Maybe she'll collect some great exotic seeds in her travels!
Cottage Garden Seed Swap & Chat #43
That would be awesome if she did, 'course she has such an awesome collection already!
Mao, I reread your post and realized you probably meant to post the wants after the starting gun was shot off. I thought you meant prior, hence my remarks above. As I said, it's all good!
Tonya
OH -- I think i'd take world travel over a piggy swap.
Tonya -- i too am waiting for my gloves... hopefully today.
mao -- yes we did post our wants - but i do think it was in a different thread... I'm going to check the old threads to see what we did last year.
Hmmmmmmmm, couldnt find much on the "wants" list... but i'd think if we did that in the Chatter thread, that would work.
OK - here is what Danita did... http://davesgarden.com/community/forums/p.php?pid=5784734
I think that's pretty much how many of us did it. It was so easy to keep track of everything in one place!
Yes, that is how I remembered the wish lists as well.
Tonya
I not sure if today is ednesday or thursday yet. Am up but that about it for the moment. but nto to many days left for sure til it tiem to start.
I nee d soem suggestions. They are drie d soemwhat, but it betetr if t hey don't dry out completely and that is Asparagus fern seeds. I hjave soem for the swap and have bene tryign to figure otu the best way to do them. They always stay a bit sticky and ya just have to pul apart and plant, but don't want them to mold and don't have a bunch of them silica packets to put in there.
If I just put in plastic baggy they may mold. Nothign a good hydrogen peroxide bath wouldn't cure, btu stil don't want them arrivign that way.
I had thought abotu using hoelpunch to put fe w hole s in see dpacket but hole punch too big the eed s fall out. Anybody got an ideas on how to package them up?
need the idea not onyl for them, but for the Lirope seeds too.
Ella, I wonder if paper envelopes would be better for those? I'm thinking they won't be airtight, and may absorb some excess moisture.
Gemini.. Ya knwo you may be right. Can put in them and fold over and just put little piece of tape so some air cna get in through the top. : ) Thanks. I don't think so good at 4 in the morning.
which brings me to this..
Now I am a mornign person usually. Up and at em before the sun come s up. Lot s of thing s to do and best time to scout for bugs and water and do all them neat things with the plants before the sun comes up, so that when it does I cna sit back with a hot cup of coffee and watch the sun rise.
Now I really don't get to functioning ful out til I have had abotu 6 early mornign cups ofcoffee loade d up with sugar. Right now I only on cup numebr 3. Hard to slurp coffee and doseeds at same time. I kow I swalloed a few seeds yesterday alogn with my coffee as they stuck to figer s and fell in when grabbign or cup. Oh well, at least they wasn't posionous . Though itmight be a good way to do seed s liek the bird s do for germination. hummmmmmmmmmm. ; )
Well, I went to fridge to find another bag of seeds to sort through and starte d lookign at the seeds name and realized. Wow. Thsi is the baggy of seed I guess i forgot abotu in the back of the fridge. Had flour and cornmeal in front of it. Which is somethign haven't use d in abotu a year which is why I didn't notic e them.
I was like all excite d and thinkign cool. Cuz I had wodnere d where seed I bought last year went too and why this year it seemed I just didn't have as much sowed as I what I normally do. Dahhhhhhh .. dummy me. Good for both of us though cuz now I have some to plant this year and a little bit to share in swap too. : )
Now I have been hours messign with them though and thinking grrrrrrrrr. I wish I hadn't foudn them. Most are dust size seeds and sicne soem of the packets don't have many seds, I sharign anywheres from 10-20 seeds per swap package.
Well, all these dust seeds cannot just go into baggy. They wil stick toside ad ya proabbaly wouldnt' be able to se ethem, so that means get otu the foil and make some mroe tiny squares.
Now I have this old song , onyl a fe w words runnign through my head like crazy. I sisnging The Tin Man. lalallala over and over. Thinkign it wa s a song by the Beatles, but knwo there a tin man song out there somewhere. Why am I singing such a song?
becaus e I am covere d in foil and the kitchen is covere d in foil pieces!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! Remidn me to never buy a cheap roll of foil again . Ba d enough the box is all floppy and hard to try and get it tounwind just a fe w inche s at a time and half the teeth missing so it dont rip straight or easy. Every time ya try and pull some the box bend s in half and the roll flops all around.
Well, been rough enough tryign to deal with making foil square s fromit, btu have manage d so far. Cours e the foil was all crinkly an tryign to press it out didn't help much, but now it really...really crinkly and all kind s of weid shapes.
Somebody at ht efactory must have ha d a ba d day and decided to get even with a few unsuspectign folks cuz I barely into this roll and was havign the dickens of a time tryign to get it to unroll. I took it out of box , what passes for abox anyways, and tried to unroll it.
