Drying Wet Seeds

I'm learning more and more to save my own seeds. Large dry seed, like corn and beans, are easy. Pumpkins and gourds aren't all that complicated either. But what about tomato? Tomatoes are pretty wet.

A few days ago I processed some orange plum tomatoes, a variety I think I want to keep growing. So I figured I'd save some seeds, a few from each tomato I diced up. So I put the wet pulp and seeds into a glass of water and let it sit for a couple days. Using a spoon to scoop off the moldy stuff on top, I was left with a glass of yucky fermenting tomato water & seeds. I rinsed off the seeds by adding water, stirring, letting the heavier seeds sink to the bottom, then pouring off the liquid. Repeat several times. Eventually I ended up with fairly clean heavy seeds. Now what? 

I've tried drying tomato seeds a couple different ways and the way I like best is to spread them out on a coffee filter to dry in front of a breezy open window. The filter wicks the water away quickly so it evaporates, leaving dry seed behind. 

I used to stir the seeds frequently so that they wouldn't stick to the filter, but now I do just the opposite. Let the seeds stick. When dry, I pop seeds and filter into a glass jar for storing. Having the seeds stick to the filter makes it easier for me to pick out the seeds I want for planting. Otherwise tomato seeds have a tendency to bunch up and cling together. 

I also processed some lilikoi seeds the same way, but their pulp tends to cling to the seeds more so than the tomatoes. No problem. The coffee filter methods deals with this easily. I normally don't save lilikoi seed, but I have plans of growing more plants and guerrilla-gardening them. You see, some of my favorite lilikoi foraging sites have been destroyed by bulldozing.....people clearing their land for house building. No problem. I'll just re-establish lilikoi plants on other unused land. There plenty of places to choose from.  I have one lilikoi vine on my own farm, and plan to add a few more. But it won't hurt to plant a few seedlings here and there so that other people will have the opportunity to forage them. 

Reject Seed - Using Them

For the past couple of years I've been trying to produce seed for myself. So far I've been focusing upon the bulky seed that usually costs the most to ship here to Hawaii. Beans. Peas. Potatoes. (I'm not yet growing much corn.) 

After a bit of a learning curve, I now have things down pat when it comes to most bean seed, peas, and potatoes. I'm also successful with many herbs and radishes. It's routine now. 

Just recently I harvested quite a bit of bean seed. After sorting through the finished seed, I stored four quart jars in the frig for future plantings. This left me with a bit more than a cupful of rejects -- seeds that were discolored, had dark spots on them, were smaller than others, were misshapened, or had some other defect. Seed companies just throw these away, but I wanted to know what would happen if I planted them. They represent about $7 in seed if I had had to purchase them (of course, assuming that they were good quality). Why throw $7 away? 

Now......I only planned to grow these seeds for cropping, that is, not seed saving. No sense in selecting for plants that might reproduce small or deformed beans. But if I could get edible beans from them or at least plants to feed to the livestock, then I'd be happy. So I went ahead and planted some. 

Except for a few misses, the beans germinated fine. So far the plants look normal. So it looks like I'll get an edible crop out of them. 

Another use for reject seed would be to plant them in the pastures. Nothing lost by opening up a shallow trench, plopping in seed, covering it up. When it germinates, the livestock will find a treat on their next pasture rotation. I feel it's a better use of the seed than to simply chuck them into the newest compost pile. 

Just another example of zero waste and utilizing one's resources on hand. 

SeedPod

"S" just sent me a link to a Kickstarter post promoting the "SeedPod", a cutesy, plastic, individual seed  drying/saving container. Colorful and modern....looks to me to be targeting the urban and suburban housewife with "Martha Stewart" lifestyles ( I'm not against this sort of lifestyle, but it's just not my thing.) Cute. But I can foresee that a lot of them will sell and eventually end up in some bulging, overstuffed landfill somewhere. Just more disposable material waste.

 

As a homesteader, I save seeds. But I've become an avid "low cash input" sort of farmer. So I save my seeds in recycled glass jars, or in folded homemade paper packets stored in glass jars. Doesn't cost me a penny. 

