Open-pollinated varieties.

Preference for open-pollinated varieties of vegetables is increasing, with many gardeners choosing to grow corn and tomato varieties that have not been subject to the rigorous inbreeding program that is part of the hybridizing process. Open-pollinated corn, for example, has been shown frequently to contain higher amounts of protein than hybrid corn. In addition, its genetic heritage is more diverse, so that it is less likely to be totally wiped out by disease that would be more serious in strictly controlled, uniform seed crops. Hybrids bear well and many of us will continue to plant them, but there is new respect now for the genetic diversity of open-pollinated seeds. Hybrid plants tend to be highly uniform in both physical characteristics and bearing times. Many gardeners prefer the longer. More gradually maturing period found in open-pollinated plants. Experimentation. Saving seeds allows for experimentation, with selection and even with deliberate crossing of certain varieties, that constitutes a challenge for the experienced gardener. Planting and evaluating the results of each years careful choice of seeds can be an ongoing adventure. There is even the possibility - remote, but nonetheless real - of discovering a worthwhile new strain. Although most new vegetable introductions within the last 28 years have been produced by purposeful crossing, simple discovery accounts for the appearance of many garden favorites. The Henderson bush lima, for example, was spotted along the roadside in the 1870s by an elderly man who was taking a walk. Golden Bantam corn, still a favorite, was selected and developed by Two Massachusetts gardeners. (Two quarts of the seeds were sold to the Burpee seed company sometime in the 1890s for $25.00). Mutation, the sudden altering of plant character caused by a change in the molecular structure of its genes, usually produces undesirable changes in the plant. Beneficial mutations affect about one plant in a million within each generation. The fact that mutations are not reversible makes it possible to breed new generations of like plants from the one that has suddenly changed. Burpees Fluffy Ruffles sweet pea, introduced in 1928, was a mutation. The gardener who discovers something new is the one who spends time with plants, observing and recording, with a sensitivity attuned to subtle shades of difference. Granted, the odds against a dramatic plant discovery are high, but the search is a lot of fun. Self-Reliance. A supply of well-chosen, correctly stored garden seeds will feed you next year, no matter what happens to prices of food, fuel, or postage. Saving seeds will also yield satisfaction on which a price tag cant be put - pride in being able to provide for yourself, and possibly for a few other people as well, and satisfaction in refining and upgrading the crops you grow.

28 How Seeds Are Formed

Your seed-saving efforts will be more successful if you have some idea of how the seeds are formed.

Reproduction in Plants
The process is a cycle, and so we cant say, really, whether it begins with the flower or with the original seed that produced the plant. Since we must start somewhere, lets break into the cycle at the point of flowering. The flower. A flowers reason for being is to produce seeds. All kind of flowers can be found in nature - the large, show yellow trumpets of the squash family, the small, white stars of peppers and tomatoes; the bright yellow florets of broccoli; the inconspicuous petalless blossoms of spinach. The variations in color and form have evolves as ways of encouraging pollination. Insect-pollinated flowers need to attract attention, whether by producing nectar, smelling sweet, or displaying an inviting color. Wind-pollinated flowers, since there is no need for them to invite insect visitors, are often drab, tiny,or otherwise obscure. Structure. The pollen-bearing, fertilizing part of the plant is the stamen. It is composed of a long, thin stalk called the filament and the pollen-containing sacs on the ends of the filaments, called anthers. The receptive, seed-nurturing parts of the flower are called the carpels. These include the pollen-receiving region, or stigma; the style, a long, thin tube that leads from the stigma to the ovary; and the ovary, an enclosure containing an ovule (egg) or ovules. In flowers containing a cluster of more than one carpel, the whole assembly is called a pistil (after the Latin for pestle). The term pistil is also used for a single carpel. The calyx, the cuplike outgrowth of the stem, which may be composed of individual parts called sepals, and the corolla, and petal cluster, are supportive parts without any productive function. A flower can be fertilized in the absence of the corolla; in fact, many people remove the corolla; in fact, many people remove the corolla when practicing hand-pollination. Incomplete flowers. Most vegetable plants have complete flowers, containing both stamens and pistils as described earlier, but some plants have incomplete flowers, containing either stamens or pistils but not both. A whole group of vegetables, the cucurbits, which include melons, cucumbers, pumpkins, and squashes, bear two kinds of incomplete flowers on each plant. The staminate, or male, flower appears first, followed in a few days by the pistillate, or female, flower. Spinach plants can occur in a bewildering number of gender variations. Some produce both male and female flowers, others only female; still others are either pollen producers or seednurturers. Male and female flowers of asparagus are produced on separate plants. Female asparagus plants tend to produce thicker but fewer stalks. Male are thin but more numerous. Berries are, of course, borne only by the female plants. Thats why not very front in your asparagus patch will go to seed. Fertilization. If the flower is to form seeds, the ripe ovule must be fertilized by a grain of pollen. The speck of pollen, whether it lands on the stigma by the agency of wind, insects, or gravity, has the same fabulous journey to make. It begins by growing an extension of itself, a long, tenuous thread of tissue, which is somehow stimulated by the arrival of the pollen in the right