Well piece s started ripping off. Piece here, piec e there and I tried to unrolsomemore to get past rips and stil the foil stuck and ripping in funky shape s and sizes.
This whoel roll of foil ha s been like melted together. They liek wrappe dit so tight and it so thin that it all compresse d together. I been sittignhere rippign the whoel roll throwing littl epiece s of foil eveyrwhere tryign to get sizes decent enought to to wrap seed s in.
So when ya all get foil wrappe d seed s from me make sure... double sure ya open over a saucer or something.
Ther some sayign about allthat glitters is not gold. Wellthe kitchen all glittring in foil and next roll I buy for piggy swap wil make sure I spend a fe w extra gold coins and get the good stuff.
Oh Ella! I'm sorry you're having a time of it...but you do manage to entertain us in the process! I hope your morning is getting better.
Ella -- when i need seeds to dry... i use the 'cone' coffee filters... they can breathe in there and not mold. could try to make lil envies out of those too.
Great idea. As I runnign out of glassien bags, but have oodle s of coffee filters. : )
Now Ihave togoogle some of thes e seeds cuz I have noide a of what it was I bought. LOL
I've received seeds that had rice packed in with them to absorb moisture, you might try that.
Do you think anyone would want fresh Carambola seeds? They are difficult to come by but I have a few from some tree ripened star fruits I recently received. They make wonderfull muffins, bread and cake, but are slow growers.
hi
in having a slow start some seeds dried and not bagged up i guess i will not be bagging until i have some interest. i dont have that many little baggies and they are hard to come by as walmart seems to be sold out of them. ..i will not be home until sunday night and dh will probably be on the computer in the evening...ill be listing mine probably on monday or so.
ella ..do spend as much time with your son as much as you can.i think it is wonderful that you guys will have time to visit
neal..im sorry to read about the loss of your mom .
i see many old faces and some new ones i will try to keep up with the chat.
pam sue
Mittsy.. Put them in there. Sur e somebody be oinkign for them and if not ya got them for the one to one part of the swap too.
I ntofamila r with them. They do sound yummy though. : )
Pamsue... If ya have a Michaels craft department around they have some of the baggies and I have even used them tiny snack siz e sandwhich bags and just cut in half and tape d them up.
Somebody last year used wax paper. Don't knwo how they did it but folded it over and just taped it. Don't matte r what the wrap looks like. heck if ya gott aus e tolietpaper squares so be it. heheheheh
Somebody also used peices of typign paper and just cut and folded and had little piece of tape on it.
That what I luv abotut he piggy swap. Anything , anywhich way it works goes. It always interestign to see how creative people cna get.
Shoot. Iwill startsome of my list out, but even though I more ahead this year than I been any year, still can't break habit wil be doign alot as I go along and pul stuff out and then bag it as somebody wants it, too. Ihave hardly made a dent in the see dpart and haven't even looke d at veggies yet. I'll getthere eventually. Always do. LOL
as i rummage thru my seed basket this morning... i have found about 6 lil baggies [2x3 ziplocs] of BES noIDs. whoops.. not even a description. I did have a lot of pretty ones this year though.
Mr Sieve worked great on the Foxglove... Now i'm going to see if I can ID the seeds i have. there was no plant tag from where i snagged the seeds from.
also -- Husker Red... i have a lot of seed, plus i have not even harvested here yet... they seem to come late for me. If there is not a lot of interest, I will not harvest this year.
also -- looks like we may head to Wisc on Sunday to rake leaves... so i may miss out on the beginning of this... I'm sure we will bring the laptop... so i can have my list all typed up and ready to go... then just post it when i get a chance.
oh.... went to WallyWorld yesterday and got 200 lil baggies... should be set for the swap.
SEED PACKETS:
If you want to reuse paper here is an origami way of making your own seed packets.
Star, you might have seen these from me last year. I go back and forth between these paper packets and small baggies that I can get from work. If no baggies are near me (in the basement) and I'm lazy, I'll just whip up an origami seed packet. Also, if you are out and about and find some seeds but don't have a baggie, but have some handy paper, you can make these. You don't even have to tape them in the short run ... I tape mine down to send in for the swap. And Don't let the word Origami scare you away ... these are incredibly easy!!
http://www.cheapvegetablegardener.com/2008/12/make-your-own-paper-seed-packets.html
Ella you and I are so much alike with our morning routines. My situation has changed a bit recently, but I usually like to get up way before necessary so I can have plenty of coffee-drinking, wall-staring time before I have to jump into action. My morning brain is so fuzzy that I normally don't remember the first cup going down, but I like to take cup #2 (and 3 and 4) with me as I wander around outside making my plans for the day.
Have you tried using wax paper for the dust seeds instead of foil? I made some make-shift wax packets first, then just closed them with a tiny bit of tape and put them into my regular seed bags. Not only was the wax easier to work with than foil (in my experience,) but hopefully it'll be easy for the recipient to remove the seeds since there are no cracks and crevices for them to get lost in.