Now I can appreciate someone's problem with seed drying. I live in a frequently damping location. On good weeks I can dry seeds in the shade under a protected porch roof. On damp months I have another method. I place a inch of powdered dry milk in the bottom of a quart mason jar. Place the seeds to be dried the rest of the way into the toe of an old stocking (some ancient pantyhose from my previous life). Place seeds into jar and close it. Leave it for a month (replace the milk powder with fresh if it is no longer powdery). Then remove the seeds, label, and store in the bottom of the frig in a glass jar. 

My only expense is the powdered milk, which I then feed to the animals.......pick one : lamb, chicken, cat, or dog. One box of powdered milk lasts me a year or more since I seldom need to resort to its use. 

Zero waste. Nothing goes to the landfill. Old paper packets go into the compost. Glass jars go to a massive garage sale once I've died. 

Before someone points it out to me, yes, I could use a commercial desiccant instead of powdered milk. One can buy the type with color indicators in it so that you'd know when it was time to recharge it (that is, bake it dry). But since powdered milk is biodegradable and minusculally (not a real word) helps dairy farmers,  I opt for the powdered milk......just a personal choice. 

Harvesting My Own Dill Seed

One of my aims is to produce as much of my own seed as feasible. If you haven't noticed, buying seed is getting more and more expensive lately. And part of my idea of being self reliant calls for growing my own seed. 

So with that in mind, I harvested six big dill seed stalks a couple of weeks ago. I left them dry thoroughly in an airy spot in the shade. Weeelll, as dry as they could get considering that it's been raining frequently. But I don't want to force them to dry using added heat. Too high a temperature can kill the seed. So simple air drying is fine. 

Above.....so here's the stalks, ready for seed harvesting. Dill seed tends to cling to the stalk, but not overly tightly. Below is a close up so that you can see the little brown seeds. 

One of the farm cats, Crookshank, was curious and checked things out. Is it edible, Mom? He actually took a big bite! 

Next, I put the dill stalks into a paper bag. Crookshank wanted to check it out too. 

Using a big spoon, I beat the bag pretty well. The idea is to beat the seeds off the stalks. I could have used any number of things to wack the bag with, but a spoon was handy and easy. Wack. Wack. Wack.....take care not to beat a hole in the bag! 

Looking into the bag I could see that I got 90% of the seed off. A few scrapes with the spoon got just about the rest off. 

Below.......Here we are, just about done. It only took a minute. There's about 2-3 dozen seeds still clinging to the stalks. 

I could have tossed the stalks in the trash at this point, but instead I walked over to the radish bed and pulled the rest of the dill seed loose. Scattering them about, they will sprout and become the next crop in this area. In the end, those seedless stalks got tucked into the soil where they will decompose and become part of the garden life cycle. Ha, another case of zero waste! 

Back to the bag. Checking inside, I see I've got quite a few seeds. Oh my, it smells great. Shame you can't smell what I'm smelling. Love that dill aroma! 

Even Crookshank found the smell appealing. I thought cats were catnip fiends, but Shank seems to have a thing for dill. 

A bowl of dill seed, how pretty. How cool! The seed is fairly clean, so I'm not going to bother processing it any further. If I intended to sell this seed, then I would sift out any dust and remove any bits of stalks. 

I ended up with 1/2 cup of seed from the 6 flower stalks. Wow, that's a good return. It would cost me quite a bit to buy that much seed. This will be enough seed to last me a while. I am growing dill year around and supplying a local restaurant, so I need to seed a little every two weeks. So all this seed will eventually get used. I'll store it in the refrigerator in an airtight glass jar. It should keep just fine that way. 

Gourd Seeds

"J" emailed to ask, "What do the seeds look like?" So here's the seeds that I saved from the gourd.....

Yes, they all come out of that one gourd. That's quite a lot of seeds. I'm estimating that there's about 400. I plan to dry them, save a few for myself, sell a few, and give the rest away. Since I have several more gourds on the vine, there will be plenty of seeds to go around. 

