070 Are Those Old Seeds Still Good? Here's How to Tell. Grow tasty Pluots.

If you’re venturing into flower and vegetable seed starting in 2021, good for you! It’s fun, and with seeds, there are plenty more varieties to choose from. You may have some leftover seeds hanging around. But will those old seeds germinate? Our favorite retired college horticulture professor, Debbie Flower, has a surefire way to tell.

Are you familiar with the pluot? It’s a fruit, it’s a cross between a plum and an apricot. And it truly is one of the sweetest treats that you can grow in your yard. If you’ve got a sweet tooth, you will want to grow the pluot. We’ll tell you all about the pluot today. 

A lot of gardeners like to grow flowers among their vegetables. That’s a great idea! But if you grow tomatoes, there is one very alluring flower that you definitely do not want to grow anywhere near your tomatoes. What is it? Find out on this, Episode 70 of the Garden Basics with Farmer Fred podcast. And we will do it all in under 30 minutes.

Links:
Seed starting kits
Seed starting soil mixes
Farmer Fred Rant: Tips for Speeding Up Pepper Seed Germination
Farmer Fred Rant: Make Your Own Planting Mix
Farmer Fred Rant: Grow a Pluot tree!
Farmer Fred Rant: The Life Cycle of a Tomato Worm
UC Davis Arboretum

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Chapters

• 1:20 Are Those Old Seeds Still Good?
• 14:52 Join in the fun! How to Contact Us
• 16:27 Plant a Pluot tree for a sweet taste treat!
• 26:11 Don't plant this near your tomato plants!

Transcript

Farmer Fred  0:03 
Welcome to the Garden Basics with Farmer Fred podcast. If you're just a beginning gardener or you want good gardening information, well, you've come to the right spot.

If you're venturing into flower and vegetable seed-starting in 2021... well, good for you. It's fun. And with seeds, there are plenty more varieties to choose from. And, you might have some leftover seeds hanging around. But will those old seeds germinate? Our favorite retired college horticultural Professor, Debbie Flower, has a surefire way to tell. Are you familiar with the pluot? It's a fruit. It's a cross between a plum and an apricot. And it truly is one of the sweetest treats that you can grow in your yard. If you've got a sweet tooth, you will want to grow the pluot. We will tell youall about the pluot today. A lot of gardeners like to grow flowers among their vegetables. And that's a great idea. But, if you grow tomatoes, there's one very alluring flower that you definitely do not want to grow anywhere near your tomatoes. What is that flower? You're going to find out, here, on episode 70 of the Garden Basics with Farmer Fred podcast. And we'll do it all in under 30 minutes. Let's go.

We like to answer your garden questions here on the Garden Basics with Farmer Fred podcast. Details on how you can chime in, you can find in the show notes. We're talking to our favorite retired college horticultural Professor, Debbie Flower. And Debbie, this question comes in and I bet this question is on the minds of a lot of gardeners, both new gardeners and experienced gardeners. Cheryl writes in and says, "I still have half a packet of tomato seeds left from last year. Are they are they still good?" Well, I guess we can go with our standard answer. 'It depends', right?

Debbie Flower  1:55 
Right. It depends what we need to know, seeds can last several years. Typically, I maybe will keep them for two years. But the critical thing is how they were stored in that time that you're saving them, they need to be kept dry and cool. And the smaller the seed, the shorter life it has, the less chance that it's going to survive for this year. And so, if she wants to check it, to see if it's going to germinate, the easiest thing to do is take five or 10 seeds. Hold on, I'm gonna sneeze. Okay. Now, of course, it's not gonna come.

Farmer Fred  2:31 
Well, it will in mid sentence.