I'm excited because I have exams next week which means my school schedule is a bit hinky the next few days. I'll have a 4-day weekend (which is supposed to be for used for studying) so now I can pop in on you other piggies a little more often. Um, if you see me here too much give me a scolding and send me back to the English paper, OK? LOL!
(I would like to have some Husker's Red)
Haha there was a lot of cross-posting going on re: the seed packets. Sorry if i was redundant.
:-)
This message was edited Oct 29, 2009 9:59 AM
thanks toofew... nifty lil envies....
Neat!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! Now just to figrue out if I cordinate d enough to do it. LOL Shoot I can't even make animals figrue s ont he wall with fingers, so should be interestign what Ido with paper.
I had gotten 2,000 plastic baggies for the swap so still doign good , butusually run out so when I do look out gonan try the chines e finger packet method then. : )
well... mine aren't perfect squares... but they will work as envies if i need more.
Hmm, I bet I'm short on seed baggies, too, better go check my Wal-Mart. I know I used quite a few to freeze basil in a couple of weeks ago. They were just the right size for that.
I knew I'd regret not taking Neal up on his baggie offer!
3 more days!!!!! This piggie is chompin' at the bit!. Uh, I think this Texan is mixin' her metaphors, am I a horse or a pig?
Tonya
Good morning piggies!
I have a seed picking question for you all.... On Echinacea or Purple Cone flower, are all the seeds good? What I mean is... It seems to me that some of the seeds seem to be a bit soft or even hollow. Are these supposed to be firm or hard all the way through?. If so, is there an easy way to separate which ones are good? I did pick them when they were clearly brown and dried.
Thanks! Andrea
Tonya, I've still got plenty of those seed envies.
Andrea.. No way really to tell and I have some that just like ya describing and they usually come up. I would just coutn how many ever ya want ot put in your baggy and not worry abotu it.
Soem seed ya cna tell might be better than others, but til ya germinate no way really to tell on any seed. very rare ya find a seed that wil germinate 100% of the time. The genral is between 65-80 %
I generally take the bigger seeds... if they are flat, i toss them back in the garden. Someone once referred to them as "cork like". I did not collect any echie seeds this year.... Maybe White Swan - i just cant recall.
Yeah, the tops of the seeds are round and hard. It's when it gets to the bottom, they seem hollowish. I can't figure out if that is the way they were supposed to be. I was collecting white pincushion and thought the same thing but then discovered the seed that was actually in the bottom of outer shell. I thought all of those were bad until I ended up ripping one apart and found the seed in the bottom of it. I just want to make sure I'm not sending duds. Thanks :-)
Re :seed viablity. I had some old seed (still do) from England from 1990. It germinated in the garden this year! I was shocked as I didn't hold out much hope for it. I remember reading something about seed from the pyramids germinating.......
Thanks Neal! You have d-mail...
Tonya
Star, your stories are always so entertaining. You are one person who I would love to meet and share stories with (plenty of coffee, of course). I do, however, have a visual of you seeding like the birds do. Hope you live in the woods!!!! LOL!!!
Star, I agree, you are hilarious! Always enjoy reading your posts. I guess when you seed like the birds do it is a good thing that you don't have batteries for your camera!
On Candylily seeds, does the "bulbish thing" (don't you love my scientific name?) that the seeds are in turn brown when the seeds are ready? I think I remember reading somewhere that those can burst rather unexpectedly, so I have really been keeping my eye on them, even though they are still very green. Also was wondering if they cross pollinate, because one of the three kinds that I have in one pot had the prettiest orange-fade-to-pink blooms and I am hoping those seeds will come true. I am afraid they are like day lilies, though and do cross pollinate.
Tonya
My candy liliy seed pods split open while green and some of the seeds dropped before I was ready. I think they're ready when the seeds turn dark.
oh, that's good to know. I should probably bag those seed heads since I won't really know when the seeds turn dark until it opens! Thanks mittsy!
Anyone know if they cross pollinate?
Tonya
Now that I able to get back online let me ask, cuz I done forgot already.
Weren't folks askign for Dames Rocket seeds? I thought I had some, but didn't say anything til I could be sure. Well I for sure. I got em going into the Piggy swap. Have no ide a what color or anything. One of thes e days I gonan learn to writ e down what it is I buy and have. Mayeb i'll make that a New Years resolution. Won't feel so bad when I don't do it, cuz I ain't never kept oen yet even though I make bunche s of them.
Star, I know there were some oikers for dames rockets on the other thread. I will oink,too once you put them up if there are any left!
Ok, thought folsk wa s lookign for some , but wante d to be sure. Wil start dividign them all out. Thanks! : )
I mentioned wanting white ones, not mixed with purple. Usually they're mixed though.