Tips for Saving Heirloom Seed

If you'd like to save seed of heirloom cultivars, the first step is to figure out if they're self-pollinated or open-pollinated. Both types of pollination take place when pollen is transferred from the anther (male part of the flower) to the stigma (female part of the flower).

If a plant is self-pollinated, its stigma is pollinated by pollen from the same flower or from another flower on the same plant. Self-pollination is common among many of the major food crops of the world. Wheat, barley, rice, and oats are all self-pollinated; so are beans, peas, soybeans, peanuts, eggplant, lettuce, peppers, and tomatoes.

corn, cucumbers, pumpkins, squash, broccoli, beets, carrots, cabbage, cauliflower, melons, radishes, spinach, Swiss chard, and turnips. They can't pollinate themselves. Instead, they depend on bees or other insects to transfer pollen from the anther of one flower on a certain plant to the stigma of a flower on a different plant. These plants may be pollinated by a plant of the same cultivars, a different cultivars, or a related species. (Pumpkins can pollinate squash, for example.)

To make sure your heirloom seed is true to type, isolate the plants you want to collect seed from so they can't cross with other cultivars nearby. (One way to do this is to set a tomato cage or frame around the plant and cover it with fine mesh netting to keep out bees and other pollinators.) If the plant is self-pollinated, it will take it from there. But if it's open-pollinated, you'll have to lend a hand. Lift up the netting and brush pollen from another plant of the same cultivars onto each flower's stigma with a soft artist's brush. Then replace the netting.