This gourd plant is the only one on my farm, in fact, the only one I'm aware of anywhere near me. So I'm assuming it's most likely been pollinated with itself. That fact should help make the next generation similar to the parent. But since I don't know the parentage of the mother plant, there's no guarantee. Yes, the mother plant is a volunteer that just showed up here out of the blue.  

Isolation Cages

Now that I'm growing seed, I'll be growing some of it from time to time on the homestead farm. When that's the case, I'll sometimes need to cage the plants in order to keep them from cross pollinating. Of course, that depends upon which veggies I'm growing for seed. Some cross pollinate, some don't. Plus, there are other ways to prevent cross pollination. 

Isolation cages. I'm making a few cages for beans. I have a few bean varieties that do exceptionally well on my farm. So I might as well take advantage of that and grow them here. This I'm experimenting with isolation cages so that the bees don't cause cross pollination. Beans are primarily self pollinating. But foraging bees have been known to transport pollen from one bean variety to another. Therefore my isolation cages are being designed to exclude my honeybees. 

I'm figuring in making the cages 3' by 3' square, and 2' in height. I want them easy to put up, take down, and store away. Plus I want them made as inexpensively as feasible, recycling materials when possible. So my first step was to gather up assorted used lumber, cut it down into 1/2" by 1/2" widths, 3' and 2' lengths. To stabilize the frames, I used a 45° brace in each corner. 

Once the frames were made, I decided to cover them with clear lightweight plastic. I have a roll of plastic sheeting that had been given to me. Perfect for the job. 

I attached the plastic to the wood frame using a staple gun and home scrounged material in place of batten tape. I could have purchased a roll of batten tape, but hey.....I already had some bands that came off hay bales and some lengths of discarded electric fence tape. 

Here's a closer look-see on how I stapled the plastic on by running the "batten tape" over the plastic sheeting, then stapling it to the wood. This method prevents the plastic from pulling through the staple. 

How to quickly erect the cage?.......my first thought was to tap a nail in at the corners, then tie the frames together with a bit of string. I'm not entirely happy with this arrangement, but it will do for now. 

At the bottom of the frames, instead of tying them together, a well placed rock or stake does the trick. 

So now I have a cage with four sides. So far, so good. But now it needs a top. A plastic top will not work. The cage would get too hot inside. So I'm opting for screening which will let the heat out and the rain in. I have been collecting and saving old discarded screening for some time now, so I have a good supply. So I cut a few pieces into 3'6" squares. 

Now how to attach the screening? Remember, I want easy on/easy off, so staple gunning it to the frames won't do. I came up with the idea of using clothes pins. Quick and easy. 

Ta-da! Completed isolation cages. Very quick to erect and take down. Let sun in, rain in, heat out, and keep bees out. 

This is my first test run using these cages. So we shall see how they work. Will they prove effective in keeping bees out? I'm predicting that they will. Will they get too hot inside? If so, I could always use screening on one or more sides. Will they fall down if it gets breezy? Perhaps. Then I'd need to make them fit together in a sturdier fashion. 

I'm still not thrilled about those nails. I need to think of a better, simple solution. 

Saving Seeds -Peppers

I'm slowly moving to saving as much of my own seed as I can. So far I'm doing well with several different veggies. So I'll describe what I do about each one. First on the list....peppers, only because I'm saving some at this moment. Hey, ya want to see photos, right? So this is the opportune time for pepper seed photos. 

I've been told that peppers tend to cross pollinate if there is lots insect activity in the garden. So I will put a screen cage over the plant I wish to save seeds from in order to prevent cross pollination if I'm growing more than one type of pepper at the moment. Peppers are normally self pollinating, so they will produce fruit in a screen cage. 

(Photo---This was grown by a neighbor down near my seed farm. Unusually large, it caught my eye. It's an open pollinated variety wit no name. Just bred down from some hybrid seed he planted about 15 years ago.)

I'll select the vigorous healthy plant to save seeds from. One that is showing the traits that I desire. Perhaps a sturdy stalk, not too tall. One with good flowering and fruit set. One that isn't getting attacked by pests or disease. Then I'll choose fruits that are the earliest, fully mature, and nicely formed. If I have a choice between one that is thin walled versus thick, I'll choose the thicker walled one. 

