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This is the seed of a bloodroot...
Usually, if I'm not collecting seeds, I'll just throw 'em out...and you get a percentage of 'em that sprouts.
I get as many as I can inside of one and I just pull the draw string
pull the bag open and
slip it down over the seed pod
like these seed
pods here...that ones done open and lost the seeds out of it
but there's more that haven't opened.
And if I can get two or more, just slip the bag down over it, draw the string up and
usually is the seed develops, the weight
increases and the whole stems fall over so the seeds
don't get lost down the opening
if there is an opening left in the bag and
just leave them there and you can
look at the ones that haven't been bagged and when most of them
has opened up and dropped their seeds,
that's an indication that the ones that's in the bag is ready to harvest.
So I take the bags, stems and all
and drop 'em in a five gallon bucket and collect all of them that way...
and when I take the bags off to get the seeds out, I save the bags and
go back and bag up my goldenseal seed berries.
Then, the way I do that is - take this one here for example -
I carry a pair of scissors, and snip that leaf
like that and put the bag down over the stem
see, I don't want that leaf in the bag
so I cut the leaf off slip the back down over
it and put the drawstring on...then later on you can go back and
check periodically to see if the berry is ripe, or
some some of them that aren't bagged, you can get an indication from them
when they turn red that it's time to harvest the seeds. Then once you harvest the seeds,
they are... or the berries, there's a lot of pulp around them
so you put the berries - the ripe berries, and make sure they're dead ripe -
in the bucket with some water and you take your hands and crush them all up...you
don't hurt the seeds, you just break
the berry from around the seed and let it ferment
for a few days in the bucket, and
once the pulp disintegrates and pour the water off
along with pulp... the seeds will be in the bottom of the bucket and
the pulp will be floating...and you pour it off
and you put fresh water in it and do it again
several times and you end up with a bucket with water and
clean seed in it. Then you can pour it all through a screen wire
and bag up the seeds and they're ready to plant.
You see my stake I've got there? I attach a wire...it hangs out...
and I take the bridal veil material and I
have seamstress in town sew me up a sock
about this big around or so...
and you can't pull that sock down over that
seed pod when it first starts to form because it hangs up...
so I slip the sock down over a piece of
PVC pipe, slip the pipe down over it, then
pull the pipe back out and take tie tans...tie it top and bottom
that keeps predatory insects
one of the gall midges
which will destroy your seeds.
That keeps him off of it. It's real light-weight and simple and
it's open...they can get air through it...it can rain
on it - won't hurt it. So, that's my solution to that.