Debbie Flower  2:33 
Right. She wants to check her seeds. To find out if they're going to germinate. The easiest thing to do is to take a paper towel or a coffee filter, but I use a paper towel folded in half, and then open it up again and take 10 seeds because then the math is easy. Typically, there are lots of seeds in a seed packet. So 10 is good. You're not going to run out of seeds by using 10. But you could do five, the math is just a little harder. Put them in, right in that fold. Separate them by an inch and fold the paper towel back over them. And then roll it up in the other direction like a cigar so that the seeds are all in the fold and they are all at the one end of the cigar and then dampen the whole thing. And then I like to stand it up in a jar or coffee cup, glass something like that and put a plastic bag over the top so it stays moist. And I look at the package how many days until germination, tomatoes probably seven to 14. And so I would check it in a week by taking off the plastic bag taking out the paper towel unrolling the cigar opening the fold and see how many have germinated. That will give you an idea of how many will germinate in the ground. If half of them have germinated. Then I might want to double seed. Put two seeds wherever I would start one and then hopefully I'll get one to germinate. If none of germinated after seven days I fold the thing back up again. Roll it up like a cigar again, put it in the jar again. cover it with plastic again, leave it another week and check it again. If none germinate then then probably the seeds aren't very good. I wouldn't trust them and I would buy new.

Farmer Fred  4:16 
Inquiring minds want to know... Why stand the paper towel up? Why can't you just lay it flat, that wet paper towel?

Debbie Flower 4:24 
Because it's easier to see which seeds have roots. If you lay it flat,  roots grow towards gravity. And so if you lay it flat, the roots will just grow wide all over the other seeds and it's difficult to tell from which seed the root has arisen. If you stand it up in the cup, then the roots grow down and when you open it up, you'll be able to see which ones have germinated and which ones have not.

Farmer Fred  4:49 
There's some downsides to doing this test in January for tomato seeds. I'll explain that in a second. But let's say you're doing this test in February or March, could you take those seeds that have germinated and then put them in some sort of seed starting mix?

Debbie Flower  5:06 
Yes, you could. And that's why I mentioned a coffee filter instead of a paper towel. The downside of a paper towel is that it has fibers and the roots can become entwined in the fibers. And so if I did this experiment with a paper towel, I would cut the paper towel around the seed and plant the whole thing, paper towel and all, because the root hairs tend to get into the paper towel, if you do it on a coffee filter, they're less likely to do that. But coffee filters don't give you as much space as a paper towel does to do this test.

Farmer Fred  5:40 
And why use a seed starting mix instead of just backyard soil?

Debbie Flower  5:45 
Seeds are small, if we're growing in a container, backyard soil holds too much water to be in a container, it's very tight in its texture, and water stays in the soil on the surfaces of all the particles. And if the particles are very close together, which is what I mean by tight, then the water fills all the pores between the soil particles and there's no place for oxygen. Roots do need oxygen to grow. So a seed starting mix is more open, it actually has bigger particle sizes, or there's lots of different fields soil. And some of the reason field soil can be tight is because the particle sizes are of all different sizes. And so the little ones fit in between the big ones, the seed starting mix that you purchase is of all one size. And so they're all big, and so when think of a jar full of golf balls, and how there would be spaces between them. But if you added pennies to the golf ball jar, all the spaces would be filled with pennies. So the golf ball and the pennies is this field soil. The golf ball alone is the seed starting mix. Seeds are small, and the little plants that come out of them and seeds contain a completely formed little plant. The little plants that come out of them aren't very strong. And so the particle sizes need to be very lightweight, so that the little plant that comes out of the seed can push that particles out of the way. Field soil tends to be heavier, it can have rocks in it. Other kinds of potting material that you would buy in a bag to grow things and in containers can have particle sizes that are too large and baby plants can't push their way out. And if they can't push their way out, they can't get bigger. So we use seed starting mix for those reasons.

Farmer Fred  7:24 
Ah yes, that mysterious big wall of soil that you'll find at a garden center or big box store: potting mix, planting mix, outdoor mix, container mix, and somewhere there you will find, usually small bags of seed starting mix. I guess that's fine if you're only starting a few seeds. But if you're starting a lot, you may want to economize by perhaps making your own seed starting mix.

Debbie Flower 7:50 
That's true. That's very true. And so for that we typically use peat moss, perlite and vermiculite on a one to one to one mix. Meaning if I have one, I'll use an empty a clean, empty container, maybe a four inch, maybe a gallon depends how much material I'm trying to make. And so one part means one container full of peat moss. Another part means one container full of perlite and another part means one container full of vermiculite then you need to add a little bit of lime to that because peat moss is very acidic. If you don't want to use peat moss, you could use sand that would be for very well drained things, native California drought tolerant plants, cactus, things that like drought, you could use coir. And apparently it comes in pellets. I have not used the pellets, but the pellets need to be soaked, but they work better than the big blocks that are all compressed because the big blocks have to be soaked before you use them. But coir is coconut fiber, you could use compost or any sort of organic material that is clean and seed free can be used to as the instead of peat moss.