I'll pick the fully mature fruit then cut it open to retrieve the seeds. No need to let it dry out first. I'll scrape the seeds out then rinse them off in a sieve, removing any pulp or little bits of membrane, miscolored seeds, and any small ones. I then spread them out thinly on a coffee filter to dry. I find that the old coffee filter (yes I'm a cheapskate. I'll use an old filter that I rinsed out rather than waste a new filter. I prefer the words frugal, fiscally wise, thank you.   :)     Anyway, I find that an old coffee filter works well since the seeds don't permanently glue themselves to the paper. 

I'll leave the seeds dry in the kitchen out of the sun for several days. If its really rainy here, I'll take them to my seed farm where it is drier. But I keep them out of the sun and rain in an airy spot. It takes several days for them to dry adequately. If I can crack a seed in half, then they are dry enough. I'll then store them in a small canning jar in the refrigerator. I don't have a cool basement, so the refrig is my best bet. 

If the pepper is a hot variety, I take one extra step. I will wear waterproof gloves when processing the seeds. I once made the mistake of processing Hawaiian chili pepper seeds with my bare hands, then scratched my eye. Ooowww-yyyyy. I packed my eye with yogurt, swearing never again, never again while waiting for the pain to subside. Im glad I don't have that on video.....cussing old lady first turning the sink sprayer on her face, then remembering that the burning stuff was an oil, went digging into the frig for the yogurt. Just picture it....I'm in the bathroom trying to blob yogurt into my eye which is spasmed shut, with tears streaming out both of them. Not pretty. Now I slip on a pair of gloves to pick seeds and wash those hot peppers. I'm taking no chances of a repeat. 

Growing My Own Seed Potatoes

For years I would purchase seed potatoes from the mainland, assuming that since they were certified to be disease free that they actually were. But recently while investigating some USDA standards I came upon a document governing seed potato certification. To my disappointment I learned that fields with late blight and other problems will still be certified as disease free as long as the percentage is low. My, but that's not good enough for me. I come from a veterinary background, so that would be like saying it was ok for me to allow 1% of patients to deliberately die without taking any steps. Since  the practice about 10,000 patients, that means I could kill 100 dogs and cats a year and it would still be acceptable. No way! No way! 

So I am switching to growing my own seed, especially potatoes and sweet potatoes. 

My seed production area will be kept apart from the food production garden. This way I can carefully screen each individual plant, eliminating slow growers and less vigorous plants. When it comes to culling, I can be ruthless. As you can see in the photo below, I've already pulled out the less robust plants. 

Each row of plants is labelled. You can see the very visible yellow labels. I alternate varieties so that I don't accidentally mix things up. So a row of purples would be next to a white, next to a red skinned, next to a small fingerling, etc. Since I grow quite a variety it's no trouble alternately the color and types. 

Once the plants are growing well, I begin to mulch them. Initially the mulch is only two inches deep. But eventually I will apply mulch two more times making it 6-8 inches deep. Those 2x4 wood pieces in the photo below are 7 inches long, just to give you some perspective. 

Deep mulching works really well on potatoes. It not only keeps weeds out. More importantly it keeps soil moisture levels fairly constant and it keeps light away from the tubers. 

I've just harvested my first few varieties that are early types. It took just two months from the time they were planted to the time of harvest. Here in Hawaii the potato plants don't die back to indicate harvest time. Instead they look "old" and ratty. A variety called Dark Red Norland proved to be the fastest producer with Red Thumb right behind it. Guess the weather was just perfect for them this year. 

Pre-Sprouting Seeds - part 2

I wanted to show you some more pre-sprouting. Here's an interesting example. 

These are beet seeds. Normally I wouldn't pre-sprout beet seed but this package was from 2 years ago, and although stored correctly, I wasn't sure of its ability to germinate. As it turned out, I was getting 80% germination, not bad. But the interesting thing is that you can easily see that beet seed contains multiple germs. The two bottom seeds have two rootlets emerging while the top seed has three. Yes, three little beet plants will develop from that one seed capsule. This is why one must thin beets even if you are careful to space the seed 3 inches apart. 

