Weather
We have a very special cosmic situation with Mars, Pluto and Uranus creating a great air Trine over this weekend from Friday 8. – Sunday 10.8 bringing clear skies and a lot of grounding energy with hot sunshine and clear nights.
We also are entering a high pressure zone which will be bringing temperatures up 4-5 degrees from last week.
Stay posted for changes that might occur as the sun was very quiet the previous week but is right now building up solar sunspot activity which could make the sun appear hotter than usual.
Expect a couple weeks of very dry and bright weather impulse by the triple planet trine and also Venus and Jupiter going conjunct on Tuesday.
Collecting Seeds from Fruiting Vegetables
The Squash or Cucumber Family (Curbuticaea)
Courgette and Marrow, Squash, Pumpkin and Cucumber
Ferment by Soaking. Soak the seeds.
Place the seeds in a glass jar or bowl and cover with just enough warm water so the seeds float (they will eventually sink to the bottom). Leave the seeds soaking for three to four days. Keep seeds out of sunlight.
Then dry them on kitchen towel and store them in a glass jar with holes in lid or paper envelopes. These vegetables are all cross-pollinating and therefore need to have 500 meters between same types of plants from same family.
Sweet Corn
This is another easy seed to collect. Make sure that the filaments coming from the cob are all brown and dry, just like the leaves surrounding the cob.
The only downside is that you can’t have any other variety of Corn closer than a 1000 m as they are wind pollinated and therefore will heavily cross-pollinate. Make sure to plant Sweet Corn in blocks rather than lines for better pollination.
If you would like to experiment to improve your resilience and vitality of the Sweet Corn, count from the bottom of the cob the layers and choose the 6 layer of grains to sow next year’s crop to create improved a greatly improved variety of Sweet Corn.
This wisdom goes back to Pythagoras, Steiner and the Seed breeder Georg Wilhelm Schmidt, who used this method successfully on lal grains to revitalise them.
The Tomato Family (Solanecaea)
Tomato seeds are best harvested from fruit which is slightly over ripe and possibly started to slightly deteriorate. Seeds are then put into enough warm water to start fermenting the jelly like substance around seeds. Proceed as with seeds in Cucumber family. Tomato flowers are self-pollinating and can therefore different varieties can be grown together or just a few meters apart.
Concerning Pepper and Aubergine seeds; they can be extracted and kept to dry. Make sure the Aubergines are very ripe and show signs of oxidation on the inside of flesh. These are semi cross- pollinating, meaning you have to have same type of plants at least 50-100 metres apart or just take seed from one variety and making sure there is no other variety of the same type of vegetable in the neighbourhood.
Legume Family (Leguminosaea)
All Legumes are self pollinating
Peas
Pea seeds are easily obtained as they ripen progressively on the vine and the oldest are first ready to harvest when absolutely dry and you can’t push your fingernail into the skin without leaving an indentation (see images of peas ripening progressively-last two peas in image are ready and the ones on the vine).
Beans
For French or bush beans proceed as for Peas. They are self-pollinating and you can grow different varieties in their vicinity.
Runner Beans and Broadbeans are easy seeds to collect, making sure the pods are absolutely dry and seeds can’t be indented with the fingernail. If the seeds and pods are too late in the season for drying, harvest the whole plant and hang upside down in a dry, warm place to ripen out the seed and then only take out of pods to store.
All the plants mentioned are producing seeds in a few months and therefore are easily grown, selected and harvested in the same year.
Other vegetables are biennial and therefore need a whole year to produce seeds and usually have to overwinter or even be harvested, stored and planted out in late winter for spring flowering and to produce seeds.
We will deal with those next time.
I am looking forward to hear about your tricks of how to grow strong plants to select, collect and get the best seeds from.
Be aware that from last Tuesday onward we are in the sowing period of the ascending moon. You can start sowing more root crops for autumn and winter this Friday through Sunday with the ascending moon. Tuedsay 12. and Wednesday 13.8 are excellent dates for leaf sowing.
Happy summer harvest
Hans-Günther