Farmer Fred  8:59 
And if you do use coir the benefit to that is it has more of a neutral pH unlike peat moss, which is very acidic. So you wouldn't need the lime in that case.

Debbie Flower  9:09 
Yes. And the math to calculate how much lime you need. It's not easy. Yeah,

Farmer Fred  9:15 
So all of a sudden that bag of seed starting mix looks better and better.

Debbie Flower  9:18 
It sure does.Yeah.

Farmer Fred  9:19 
But it's amazing. What you can do on a big scale though if you just got in my case I would use peat moss, I would use compost and I would use perlite. Now I know you're not a big fan of perlite but you have a substitute for the perlite.

Debbie Flower 9:35 
I wouldn't use the perlite in seed starting because it is lightweight. And I'm not a fan of it because of the amount of dust it creates. It creates dust whenever you're using it so when you open the bag, there's a puff of dust in your face and then when you dig into the bag to get some out there's dust and when you pour it there's dust and when you mix it with the other stuff, there's dust. So the number one thing to do when you're working with perlite is wet it. Open the bag with scissors rather than pulling it apart. The scissors are calmer and cutting the bag you create less dust that way. Take the hose and put it right in the bag and wet the perlite. Then, of course, we all have masks these days. Wearing a mask is a good idea. When I'm potting on up once the seed has germinated and I have a small plant with a roots system then I will switch to pumice. Pumice is created by volcanoes. And it comes in different sizes. You can get small sizes that are no I haven't found one that's as small as regular horticultural perlite, I haven't had trouble with it creating problems because it's a little bit bigger. So I will use that as the component in in container mix.

Farmer Fred  10:41 
One of the problems with perlite as well is as it goes on in the growing process of that new plant. It tends to float up to the surface.

Debbie Flower  10:51 
Well, it doesn't float to the surface, but everything else washes away.

Farmer Fred  10:55 
Okay, Everything else goes down.

Debbie Flower  10:59 
Everything else goes down. Yeah.

Farmer Fred  11:01 
All right. And is that just cosmetic though?

Debbie Flower  11:05 
Yes, that is cosmetic.

Farmer Fred  11:06 
And if you don't want to use perlite, you could use pumice.

Debbie Flower  11:09 
You can replace perlite with sand in seed starting. It needs to be horticultural sand, which is also builders sand, which is washed and sized. Because sand typically comes from places that where saltwater has been my I know, you know, you can drive around the US and find gravel pits and sand pits, mining pits all over the place. But they're in places where salt water used to be and so the sand is full of salt. And so that salt needs to be washed out. Salt will kill a plant very very quickly. It's it's got sodium in it, and too much sodium will quickly kill a plant. So the sandy would use in place of perlite and seed starting mix needs to be washed and sized and builder sand is sufficient for that that that you can get at your big box store.

Farmer Fred  11:54 
You don't want to start tomato seeds in January because they're going to be ready to transplant in probably eight weeks. And if you do that in January and think you're going to transplant in March, you just might be in for a rude surprise if the weather turns cold. So if you want to back-time your tomato seed planting, subtract eight weeks. So if you normally plant in late April, you would want to plant those tomato seeds in late February. So I guess this little test, your seed experiment, would work with just about any vegetable seed, wouldn't it?

Debbie Flower  12:25 
Yes, I used to do it with my students a whole classroom I kept old seeds, some of them decades old, a bean in particular and Anasazi bean that germinated every year, almost 100% for decades. So some seeds can be kept a long time and some seeds can't. But yeah, every semester we did I did that test with students. It was to me a very wonderful way of testing your seeds.

Farmer Fred  12:49 
What is the best way to store seeds? I know you said in a cool dry place. Is the refrigerator an option?

Debbie Flower  12:56 
Yes, the refrigerator is an option. And that's where I keep my seeds. Most of them, not all of them. But just because I'm lazy not because I have any selection of ones that shouldn't go in the refrigerator. refrigerators are typically around 42 degrees. And that's okay for all seeds.

