We had our garden for several years now and this is the second year we have saved seeds. Last year, we saved seeds ideally. “let’s keep the seeds and see what happens…” but this year we are saving with a purpose! Almost with a fervor. So this can still be considered something new.

The first year we saved seeds, we saved pepper seeds almost exclusively. When we planted them at the beginning of this year, a lot of them were viable! We got a pepper crop from our old peppers! How exhilarating! It made us want to collect all sorts of seeds and try to grow them next year. We saved seeds from all our favorite items that we grew this year; tomatoes, peppers, flowers, peas, edamame, and more. My husband is great about researching how is the best way to gather, and save seeds. I usually just pick something, let it dry and get those seeds. what’s the worst that can happen?

Once we exhausted everything in our garden we started looking else where for seeds. Anything we ate, the question came up, can we save the seeds? If we took a walk and saw a fallen flower or plant. Can we save the seed? When we got our holiday pumpkins we thought - we can save the seeds! And when we visited community gardens we searched for fallen fruit and veg to save the seeds!

Now we are seed foragers and plan to grow all sorts of interesting things that we might not have if we hadn’t found the seeds. Ground cherries, why not? Pumpkin patch in the yard, sounds good! It’s been a fun adventure to seek out seeds. It’s zero waste, saving us money and it’s an enjoyable pastime. And it will be a fun adventure to see which seeds are viable next year.

If you garden, do you save seeds each season? Have you had good luck or bad?