I am sure you remembered when I brought in my first batch of flowers to save for seed. I have them in a plastic basket and they are all dried up now.
Outside in the zinnia bed the freeze decided their fate. There were no single plants left alive.
I did find this one flower that was laying in the grass so it still had a little bit of color on it.
I was asked as to what I do to store the seed. First of all this is a haphazard way of doing it if you want to control color. I don't, so I just mix all the colors together. I stored last years batch in a small plastic pet container that had air holes in the top of it and I kept it in the basement where it was cool. This year I am going to store them in glass jars with loose lids or no lids.
I didn't have complete success with saving seed as I think some of them didn't dry correctly and left the seed rotted or unable to sprout. The seed of a zinnia is strange as it is attached to the inside part of the color part of the flower. It looks like chaff instead of seed.
I do admire some of my blogger's friends who have bought new seed and I may do that to get a single bed of pure color. It depends on whether I get to it in the spring or just spread my harvested seed.
Thanks for stopping by.... worked on the house today and got back late.
5 comments:
Thanks Larry for sharing how you store your seeds. I've never grown zinnias but they sure are colorful and such magnets for butterflies. Mama and I used to collect marigold flower heads in a brown paper sack and store in the basement until the following year. We always had good success with them.
Good luck with the seed saving. I'll look forward to knowing how it does, come spring.
I bet the brown paper bag would be a good way to store them. I tend to grab whatever seems to be handy. The glass jar needs to go to the basement so I just put them in there and it now has to go down there.
I admire you for trying! I usually just get perennials and don't try annuals unless they are already plants. ha
The jar will work fine. When I save seed after I get all the seed cleaned..I wait until it is good and dry..then I put them in small ziplock bags and throw them in the freezer until I am ready to plant them ..sommetimes that helps to break the dormancy of seed that does not have a good germination rate:)
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