These seeds are tiny. They're turnips. The big white blog in the bottom of the photo is a normal bean seed for size comparison. Small seeds the size of turnips are not worth pre-sprouting because of their small size. They are very difficult to handle without damaging the emerging rootlets. But again, this was old seed that I wasn't sure would sprout at all. As it turned out, I got a 40% germination rate. So when I go to direct seed into the garden, I now know to seed it on the heavy side since less than half the seed will germinate. 

These are a tan soup pea variety. I was given these from another heirloom gardener. So again, I didn't know if they would germinate. But being large and thus easy to handle, pre-sprouting goes just fine. These little guys germinated a lot faster than I anticipated, so they are a day older than I would prefer to plant. With the longer rootlets, I will have to be careful when planting them. Breaking the rootlets off is way too easy to do. I would prefer the rootlets to be just emerging or up to 1/2 inch long when I go to plant them. 

Pre-sprouting Seeds

Now that it's springtime and I'm planting more things into the gardens, I'm going through seed leftover from last year. I'll use up the older seed first before sowing the fresh stock. Not sure about the germination, I prefer to pre-sprout the seed so that I don't end up with a spotty bed with lots of gaps. 

Pre-sprouting seed is easy. I just use two cloth rags. I wet them in water then wring them out. Inside one rag I spread out the seeds. 

Then I roll up the rag and seeds. Ends up looking like a long sausage. I then lay this sausage in the second rag and roll the whole thing up. 

It ends up looking like this. I then put it in a warm spot. In my case, that's on a table three feet from the woodstove in my livingroom. Each day I will unroll the rags and check for germinated seeds. And if the rags starts drying out, I will redampen them.

Eventually, unusually in a couple days, I'll spy some rootlets. Wonderful! The photo is of green beans that I'm now sprouting. The one in the upper left I must have missed yesterday when I checked because to root is rather developed, it's far easier to plant the beans when the root is smaller. Less chance of snapping it off. 

So why do I use two rags? Because it keeps the moisture more even up against the seed. If my rags were bigger then maybe I wouldn't use two. But two works for me. 

I like setting the seed near the heat source. The little extra warmth gets the seed germinated faster. I could also set the sausage roll in a patch of sunshine on the kitchen counter. That would work too. I would just have to be careful not to let it dry out or bake. 

As I pre-sprout seeds other than beans, I'll post the photos so that you can see what they look like. 

So how do I plant these sprouted beans? I just poke a hole about 1 1/2 inches deep in the prepared bed, drop on the bean, and gently cover it over. Give it a little drink of water and the job is done. 

Seed Ordering Time -- Hurrah!!

Some people play fantasy games on the Internet, others create fantasy sports teams. Neither interest me. But give me a pile of brand new seed catalogs and I can become totally immersed in planning my ultimate fantasy garden. Now you talk about a great rainy day activity. Right on!

With the arrival of each new catalog, the imaginary garden grows. If I actually ordered and planted every one of the varieties I select, then I guess I'd need a 5 acre garden. Maybe even double that because this year I've taken a fancy to grains. Wow, look at all those different types of corn. Sweet. Heirlooms. Dent. Flour. Ornamental. Popcorn. And sorghum....must be a dozen interesting kinds. Rice, I'd like to give that a try. And there are plenty of varieties to choose from.  Why not wheat? And barley while I'm at it. Teff sounds different. And quinoa. Amaranth for grain might be fun. I haven't tried flax yet, but why not give it a go? And buckwheat. See? Things just snowball. But luckily it's all for the fantasy garden. I don't think I'd even have the time to actually plant all that stuff, let alone care for and harvest it. 

But there's something enjoyable about scanning through the tomato listings and picking out the best sounding red ones, those pretty pinks, the bold oranges, and fun yellows. White and green ones could be interesting. And look here, there's more than one color of stuffer types. This year there are lots of black ones listed, in addition to the striped and multi-colored tomatoes. And all sorts of shapes and sizes. In order to have just one of each kind I'd have to devote an acre to just tomatoes! 

