Saving Seeds: The Gardener's Guide to Growing and Storing Vegetable and Flower Seeds

Looking for something to add excitement and interest to your garden? Try raising and saving seeds for your own vegetables and flowers!

Saving seeds is a time-honored tradition — one that more and more gardeners are rediscovering. It can be as simple as growing a few extra peas or beans for next year's use or as challenging as wintering over cabbage heads, waiting for the flower stalks to poke up in the spring.

Any gardener can become a successful seed saver — the only limitations are your time, space, and interest. And the benefits of growing and saving your own seeds are many:

* You can save money on expensive yearly seed bills.

* You can select seed each year from the plants best suited to your garden and your particular growing conditions.

* You can help preserve old-time and regional favorites — heirloom vegetables and flowers that your grandparents grew, but that are often hard to find these days.

* You can share seeds from your own favorite flowers and vegetables with family, friends, neighbors, and other gardeners.

This book will tell you all you need to know about how to raise, harvest, and store seeds for the easiest-to-grow and most popular vegetables and ornamental plants. Each vegetable and flower is discusses in detail. And Saving Seeds answers hundreds of frequently asked gardening questions:

* Will cucumbers cross with melons or squash?

* Do some weeds cross with vegetables?

* Should I avoid raising hybrids for seed?

* How can I raise seeds that will produce earlier crops? Tastier crops?

Originally published in 1978 as Growing and Saving Vegetable Seeds, Marc Roger's popular and practical guide has now been thoroughly updated to include the best ornamental flowers to grow for seed.

Seed-saving can be a fascinating lifelong hobby for any serious (or frugal) home gardener. And Saving Seeds can help get you started.

Our grandparents did it.  And their grandparents before them.  In fact, saving seeds is as old as gardening itself.  Why then is it such a neglected component of gardening today?  Many say that because seeds from catologs are so cheap we don't need to save our own.  Have you figured out lately what you spend on seeds each year to grow the same plant?  (And doesn't it seem to be a little more each year?)  Now multiply that figure by the number of years you expect to have a garden.  Adds up, doesn't it?  But even if it still doesn't seem like a lot, the bottom line is that it's money you just don't have to spend!  Let Marc Rogers introduce you to the world of seed saving, where you will save money, strengthen your plant strains, and find a new appreciation and understanding of your garden.

This book will tell you all you need to know about how to raise, harvest, and store seeds for the easiest-to-grow and most popular vegetables and ornamental plants. Each vegetable and flower is discusses in detail. And Saving Seeds answers hundreds of frequently asked gardening questions: <P>* Will cucumbers cross with melons or squash?<P>* Do some weeds cross with vegetables?<P>* Should I avoid raising hybrids for seed?<P>* How can I raise seeds that will produce earlier crops? Tastier crops?<P>Originally published in 1978 as Growing and Saving Vegetable Seeds, Marc Roger's popular and practical guide has now been thoroughly updated to include the best ornamental flowers to grow for seed.

Originally published in 1978 as Growing and Saving Vegetable Seeds, Marc Rogers has written the popular and useful re-printed Storey guide, Saving Seeds.

Part I: Basic Information

Chapter 1 Why Raise Seeds?

Chapter 2 What Is a Seed?

Chapter 3 How Seeds Are Formed

Chapter 4 Annuals, Biennials, and Perennials

Chapter 5 Pollination

Chapter 6 Selecting Seed Parents

Chapter 7 Collecting Seeds

Chapter 8 Extracting and Drying Seeds

Chapter 9 Storing Seeds

Chapter 10 Testing Seeds

Part II: The Vegetables

Table I: Characteristics of Common Vegetables Saved for Seed

Monocotyledoneae

Poaceae (Grass Family)

Liliaceae (Lily Family)

Dicotyledoneae

Polygonaceae (Buckwheat or Rhubarb Family)

Chenopodiaceae (Goosefoot Family)

Tetragoniaceae (New Zealand Spinach Family)

Brassicaceae (Mustard or Cabbage Family)

Fabaceae (Bean Family)

Malvaceae (Mallow Family)

Apiaceae (Celery Family)

Solanaceae (Nightshade Family)

Cucurbitaceae (Gourd or Cucumber Family)

Asteraceae (Aster Family)

Table II: A Checklist of Some Seed-Borne Vegetable Diseases

Part III: The Flowers

The Best Flowering Ornamentals to Save for Seed

Mail Order Seed Sources

Further Reading

Glossary for Gardeners

Average Frost Date Maps