Farmer Fred  13:13 
And how would you store them? Could you store them in their original container that you purchase the seeds in?

Debbie Flower 13:18 
I always want to do that because there's so much great information on that seed packet. And I won't remember what they are, if I take them out and I collect those little dehydration packets that come in do things. I'm sure you've bought a new purse recently, right Fred. And then the bottom of the purse is a packet says do not eat. And it's typically white with some writing on it and rub it around in your hands. And you can feel that there are round things inside. And that's for absorbing moisture. And I collect those and I'll put those in with my seeds to keep them dry, and can put them in a Ziploc bag or a jar is even better.

Farmer Fred  13:57 
And then put them down in like the vegetable or the fruit crisper.

Debbie Flower  14:00 
I don't put them there but anywhere would work. The fruit crisper sometimes is controlled to be humid. And that's not what you want. You just want it to be cool and dry. So back in the jar in the back of a shelf or even sometimes have them in the door.

Farmer Fred  14:15 
Is there any danger of losing the life out of those seeds if you store them in the refrigerator if there are apples in the same location?

Debbie Flower  14:24 
Apples give off ethylene gas and ethylene is a ripening hormone. I don't think it would affect the seed. I would have to, honestly, look into that. But I would want my seed in a jar or in a plastic bag. And that should be enough to keep the ethylene away.

Farmer Fred  14:37 
So before you rush out to buy new seed, maybe gather up those packets that you stored in a cool dry location, test the seeds and you just might have plenty for the upcoming growing season. Once again, we learn a lot with Debbie Flower. Debbie, thanks for a few minutes of your time.

Debbie Flower  14:52 
Always a pleasure, Fred. Thank you.

Farmer Fred  14:54 
The Garden Basics with Farmer Fred podcast has a lot of information posted at each episode: transcripts, links to any products or books mentioned during the show, and other helpful links for even more information. Plus, you can listen to just the portions of the show that interest you, it’s been divided into easily accessible chapters.  Plus you’ll find more information about how to get in touch with us. Leave an audio question without making a phone call via Speakpipe, at speak pipe dot com. it’s easy, give it a try. And you just might hear your voice on the Garden Basics podcast! If you’re listening to us via Apple podcasts, put your question in the Ratings and Reviews section. Text us the question and pictures, or leave us your question at: 916-292-8964.916-292-8964. E-mail: fred@farmerfred.com . If you tell us where you’re from, that will help us greatly to accurately answer your garden questions. Because all gardening is local. In the show notes you’ll find links to all our social media outlets, including facebook, instagram, twitter, and youtube. Also, a link to the farmerfred.com website. And thanks for listening.

We're talking with Phil Pursel from Dave Wilson nursery. We're finding out about what's hitting the nursery shelves right now from one of the nation's biggest fruit, nut and vine suppliers to nurseries throughout the United States. And one of my favorite pieces of fruit is the pluot. Phil, what is a pluot?

Phil Pursel  15:18 
So a pluot is just a cross between a plum and apricot. And with a pluot, the parentage is predominantly on the plum, or pluot side that is crossed with an apricot. So think of a pluot, 75% or so a plum, you know, plum parentage, and about 25% is going to be apricot parentage. And the way you can do this is that since they're both in the same family, the pollen is interchangeable. That's why you can go ahead and cross an apricot and a plum and you give what is known as a hybrid fruit. The thing about pluots is that through the development of these pluots, you get flavors that you just don't get from a traditional plum. They're sweeter, they're more adaptable. They're just really a plum with superior flavor kind of hybridized into them.

Farmer Fred  16:17 
The pluots are incredibly sweet. And they're just so tasty. And I know at the fruit tastings that Dave Wilson has conducted over the years, everybody loves when the pluot hit the table, because they know they're in for a real sweet taste treat. And I see that one of the favorite taste test results is also one of my favorites, the Flavor Supreme pluot, which here in California usually ripens in late June, early July, and wherever you live in the United States, it will grow. it just might ripen up a little bit later in the year.

