This has become somewhat of a tradition in our home. Last year, we purchased a 25 cent package of marigold seeds from the dollar store and planted those in a pot on the deck. They took off and bloomed from May all the way through November. That's a lot of blooms for 25 cents!
The boys helped me to collect seeds from those marigolds and we dried them and gave them away as Christmas gifts from the boys to their grandparents, aunts, and uncles last year. And we kept a package for ourselves.
Well, the marigold seeds that we saved and planted this year have bloomed even more than the ones last year! And they're still blooming midway through November. So we wanted to make sure to keep some seeds from those plants too! And once you know how easy it is to save seeds from marigolds, you'll want to do it every year.
Saving marigold seeds is easy. Here's how you do it:
Collect Dried Marigold Blooms (Seed Pods)
As you walk through your garden to deadhead your spent marigold blooms, wait for them to begin to dry out if you want to save them to collect the seeds. The best time to collect dried marigold blooms to harvest the seeds when the petals are dried out, and the base (the seed pod) is turning brown.
If you find some seed pods still on the plant that have turned completely brown, you can collect those too, and see if the seeds inside are still viable (not rotted or molded).
Dry Marigold Blooms Inside
To make sure the blooms are completely dry before removing seeds, leave them on a paper towel for a few days before opening the seed pods. This step isn't completely necessary, but I always do it just to make sure I'm not working with partially dried blooms. You want the seed pod part of the blooms to be mostly brown. A little green is OK, but if there's too much green, you might want to do this step just to make sure they've dried out enough to proceed to the next steps.
Open Marigold Seed Pods & Remove Marigold Seeds
Hold the base of the seed pod over top of the paper towel and pull off and discard the dried marigold petals. You will see the marigold seeds inside attached to the base. Marigold seeds are slender, pointy, and two colors.
Pull the base apart and discard it. Separate the marigold seeds and spread them on the paper towel to dry.
Dry & Store Marigold Seeds
Allow your seeds to air dry on the paper towel for about a week.
Place your seeds in a plain paper envelope to store over the winter. Store the envelope in a cool, dry place.
Plant Marigold Seeds
Plant the marigold seeds that you saved this year directly outdoors the next growing season. Marigolds are easy to grow and make a perfect project to let the kiddos help you with in the garden.
Once you plant them, marigolds grow quickly without a lot of extra effort on your part. Most will do really well in full sun. Marigolds can, however, stand up to 20% shade if they have bright light the rest of the day.
You can plant marigolds in poor to average soil as long as it's not soggy. In fact, marigolds bloom better in poor soil (which is how I got better blooms the second year, it turns out - the second year they were planted in good, old-fashioned North Carolina red clay). Better soil will cause marigolds to grow lush foliage at the expense of flowers.
And as an added bonus, marigolds are deer resistant - can't beat that!
If you're past the season of saving marigold seeds this year in your region, I hope you'll save this idea for next year.
And if you're looking for other DIY gardening ideas, don't forget to check out our list of free or cheap things for your garden, how to dry your own herbs, and how to start seeds with k-cups.
Happy (fall) gardening!
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