Saving Spinach Seeds

So here's how we save spinach seeds.  Saving seeds is a cool thing to do.  We purchase Heirloom Open-pollinated seeds to enable us to do this.  You can't really do this with success with hybrids.  This Galilean Spinach seed I'm saving are coming from seeds I actually saved last year.  We'll see how long we can keep this going without buying new seed.

Galilee spinach is from the Holy Land.  It is delicious spinach.  Once it starts warming up, the spinach plants quickly bolt.  It flowers and goes to seed.  I let it dry on the stalk until it is brown and dead-looking.

 I gently pick up each stalk so the seeds don't fall off.  They are very dry, so they are fragile.  I did drop some, but perhaps they'll come up volunteer next year.  Can you spot the seeds on the stalk?

Once I pluck the seeds off the stalk I put them in my hand so you can get a better look at them.  The seed has two spines on either side of it.  What do you think those spines are for on a Galilee Spinach seed?

I think it is a seed distribution strategy designed by God.  Look at the seed sticking in my finger below:

If the spines stick in my finger that easily, how much easier to you think it would stick on your socks or your pant leg?  Or animal's fur?  Anyone or anything passing by the plant would inadvertently pick up these seeds and distribute them to a new location, thereby furthering the range and survivability of the plant.  It is brilliant, really!

I was unaware that spinach seed did this.  Growing up on the farm, I remember a noxious weed called a cocklebur that made numerous seeds that employed this same distribution method.  The cocklebur was FULL of spines on all sides.  It spread all over the place.  It was not a good thing to have in your soybean field.  At least Galilee Spinach is good to eat!

When I had collected quite a bit of seed, I still had some work to do.  The seed also had stems and leaves mixed in.  I'd like to do something about that.  So I thought about Gideon from the Bible that was threshing wheat.  I figured I'd do the same thing, but I used a fan.

I turned the fan on high and placed the seeds in an egg carton.  I would lift the seeds, stems, leaves and trash and drop back into the egg carton.  The heavier seed fell back in the egg carton, while the lighter stems and leaves blew away.

While not a perfect seed cleaning machine, it is good enough for me.  Mostly what I'm left with is Galilee Spinach Seed that I'll plant this fall.

I labeled a dark colored jar with the variety and date and poured the saved seed into the jar.  I'll store the jar in a cool, dark location.

This fall I won't have to order spinach seed.  I'll pull out this jar and plant.  We'll harvest delicious spinach and then save the seed again.  A beautiful cycle we'll repeat year after year.