Letting plants go to seed?

[jamesneuen]

So, growing up be had certain plants that we would partly harvest and others that we harvested completely.

Wild Onions, we would leave one entire plant every 3 feet and this seemed to give plenty of seeds to give us the same yield each year.

Blackberries, we would harvest all of them but we would selectively prune in the fall to get rid of the "leachers", and then weave the main stems into a fence around the border of the garden. Kept out small animals and was also productive.

Strawberries, we would harvest the entire plant, pull it but then cut a nice big one into quarters and replant it in the fall. Had a good yield every year, but we had to pull and reposition them once they started to grow in the spring to spread them out.

peppers, we would pull the seeds out, let them dry and then store them in a mason jar to replant in the spring.

Trees always just did their own thing and we would pull off everything that wasn't destroyed. (we never sprayed)

Grapes, same things as blackberries, but we would end up scraping the bark in certain parts and grafting branches onto those parts so that they didn't end up just getting a long hard stem that didn't produce for the first few feet.

I grew up in Indiana, so the winters were pretty mild and if it froze too hard and killed the seeds we never worried about having to get more. All we planted were heirloom style because that was all we knew. I never even knew they sold seeds for plants that didn't reproduce on their own. I didn't know that seedless watermelon was a breed. I thought they were just picked small and early.

What else do you guys do?

[bacpacker]

A lot of the same stuff. Tomatos are similar to peppers. Beans are left to dry on the vine. Ready to cook or plant then, peas as well. Some with corn, squash, melons, cucumbers, okra, etc

[Sniper-T]

Great thread. I am still in the learning stage of harvesting. I have saved peppers and tomatoes for years, but not much more.

James, can I assume your blackberry technique is the same as Raspberries? Care to outline it in detail, please!

I have been killing myself with Strawbs for years... details please

[jamesneuen]

blackberries were all we ever raised because my mother was allergic to raspberries. This picture is essentially what we did. Cut all the "suckers" off one side then bury the top back in the ground, then weave all of the others back on themselves. This isn't exactly what we did but it's the closest picture I found online.



Strawberries, my grandfather used to leave them in the sun and the skin would slide off them as if they were rotten and then he would just dry the skins. He never wanted to risk getting a hard freeze so he would store them through the winter and wait till spring to plant.

[Vodin]

Found this today and devoted about 6 hrs to research. I will have to go back to reread it granted but know I have a little information to ponder. http://extension.colostate.edu/topic...cations#fruits

[realist]

James I am showing my ignorance as to why you would do that with the blackberries? There are blackberries all around out county. When they are ripe the birds eat them and as the fly over they reseed them everywhere. Since we don't want them to take over we don't have any here. However there are plenty we can get along the road.

- - - Updated - - -

I forgot the rest. Potatoes, we planted them about five years ago and they keep reseeding themselves.
Broccoli reseeds itself very well.
Tomatoes we have bunches of volunteer tomatoes which grow where ever we do not want them.
Squash does the same. When we get some ones which are over ripe we put them off to the side and they will reseed.

I see the biggest problem is knowing what it what when there are so many different plants.

[jamesneuen]

we did that with the blackberries because it formed a living fence around our garden and kept rabbits out

[Socalman]

Something I am sure most you know but I learned the hard way many years ago was that it is not worth saving the seeds of the hybrid varieties. It will either be sterile or produce something very different from the parent hybrid. For years now, we only plant open varieties. My favorite source for "new" seeds (I do save some seed) is at www.Seedsavers.org

[jamesneuen]

Yeah, most of the hybrids I have seen don't produce normal seeds. They are either altered in size, consistency or absent altogether.

[Vodin]

Hybrids are a cross between at least 2 different types of plants. The seeds that are created are by the pollinating insects and where they bring pollen from. So you have a certain amount of plants used to create the hybrid then you add the pollen from another of the same type of plant and you come up with many different outcomes. Some being incompatible and others of the original type of plant but converted into a different type of hybrid. So it is a scattered shot when you reuse a hybrid plants seed. It is also a changed plant if you use heirloom seed since the pollen is a different 'sperm'.

So in basic terms you have a certain strain of plant (if it is a heirloom) when the flower is pollinated (sex) it all depends on what the pollinator brings to the party. Only if you hand pollinate the flowers at the appropriate time can you come out with the same type of plant. (And you will need to cover the hand pollinated flower so it cannot have more pollination.)

Think human sex and pregnancy. It depends on the women's heritage and the heritage of her partner. Then add in multiple partners and you wont know what you have until she has it.