Phil Pursel  16:49 
Yes, I mean, that's one of the old time varieties that Floyd Zaiger developed. And it's still flavor wise, it is just It is really hard to beat.

Farmer Fred  16:59 
The other taste test winners among the plots include flavor King and Dapple Dandy, Emerald Drop and Flavor Grenade. And let's not forget about Flavor Queen.

Phil Pursel  17:10 
Right. So these are just different. You know, some of them are red skin, some of them are green skin, some of them yellow skin, a pluot is various in appearances. But like you say, they're just different derivatives of Plum and apricot crosses. Pluots are known out here in the western US. And in fact, if you go into a grocery store, especially in California, they'll have a plum section, they'll have a pluot section. But a lot of people don't realize, especially back east, is that they're eating a pluot. Because pretty much that's what the growers now grow. But they just can't, they just keep things simple. But here in California, where we know what a pluot is, there are so many different pluots available that you go to the grocery store. Well, that's really outdo plums, sometimes you just call them plums, but they're just different crosses, because you get so much more flavor out of a pluot.

Farmer Fred  18:07 
So here is my reaction to eat eating pluots from various sources. Go to a supermarket, buy a pluot, take a bite. You go, 'that's pretty good'. Go to a farmers market, buy a pluot, take a bite, 'hey, that's really good'. Pick a pluot off a tree in your backyard, take a bite out of it. The neighbors will hear you going, "WOW!"  It is just so wonderful. When you grow your own fruit trees. It's just so tasty and so fresh. And you know exactly what went into making that tree. So you know, it's good for you

Phil Pursel  18:41 
Exactly. That is the benefit of growing fruit in your backyard. You know what it has, you know, has or hasn't been sprayed on it, you can control the fertilizer, the water, it's just a nice gift after taking care of a tree the whole summer to get this you know, wonderful fruit. And the thing about growing and eating fruit out of your own backyard is you can eat it early, and the pluot will be good. For example, that's what you get at a traditional grocery store, you can let it sit on the tree a little bit longer, you get more of what you would expect from a farmer's market. But when you let that  fruit hang on that tree, and keep on developing the sugars during the summer. That's when you get that explosive flavor that that you just don't get from a store-bought pluot.

Farmer Fred  19:35 
A little bit earlier we talked about the benefits of backyard orchard culture where you maintain the size of the tree at no more than you can reach, so six feet, six and a half, seven feet tall. Another good reason to maintain your trees at that height is you can keep the birds off the fruit by easily putting a net over that tree.

Phil Pursel  19:54 
Correct. It's if you if you have a 12 foot, 15 foot fruit tree, there's no way you can net that. You can't keep the squirrels away, you can keep the birds away. However, if you have something that is manageable, now you're more apt to go ahead and you know, keep the critters from getting the fruit one week before you're ready to get it.

Farmer Fred  20:16 
Are there examples of netting strategies in video form at Dave Wilson.com?

Phil Pursel  20:21 
Yeah, we do have a couple of videos that kind of show how how to go ahead and net your trees, it can be a little difficult at first, the main thing is that a lot of people don't do this don't net the tree, but they don't enclose the bottom. Mm hmm. So that still allows the the squirrels and even the bird to go ahead and get into the canopy of trees. So you really want to go ahead with the netting, make sure that you enclose the bottom so that you seal it off.

Farmer Fred  20:49 
There you go. Now pluot you mentioned are a plum, apricot cross. Apriums are primarily apricot with a plum background. And then there's some other interesting crosses with odd names like the pluerry.

Phil Pursel  21:03 
So the pluerry is kind of the newest of the Zaiger hybrids. And it's actually a plum-cherry cross. And you're starting to see it more and more. In traditional grocery stores, it was only available up to the last few years in farmer's market and in the home garden. And if you think of a pluot being sweet, the pluerries are just unbelievable, because they have the sweetness of the cherry that is hybridized into the plum. So think of a pluerry as a big cherry, but really more of a smaller plum. And they are prolific. I have a Sweet Treat pluerry in my backyard that gives unbelievable fruit. And it hangs for about four to six weeks. And it's it has so much fruit on it. It's unbelievable. And we have different varieties of pluerries that are really nice because they're not too big, you know, and they make nice snack size. And you can have one or two or three without, you know overdoing it. But it's just something that the hang time of a pluerry on a tree where you don't get to harvest all at once is a huge benefit for the backyard gardener.

