How to Save Vegetable Seeds

Hi this is Yolanda Vanveen and in this segment we are going to talk about how to save vegetable seeds. Now we all buy our vegetable seeds at the garden centers or at the store and start our vegetable gardens in the Spring and we're so excited when they grow. You can also save your own vegetable seeds so you can enjoy the vegetables again the next year and there are some easy tricks that I can show you. So a lot of vegetables produce types of seeds. For example this pepper right here has lots of seeds and it is getting a little bit soft. Sometimes green peppers are still pretty fresh and they haven't developed their seeds completely. They might not grow. But generally red peppers will, the seeds will work for the next year and so the trick is to save them and dry them out and the easiest way to save them or to let them dry out is to put them in a glass pan. So just carefully take the seeds off and you can dry them. But as you notice on these peppers they kind of stick to this gooey cover inside and the same way with watermelons, they'll stick as well. So an easy trick to remove the pulp from the seeds is to soak it in water for a day or two. So just take your seeds into the tray and put an inch of water into it and let it soak for a couple days and then just take the parts that you don't need around the seed out as it separates and you'll find within a couple days whatever vegetable it is if you just let it sit in some water the mucky stuff will come to the surface and you can take it right out. Then dry or remove the water as much as you can and just let it dry and then once the vegetables are dried the easiest way to store them is in paper. So just put them in a paper bag or a little paper envelope and make sure to mark it so you know what you have and keep it in a dry cool place, not freezing but not cooking either. That way you can start your own seeds from your own garden the next year and enjoy your garden for many many years.