellow sunburn spots, when we had the heatwave of 30C plus for several weeks, but the photo of the single tomato shows it off in all its beauty. 

An excellent salad tomato, but just as good for sauce.  I have halved a few pounds and put them into the freezer, as these make very tasty additions to a cooked breakfast with egg and bacon, just put in the pan from frozen, when the eggs go in and the bacon is starting to brown. 

[galina]

Forgot to say, there is a video on Borgo Celano   https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9QA-jMgzt4E

Also, sorry Vetivert haven't ever saved phacelia seeds. 

[JanG]

I’d like to echo everything Galina has said about the appealing and interesting characteristics of Appalachian beans, having recently become aware of them through the generous sharing of Macmex and Vetivert.

One of the bean varieties I’m aiming to add is another cutshort, Tennessee Cutshort. In fact it’s cutshort in name only as the seed shape isn’t as square as Galina’s Frank Barnett Cutshort, but it’s Appalachian and the other characteristics still apply. It can be eaten as a tender snap bean or left until the pods swell and then eaten with more fully developed beans inside.

[JanG]

Tennessee Cutshort