I have a few vegetable plants, Brandywine tomato, yellow pear shaped grape tomato, and some banana peppers I would like to save seeds from for next year. I have saved hundreds of flower seeds over the years, but nothing from vegetables. My question is this: how mature must I let the vegetables become on the vine before the seeds inside are viable? Thanks in advance.
I save the seeds as soon as the fruit is mature. Some people say you need to let the tomato seeds ferment in their juice to dissolve the gelatinous mass around the seed so that you will have better germination rates for the next year. i have tried just squeezing the seeds out onto papertowels and fermenting the pulpy mass. I have had decent germination rates both ways. keep dry until next planting season. the peppers I just let ripen to the maturest stage and then pop the seeds off the membrane and out into an rx bottle until they are dry and then cap it until next planting season. You must let them dry, you don't want to have any mold growing on them or the seeds will die. Those little desiccant packets that come with vitamins are good to put into the bottle also, just as insurance against moisture. Hope this helps. Good luck
This post made me think of something I had read not to long ago about seeds. In particular store bought Avocado. I read that although you can take the seeds and grow an Avocado tree from it. That tree will never produce fruit as it has been modified as such. I was wondering if, for starters is this true? And also, do similar things happen when trying to plant store bought apples or other common fruits? -Brian
If the avacado is from a hybrid plant, then, most likely you won't get a fruit that is similar to the one you ate. I don't know if the tree will really be sterile or not, though. Apple seeds from apples are they same way. You cannot grow a seed into a tree that you would, necessarily, want. I have a "wild" tree that has nasty apples on it. It's way in the back and we don't do anything to it (spray, prune) it drops its apples and they just rot, they are not fit to eat. So unless you have a "heritage" fruit (not a hybrid) the fruit will not be the same as the one you just ate.
Carolyn, apples if tended to get quite a bit better. The rankest cider apple tree makes a tolarable eating apple, breifly. if you reduced the scale, apple maggot, and some of the other chewing bugs that infest apples by a simple spray of dormant oil, tanglefoot traps, and clearing out the junk-brush from your apple tree. You might be suprised at how much better the apples become in a year or three.
No, Coppice, with this tree, there is no hope. It seems to be a red delicious variety. It has a horrible texture and tastes of, pretty much nothing. I have NEVER had a red delicious apple that was worth the time it took to pick the apple up. I did purchase a heritage red delicious a couple years ago, only because my husband wanted it, WHICH is SUPPOSED to taste like the apples of my moms childhood. If it doesn't, it will be fire wood pretty quickly.
apples I know this is an old post, but on the subject of never having good apples from that tree way in the back, what have you got to lose by trying some grafting on it? You could have a variety you want that way in just a few seasons. It would have a massive root system so should grow fast. Just a thought.
Rockhound, I probably could use the tree to practice some grafting on (which is something I would like to learn how to do, but have never tried) but it is in a really bad spot to get to. My husband parks his trench boxes (2 of them maybe 16'x 8' double stacked) in front of it to the north, the chicken coop and fence is to the south and east an the west is really not accessible to it. And is on a huge slope...not safe for ladders or equipment. But at your suggestion...I do have a couple of more disease resistant apples that I may just practice with.