place at the right time. This living thread extends, cell by cell, growing down through the style until it reaches the ovary, there it enters an ovule, penetrating the embryo sac. The two cell, a zygote, which is able to divide repeatedly and multiply into the complex organism that will be the seed embryo. The ovary grows and toughens into the protective seed coat. Endosperm. The origin of the endosperm, the supply of stored nourishment for the encapsulated plant, is a bit more roundabout. We have a pretty good idea of what happens, but we dont know why. Mysteries still abound in the plant world. Backtrack for a moment to that grain of pollen. Sometime between the time it is shed from the anther and received by the stigma, the original single grain splits into two cells. One of these cells, as we have just seen, fertilizes the ovule. The other cell unites with two polar nuclei in the ovules embryo sac and gradually grow into the endosperm. (Some seeds, those of the bean, pea, pumpkin, and watermelon, for example, have no endosperm). When the developing seed has reached its characteristic size and complexity, it stops growing and begins the drying, ripening process that precedes dormancy. The ripened seedcontaining ovary is called a fruit. A bean pod, for example, is a fruit. The seeds it contains are ripened fertilized ovules.

Pollination
In order to fertilize the ovule, pollen must be of the correct kind, and it must arrive at the right time, when the plant has achieved enough vegetative growth to enable it to begin to reproduce. Pollen from unrelated species will not take. Pea pollen landing on a tomato blossom, for example, wont get anywhere. Even within a species, some plants are not receptive to their own pollen. Many vegetables of the cabbage family cross-pollinated readily but are incompatible with themselves, so you need at least two and preferably four or more flowering plants to produce good seeds. In such cases, a flower will sometimes discharge pollen before its stigma is ready to receive it. Other flowers are sterile to their own pollen. Self-pollination. Self-pollinating flowers, those in which the flower accepts its own pollen, with or without insect intervention, can be depended on to produce seeds that will grow into plants like the parent since their inheritance is the same. Self-pollinating crops include the following vegetables and commonly grown grains. (Technically speaking, 0.1 to 5 percent of these self-pollinated crops can cross-pollinate). Barley beans, lima beans, snap cowpeas endive (escarole) lettuce oats peas soybeans tomatoes wheat

These seeds, then, are the best to choose for your first seed-saving endeavors, since you can be confident that the plants grown from them will come true. Most other favorite garden vegetables will cross- pollinate with other varieties of the same group to a greater or lesser extent, depending on variety, weather, insect activity, and other conditions.

Cross-Pollination

Cross-pollination - the acceptance by a flower of pollen from a plant of the same species that has a different genetic makeup - often results in seeds containing genes that differ from those of the parent plant. Plants grown from those seeds, then, may have different characteristics from the parent plant. Wind pollination. The pollen of wind-pollinated plant is fine, virtually dustlike, and the number of grains produced is lavish, since the wing can sometimes be more unpredictable than insect activity when distances are great. The following plants are wind-pollinated: beets corn rye spinach Swiss chard

The pollen produced by these plants is so fine and so light that any plantings spaced more closely than one mile apart have a chance of crossing, with the exception of corn, which has relatively heavy pollen and crosses rarely (if at all) at distances greater 1,000 feet.