Farmer Fred  22:27 
One thing we should mention is that for these pluots and pluerries that we're talking about, and the apriums, it takes two to tango really, in that you need two different varieties there for best pollination, don't you?

Phil Pursel  22:40 
Yes. I wouldn't even call it a drawback. But with pluerries, and with pluots, you do need to have cross pollenizer, there should be two different varieties. And it can also be a Japanese plum, used as a pollenizer. But those definitely need it. Apriums, I would say, most of them are self fertile. So you know, you don't have to have it. But having another apricot doesn't hurt. But you're gonna have a pluot or pluerry, ake sure you have another variety that blooms in sequence with it. And like I say it could be another pluerry with a pluot it can be a plum with a pluot. It's just that you want to make sure that they bloom at the same time. And if you go onto our website, we give you cross pollenizer varieties, so that you make sure you have the right type of pollenizer. But you can at the same time everything is about successive ripening. So because of blooms at the same time doesn't mean that it's going to harvest at the same time. So you can kind of cross reference our harvest chart and figure out when you want to have your pluots, then you'll just pick two different ones. Odds are they're going to cross pollinize each other.

Farmer Fred  23:54 
If you want a good Encyclopedia of growing fruit trees, I would direct you to Dave wilson.com, their website. Not only is there a lot of written information there but their series of videos they call them the fruit tube videos, can take you from planting to harvest and and caring for the tree throughout the growing season. It's also available on YouTube as well, but visit Dave wilson.com for a whole host of very good accurate information about growing fruits, vines, and nuts. No matter where you live wherever Dave Wilson product can be found which is most of the United States. Phil Purcel we learned a lot today. Thank you so much.

Phil Pursel  24:37 
Thanks for having me on.

Farmer Fred  24:41 
Here's a quick tip for you. You've heard of companion planting, correct? Companion plants are plants planted side by side that basically help each other out. Well, there's certain plants that you could call uncompanion plants: two plants that you may not want to put next to each other. Recently I chatted with Warren Roberts, the superintendent emeritus of the UC Davis Arboretum, and he was waxing rhapsodic about a particular plant that's a really nice show for the nose, and it's very aromatic at night. It's called flowering tobacco. The botanical name is Nicotiana. But after Warren was talking about the insects that the nicotiana attracts... listen to this, you might not want to plant this anywhere near your tomato plants.

Warren Roberts  25:27 
Nicotiana sylvestris is a native of Southern Brazil and that area. It has very long white flowers. Daisy Mah gave us our original start, and it seeds around in the garden. Never weedy and always beautiful. It gets about four or five feet tall in time. And then it has these very long tubular flowers which are fragrant, it's pollinated by Sphinx moths. You know, when you're growing tomatoes and you have the hornworms? Big bright green worms. Those are actully the larvae of the Sphinx moth so don't squash all of them. At least some of them to produce these magnificent moths which look like hummingbirds in the evening. The reason that we have these wonderful fragrant flowers because they follow that fragrance as an indicator of nectar.

Farmer Fred  26:23 
Note to self: don't plant Nicotiana anywhere near where you want to plant tomatoes. Okay, got it.

Warren Roberts  26:29 
Oh. I suppose, yes. Yes, they're the same family, too.

Farmer Fred  26:36 
Yes. Both Nicotiana and tomatoes are in the Solanaceae family. Nicotiana can be grown in all zones full sun or part shade needs regular water. Now besides the Sphinx moth, Nicotiana does attract hummingbirds and butterflies. Remember, though, that all parts of Nicotiana are extremely poisonous if ingested, it is a tender perennial. But if you don't live in a mild winter area, it will probably just survive as an annual and a word of warning: some nicotianas reseed readily, which can either be a good thing or a bad thing.

Farmer Fred
The Garden Basics podcast is going to a winter schedule, maybe just like your favorite local nursery. November through January, Garden Basics will come out once a week on Fridays. Then, as the weather warms back up in February, we'll return to our twice a week schedule. Thank you for listening, subscribing, and leaving comments. We appreciate that you've included us in your garden life.