Here is the collectingseeds forum.

Ok all you seed collectors, please share your secrets.

When I harvest my zinnia seed I dump all the seed and junk in a plastic container, I find that the static electricity makes the chaff stick and jump up to the sides of the dish leaving the seeds in the bottom!

Great tip, Candee, I'll have to try that.
I started seed collecting last fall, I go out and clip seed pods into paper lunch bags to let dry and sort and clean later. Last fall I broke my wrist and was in a cast just when I was on a collecting roll, I am still sorting seeds and have quit a few lunch bags to go through.
Hey, that's life.

I have collected these. Cerinthe Kiwi Blue

Melampodium is one of the easiest seeds to collect, so clean. I just have to remember to keep a pill bottle handy to collect the seeds when they ripen.

Candee excellent tip. I am going to try that. I have pill bottles. Ziplock, Glass jars. Envelopes, and 20 other ways to save them but not this.

Speaking of saving seeds. I have some Tomato seeds that are almost 30 years old and grew some last year and 3 out of 4 still germinated and grew. I kept them in the original seed pack in closed plastic container in a cool dark closet with a collection of other seed. I hope to see what some of the other old seed will do this year.

I have lots of oriental poppies that are almost finished blooming. I don't want to leave the pods on the plants to reseed, can I cut the pod off, put it in a brown lunch bag, leave it out in the sun to dry and let the seeds pop open inside the bag? Hope my question makes sense. I am going to have to divide these poppy plants this Fall. If I remember right, these plants go dormant? When would be the best time to divide them, before they go dormant or when they go dormant, cut them off at the basal crown and then dig them up to divide and replant them where I want them?

make sure you leave them on the plant long enough to mature... the tops should crack open.. I believe.. hopefully someone will weigh in with more experience with them

I seem to recall in previous years, somebody mentioned that she bought some type of organdy bag from Walmart and tied it around the bud and let the seeds pop open in that but I couldn't find that helpful tip. Maybe somebody else will remember reading it. I think the bags are also used for wedding favors.Seems like something was also mention about an old piece of ladies's hose could be used to catch the seeds in.

For the second part of your question, moving and splitting; I've had the best success waiting until they go dormant in summer, then lifting and moving. They'll put up more green growth again in the fall.

If you can rely on "no rain and little dew", you can spread newspaper, sheets, plastic film, or paper plates under the pods to catch SOME seeds. Or, wiat until you are JUST STARTING to lose seeds, spread the newspapedrs or sheets, and then slap and rub the pods toi shake as many seeds free as possible ... but not all will necessarily be fully mature.

Craft stores and Wal-Mart sell small "organza" bags in the Weddings isle - apparantloy the are popular for putting favors in.

I like the organa bags that are big enough for a bittle of wine! You can bag a whole flowering stalk that way.

I have a few links for online stores that sell them - I think the first one had the best deal, and small minimum orders, last time I looked, like 30 bags for $3-4:
http://www.yourorganzabag.com/...

Here's a few otgher "organza" links, but I can't say what their shipping charges are:

http://www.giftsintl.com/organ...

http://www.fetpak.com/whstore/...

http://cgi.ebay.com/30-3x4-MOS......
or you can just search "organza bags" on ebay.
http://shop.ebay.com/i.html?_n... White Organza Wedding F...



P.S. If you are a hand-pollinating hybridizer, you probably already know you can use organza bags to protect individual blooms from random insects.