Squash. Just when you finally have the tomatoes sorted out, you sneak a peek at the new squashes. Before long squash has taken over. There's more shapes, colors, and sizes than tomatoes! And since many have giant vines (catalogs describe them as vigorous), I'd need two acres just for all the squashes! Squashes lead to the pumpkin listings, then to gourds. So much to choose from! Wow, this is getting to be fun. 

The imaginary garden is rapidly growing in size. Things are getting confusing, so I start going down the alphabet. A. Artichoke. Two kinds would look nice together. One silvery green, the other purple. Whew, that was simple. Next, asparagus. An all male variety sounds good. But that purple one would be pretty, so add that too. Oops, forgot the amaranth. O-o. Lots of varieties to pick from. Green. Red. Multi color. Grain type, leaf type. These choices are gonna be a bit tougher, require more thought. Uuuhhh. Better increase the size of the fantasy garden. 

And so it goes. 

Just when I'm satisfied with my fantasy creation, another catalog shows up! Here we go again! 

Storing My Seeds

When I order or buy seeds, I often buy in bulk. This is not only cheaper for me, but since I garden year around, I always have seed on hand. No need to make a special order. But buying in bulk means that I need to store the seed in such a way as to preserve its quality. Otherwise the seed will deteriorate,  not germinate, thus wasting my money. I've been there, done that, and don't plan to waste anymore money. 

Some companies package their seed in sealed containers, preserving the seed better. But most send the seed in paper packets. I transfer seed from paper packets into sealable glass containers. The idea is to control the humidity/moisture exposure to the seeds. For large seed I will use appropriate sized canning jars. Their lids make a good seal. For small seed or small amounts I will use glass test tubes with rubber stoppers. Again, it's a real moisture resistant seal. I used to place a desiccant in the jar with the seeds, but unless it's homegrown seed, I don't bother anymore. The commercial seed seems to be dry enough already.

Once sealed in glass jars, and of  course labelled (at my age I don't trust myself to remember!), I store the seed in the refrigerator. I have a chest refrigerator, so I store seed at the bottom where the temperature doesn't fluctuate.

For homegrown seed, I store it in a jar with a little desiccant. I started out by using powdered milk. But when I mentioned this to a medical lab person, she said that at work they threw away desiccant packets all the time. So she started saving them for me. Now I have plenty, in fact at my age, a lifetime supply! A friend in a floral shop told me about the desiccant they sold that had an indicator crystal in it. When the crystal changes  color, it's time for it to be dried out again (an oven works great for this). So I've mixed the two together giving me plenty to work with while still having the benefit of indicator crystals. I've been told that you can buy desiccant online, but I like the idea of  re-using something destined for the trash. So when I want to add more desiccant to my stash, I can ask my local medical clinic or veterinary hospital to save me some packets from their medical testing kits.

I haven't tried using my freezer for seed storage. For one, seed needs to be dried down more than just natural-dry for safe freezer storage. I couldn't just pop my homegrown seed in there and expect everything to be fine. And second, I have room in my frig for seed storage, but not my freezer, which is often crammed. Plus my system present works for me ok. My seed does just fine.

Seed Sources I Use

People come look at my farm then invariably ask what seed company I use. Like it's the seeds that make the difference?  Well anyway, I don't use just one. In fact, I've used plenty. And I've acquired seeds from other sources too. My sources include:
   Growing my own
   Swaps with other gardeners
   A local seed producer
   Local seed exchanges
   Mail order seed companies
I tend to avoid stores here. I have experienced terrible germination rates from some of the store purchased seed, so I suspect there is a problem on how the seed has been shipped, stored, or otherwise handled. 

Recently I have been growing some of my own seeds. I can get high quality, fresh seed this way with high germination rates. I love it! It's true self reliancy. 

I also swap or buy seed from other gardeners. I can get some varieties this way that are no longer available in the seed catalogs. Most of the time the seed is excellent. I've only had three cases of poor seed, so I longer deal with those individuals. 

The University of Hawaii produces some seed for varieties that have been selected for Hawaii. I occasionally will buy some to give the varieties a try. 