Wind Pollination and Plant Design Wind pollination is a very uncertain occurrence; botanists estimate than I grain out of 1,000 might reach a receptive ovule. Recent studies have shown, though, that wind pollination is not as wildly random as it might seem. When scientists tested pine cones, millet flowers, and ovulebearing parts of 18 other plant species, they found that most of them created air turbulence when struck by wind. This pattern of turbulence increases the chance of contact between airborne pollen grains and the ovules in the cone or flower. Even the bean needles surrounding the cone exert a snow fence effect, slowing the wind speed and thus encouraging more pollen to land on the cone. According to a recent report in Scientific American, researchers concluded that many plants are aerodynamically designed to capture pollen from the air. Even more amazing is the fact that the pollen itself is, at least in the examples considered, so shaped that it responds well to the air turbulence created by the shape of the inflorescence of its particular species. Further proof of this theory is offered by studies of fossil ovules, which show that ovules developed increasingly aerodynamically efficient shapes as they evolved over the millenia. One wonders how many other purposeful designs exist in the natural world that so far have escaped our notice.

Insect pollination. The large insect-pollinated group include the following vegetables (those marked with an asterisk are biennials): asparagus broccoli brussels sprouts cabbage cabbage, chinese carrots celeriac collards cucumbers eggplant gherkins kale kohlrabi melons parsley parsnips peppers pumpkins radishes rutabagas squash

celery

onions

turnips

Although flowers of these vegetables may cross-pollinate within one mile, a quarter-mile separation is generally sufficient to prevent cross-pollination for home garden purposes. Crosspollination is especially likely if several stands of different varieties of the same vegetable are located on the direct flight line of a bee colony. Bees generally collect pollen from one species at a time. Keeping Strains Pure. To keep strains of cross-pollinating vegetables pure, you will need to isolate flowering seed crops from any other flowering plants of the same species. You can do this by planting different times. For example, if you want to save seeds from varieties of carrots, plant one early and another late so that they will flower at different times, or isolate by distance as described earlier. (Remember , though, that carrots, radishes, sunflowers, and some other vegetable and flower plants will cross readily with nearby wild relatives). If you cant control planting time or distance due to short growing season or lack of space, you can cage seed-bearing plants. When using wire or cheesecloth cages to keep out crosspollinating insects, or muslin to shut out fine wind-blown pollen, its important to put the cage over the plants well before the blossoms are ready to open, and not remove it until you see that the plant has produced seeds. For caged insect-pollinated plants, you might need to put some flies in the cage to ensure pollination. Crossing, however, can occur only within a species. When you know this, you can dismiss the old garden myth that you shouldnt grow cucumbers next to cantaloupes. Its amazing how many people still take this seriously. Youll even hear tales about the cucamelons or water cucumbers that someone grew, but theyre just that - tales. If youre not saving seeds, you can grow any of the cucurbits next to each other. Any close-relative crossing that did occur would show up only in the next generation planted from seeds of this years plants. I hope this is good news to the man who remarked to us last year that his wife didnt want him to plant zucchini because he had already planted watermelon, and she didnt want to waste garden on weird crosses.

Seed-Saver Caveats
Generally speaking, squash, pumpkins, watermelon, cantaloupes, and cucumbers will crosspollinate within their own species. A pumpkin blossom wont accept watermelon, cantaloupe, or cucumber pollen; a cantaloupe cant be pollinated by a cucumber, squash, pumpkin, or watermelon; and the cucumber wont mix with a zucchini, pumpkin, or watermelon. However, some kinds of pumpkin and squash do cross, with odd and sometimes picturesque results. The vegetables produced by such crosses are edible, but they may not always be as tender or delicious as the originals. Heres a quick look at the cucurbit family tree you an idea of what to expect in your garden. The cucurbit genus is divided into various species. The species Cucurbita pepo, for example, includes pumpkins, all summer squashes (zucchini, scallop, crookneck, and so forth), acorn squash, spaghetti squash, and small gourds. All of these widely varied vegetables can cross, so you can see that theres plenty of potential for mischief within this group alone. The species Cucurbita maxima includes the long-keeping winter squashes like Hubbard, Buttercup, Turban, Banana, and Delicious. These will cross with the species C.moschata