Saving Seeds From Tomatoes, Peppers, Beans, and More Veggies
December 5, 2022
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Want to save vegetable seedsto replant next year? Here’s our seed-saving guide for beginners. Learn how to harvest and save seeds from some of your favorite garden vegetables, including beans, peppers, tomatoes, and more!
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Using seeds from your own plants connects you with the earth’s natural cycles, and many gardeners find this activity rewarding, especially as it helps to preserve heirloom varieties and promotes genetic diversity.
Which Seeds to Save
Some crops are easier to save than others. If you are a beginner, we would highly recommend that you start with vegetables such as peas, beans, lettuce, and tomatoes. Also, here are a few guidelines:
First things first. Only save seeds from “open-pollinated” varieties, as this ensures that the seeds produced this year will result in the same plants next year.
Also, remember that some crops can cross-pollinate if they are planted too near each other. For saving seeds, it’s best that the variety of seed you are saving isn’t intermixed with other varieties.
It’s important to know when a seed is fully mature. It is NOT always when you would harvest the seeds for eating. See our tips on which seeds to save.
How to Save Your Own Seed From Tomatoes, Peppers, Beans, and More
In this video, we show how to choose which plants you should save seeds from, and demonstrate ways to harvest and prepare your seeds so that they have the best chance of germinating when sown.
Commonly Saved Vegetable Seeds
Below is a rundown of gathering, treating, and storing the most commonly-saved garden vegetable seeds. (If you haven’t read our primer on seeds, you may wish to review the article, “Start Saving Those Vegetable Seeds” first.)
Because tomatoes and cucumbers have seeds that are coated with a gel, the first step is to remove it by fermentation. The process smells bad, however, so don’t do it in an enclosed room in the house. Follow these steps:
Squeeze or spoon the seed mass into a waterproof container (glass, jar, plastic cup, or deli container).
Add enough water to equal the volume of the seed mass, and put the container in a warm spot out of direct sunlight.
Stir the contents at least once a day.
In a couple of days, the viable seeds will sink to the bottom and bad seeds and debris and white mold will float to the surface.
Wait five days for all the good seeds to drop, then rinse away the gunk at the top.
Wash the seeds in several changes of water, and lay them out in a single layer on a glass or plastic plate or screen.
Put the plate in a warm place until the seeds are fully dry, which can take several weeks.
See our video below, demonstrating how to save tomato seeds.
Pick the brown pods from the vines and remove the seeds, which will require about six weeks of air-drying. One way is to put them in loosely woven baskets and stir them once a day.
If frost or other inclement weather threatens legumes that are ripe but not dry, pull up the vines by the roots, and hang the plants upside down in a warm area, such as your basement or barn. The pods will draw energy from the plants for another few days, which will increase the seed viability.
For watermelons, simply rinse the seeds under running water to remove any traces of flesh or membrane. For cantaloupe and musk melon, seeds will have more fibers and membrane attached to them. Wash this off, rubbing the seeds between your fingers to remove as much as the debris as you can.
Then put the seeds in a container of water, and the good seeds will sink to the bottom.
Remove what comes to the top, give the good seeds another rinse, and dry them on a plate or screen.
Lettuce and Greens
Radishes, lettuce, and Asian greens also produce seeds in pods after the plant has flowered. With these vegetables, too, it is best to let the pods dry on the plant.
These plants, however, tend to dry from the bottom up, a few pods at a time.
The dry ones are prone to shattering and spreading their seed all over the ground, so either bag the seed heads—literally putting a paper bag tied at the base over the plants to capture the seeds—or pick the dry pods on a daily basis. Old nylons or row-cover materials work well for bagging because you can still see what’s going on with the plant.
Storing Saved Seeds
Once your seeds are completely dry, they can be stored in any dry, secure container and kept in a cool, dry area. Keeping them dry is very important (as you probably could have guessed by now).
For large seeds, such as beans, you can recycle the cardboard canisters that certain snack foods come in.
For small seeds, such as pepper and tomatoes, washed-out pill bottles work well.
How long a seed remains viable depends on its type and the environment it’s kept in. Tomato seeds may last for more than five years, while squash seeds typically last for less time. You can extend seeds’ viability by freezing them, especially if you have a zero-degree freezer. Properly dried and frozen seeds can remain viable for at least 40 years!
Collecting Seeds From Bolted Vegetables
Here’s a helpful tip: When veggies “bolt” (run to seed) during the summer, use them to save your own seeds!
We hope that you will enjoy saving the seeds from your favorite plants! If you have any tips, please post below!
I bought tomatoes on a vine from the store and one sat on the counter for a week. When we cut into the tomato the seeds were sprouting. I swiped the seeds a sprouts across some potting soil in the bottom of a strawberry container box, put a dusting of soil across the top, and in about a week they were sprouting. We got about 30 tomato plants from that one tomato. Don't throw anything away. I might be your next garden.
Hi Gerald,
I can confirm seeds sprouting. I left my tomato on the counter for months! I was concerned that the tomato was not rotting!? My Dad always grew our food and I remember tomatoes rotting if left too long. The top of the tomato actually got bumpy because the sprouts were that large. I cut it open and yes there were sprouts. I wonder if those tomatoes are gmo'ed and NOT fit to eat? I'm a younger senior citizen, so when my Dad was growing food, things weren't being tampered with, the way they are at present. Happy that I'm not the only one to encounter this.
Lynn
I once planted a fresh ear of corn horizontally in a garden; in about a week every corn-kernel had sprouted; I'll try the tomato-slice idea; I know Pumpkin seeds can be saved to sprout the next spring;
I take a thin slice of tomato, place it under about 3/4" soil and plants come up like crazy! Don't forget to amend the soil with egg shells for magnesium. (I pulverize mine into bits and save in an old coffee can.)
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