How to collect tomato seeds correctly

Collecting tomato seeds is relevant for everyone who grows seedlings on their own. Of course, you can buy them in a specialized store, but there is no guarantee of germination and that the variety matches the label. In addition, elite planting material is not cheap. For people who cultivate vegetables for sale and farmers, the question of how to collect tomato seeds at home is of particular importance.

Even a novice gardener can cope with this task – it does not require any special knowledge, experience, or a lot of time. We will tell you how to properly collect seeds from tomatoes, and also invite you to watch a video on this topic.

Why collect tomato seeds yourself

In addition to the high cost of elite seed material, there are other reasons why it is better to get it yourself:

1. Shop seeds are most often simply collected and packaged in bags. At best, they are covered with a special shell, treated with a laser or ultrasound, and encrusted. Of course, this increases both the germination of tomato seeds and resistance to fungal diseases, but where is the guarantee that they were originally of good quality? In addition, this significantly increases the price of planting material, which, when growing tomatoes for sale, significantly increases their cost.
2. And who among us has not encountered the fact that the number of seeds declared on the bag did not correspond to reality?
3. It’s no secret that unscrupulous traders change the expiration date indicated on the label.
4. Not always seed material can be purchased at the store. Sometimes the necessary planting material is sent to us by friends and acquaintances from other regions or even countries. What to do next year?
5. On your own, you can collect as many seeds as you need and even more.
6. Tomatoes grown from your own seed material will be larger than store-bought ones, adapted to grow exactly in your conditions.
7. You can process the seeds collected for seedlings to increase germination and from diseases in any convenient way.
8. You will save money, which is not superfluous when planting a large plantation of vegetables.
9. And lastly, you will save your nerves. When buying seeds in a store, at first we guess whether it will germinate – it will not germinate, then what exactly will grow. And all the time, starting from sowing seeds for seedlings and until the end of the harvest: it will get sick – it will not get sick.

Tomatoes suitable for self-breeding

Before collecting seeds, you need to know which tomatoes you can and should take them from, and which ones it is useless to contact.

Varietal tomatoes

These are exactly the tomatoes from which you need to collect seeds. Just choose a variety and plant at least one bush. Of course, you will not collect seeds from one plant for a couple of hectares, but nothing, next year there will be more of them. The main thing is that the bushes do not hurt anything and are not affected by pests.

hybrid tomatoes

Is it possible to collect seeds from hybrids? Absolutely not! Hybrids are obtained by crossing two or more varieties, and this happens in greenhouses to avoid cross-pollination by other cultivars.

Of course, you can collect their seeds and sow them for seedlings. It will even sprout and bear fruit. But it is unlikely that you will be happy with such a harvest. Next year, the signs of hybridization will split, and tomatoes of different height, shape, color, and ripening time will grow. It is not a fact that you will like them or, in general, will have some kind of commercial or nutritional value.

So, tomatoes grown from seeds collected from hybrids do not inherit the properties of the original plants. Most likely, they will not even look like either the parent varieties or each other.

Fruits of unknown origin

An interesting question is whether it is worth collecting seeds from a tomato you like very much? We can meet such people anywhere – in the market, at a party. Our advice is to collect seeds from all the fruits you like! If there are not enough of them, leave until spring, sow and see what happens. If there is a lot – select 5-6 grains, stimulate with epin or other special agent and sow in a bowl. If the resulting plants will be the same, like twins – you are lucky, this is a variety, grow it for health. If it turns out to be inconsistent, throw it away without regret.

Collection and storage

Let’s look at how to properly collect tomato seeds. To do this, you need to select suitable fruits, extract their contents, dry and store until spring.

Selection of tomato fruits

In order to collect high-quality seeds, you do not need to choose the largest tomato and keep it on the bush until fully ripe. Follow the following rules:

1. To extract the seeds, take the tomatoes that appeared among the first. In the greenhouse – from the second or third brush, in the ground – from the first. Firstly, the lower ovaries bloom first when the bees are not yet active, therefore, the likelihood of cross-pollination is less. Secondly, the apical fruits are smaller than the lower ones. Thirdly, the longer a tomato grows, the more likely it is that late blight or other fungal infections will appear.
2. Even with varieties that are new to you, before collecting tomato seeds, ask how they should look. Take only fruits of typical shape, color and size.
3. To get your own planting material, it is best to pick brown tomatoes (then they are ripened), in extreme cases, in full color, but not fully ripe. Overripe fruits are not suitable for collecting seeds at all – their embryo is already ready for germination and, after drying, is unsuitable for further reproduction.
4. Always pick tomatoes from healthy, disease-free bushes. If you think it’s better to let the tomatoes get sick than “poison them with chemistry”, plant several plants separately and process only them. If you didn’t do it right away, plant it, the tomatoes tolerate the transplant perfectly.

Seed collection

Rinse brown tomatoes, dry, put on ripening at a temperature of about 25 degrees. Just be careful not to overripe, because after that they will only be suitable for making salad. There are many ways to collect tomato seeds. All of them are similar to each other, and differ only in small things.

fermentation

Cut into two parts well-ripened, but in no case overripe tomatoes of the same variety, carefully collect their seeds with a spoon along with the liquid in a jar, bowl or plastic cup.

Cover the vessel with gauze, put in a warm place, shaded from direct sunlight for fermentation (fermentation). Usually it lasts 2-3 days, but much depends on the ambient temperature and the chemical composition of the tomatoes. As soon as the juice clears, most of the seeds will sink to the bottom, and bubbles or a film will appear on the surface, proceed to the next step.

Drain the liquid from the vessel along with the tomato seeds floating on the surface – they still will not sprout. When there is little juice left, use a strainer. Rinse several times, last time under running water.

Dilute a teaspoon of salt in a glass of water, pour in the tomato seeds. The good ones will sink to the bottom, the bad ones will float.

Quick way

Anything happens. Even the most exemplary housewife, just at the moment when the tomato fruits selected for seed production ripen, may not have enough time for their fermentation. What to do? Remove the seeds from the tomato, spread them on the toilet paper spread on the table. Do not rinse or try to remove the pulp collected in a spoon.

The quality of tomato seeds will, of course, be worse than after fermentation and culling, but quite acceptable.

Drying and storage

Now it only remains to dry the seed material and send it to storage. Simply put the seeds obtained in a quick way in a place protected from the sun (for example, on a wardrobe or under a bed), cover with a layer of gauze and dry at room temperature.

Comment! Perhaps you have a special dryer, use it.

Put the tomato seeds obtained after fermentation on a clean cloth, napkin, toilet paper or plain white paper. You can dry them, stirring from time to time, or you can simply spread them on the paper in a thin layer.

Put the dried seeds in paper bags and be sure to write the name of the variety and the year of collection. Tomatoes retain good germination (economic) for 4-5 years.

Watch a video about collecting tomato seeds:

Conclusion

As you can see, there is nothing complicated in collecting seeds. Having acquired the desired variety of tomatoes once, it is not necessary to spend money on their purchase in the future. Just remember that this does not apply to hybrids. Have a good harvest!