A few times a year there are seed exchange events around the island. I love these events because I can swap for plants that I can't find anywhere else. I've come home with sugar cane, taro, turmeric,  sweet potatoes, and more. 

Then there are the mail order seed suppliers. I order from a number of them for various reasons. And since I'm forever experimenting and exploring, I order from several of them each year. When I don't need much from a company, I will ask among my friends and neighbors to see if they intend to place an order too. That way we can share the shipping costs. 

I'll go down the list and note why I order from them:
...Johnnys Selected Seed - good selection, fair shipping rate, fast service, reliable, accurate, good germination, great service
...Nichols - great people, good customer service, interesting selection, good seed, monthly specials
...Stokes- good bulk prices, good seed, commercial varieties available, good service
...Harris- ditto
...Holmes - ditto
...Seedway- ditto
...Rupp - ditto
...Osborne - ditto
...Dixondale -  good source of onion & leek seedlings
...Willhite - interesting watermelon and melon varieties
...Twilley - interesting commercial sweet corn. Expensive seed. I hardly ever order.
...Seed Savers Exchange - interesting varieties. And they support community gardens, a nice touch.
...Native Seed Search - very interesting native seed. I like them. 
...Rancho Gordo - very interesting Mexican seed. I like them. 
...Kitazawa - good oriental varieties
...Evergreen - good oriental varieties  
...Territorial - sometimes carry things that I an looking for
...Pinetree - ditto
...Shumway - I've ordered OP corn from them. They are not as interesting since they got purchased and are now affiliated with Jung Seed. Last time I looked their shipping rates were outrageous. I don't order much here anymore. 
...Baker Creek - love the catalog. Also has interesting varieties you can't find elsewhere. 
...Purcell Mountain - good price on bulk bean seed. Interesting varieties. Fast service.
...Wood Prairie - good seed potatoes. Good service. 
...Victory - good service. Nice people.
...Southern Exposure - I've found some interesting stuff here. 
...Amishland - I only order if she has a rare variety I am looking for. Prices are outrageously high for a small amount of seed and sometimes the germination rates are abysmal. I've gotten zero germination on some seeds. 
...Sandhill Preservation Farm - good source for sweet potatoes. They have some hard to find seeds. 
...Tomato Bob - I only order during the off season because he can be real slow filling orders otherwise. But I like the guy. His prices aren't the cheapest, but he often has specials and carries varieties that can be hard to find. 

There are some companies that I no longer order from because either their prices are quite high, their shipping rate unreasonable, or their seeds have poor germination rates. But make up your own mind.

Before ordering from an unknown company, I usually check out their reputation on davesgarden.com. 

Growing Seeds

Purple Teepee Beans
I'm growing these for the seeds. 

I've just started getting serious about producing my own seeds and starts. Every year I've been buying them from the mainland, mostly. But as part of my efforts to being self-reliant, I'm learning to produce more of my own. I've successfully experimented with some veggies, the easy ones. So for now on, certain veggies will now be 100% homestead produced.

So you ask, which veggies?
...beans
...peas
...potatoes
...sweet potatoes
...tomatoes
...lettuce
...yacon
...taro
...dill
...summer savory
...chives
...basils
...winged beans
...jicama
...pipinola
...sugar cane
...coffee
...hibiscus
...strawberries
These are the ones that I know I can do successfully and easily.

I've also learned to do gourds. Since I can do gourds successfully, that means the I could do cucumbers, melons, squash, and pumkpins if I want to.  I haven't yet, but I will eventually.

Certain veggies don't go to flower here. At least I haven't seen them do it yet. I wonder if I could some how trick them into it. I have chard and parsley plants that are six years old. They have never bolted. So it looks like I won't be able to produce seed for these.

I've discovered that kale, some collards, and some broccoli can be produced vegetatively. I've taken stem cuttings and rooted them. Tomatoes also grow from tip cuttings quite easily. I'm still experimenting to see what grows. Will the stem suckers root from chard and parsley? What about eggplant and peppers? Might they grow from cuttings? I haven't tried them yet. Will onions flower here? How about beets?

I still have a lot to learn!