How to Harvest Aster Seeds

Series Summary

One of the aspects of gardening that many avid gardeners enjoy is seed harvesting. Not only does harvesting seeds from your plants save you money when you are ready to plant them again next year, but it allows you to have a greater level of control over your crops from year to year. In these videos, our expert will teach you everything you need to begin harvesting the seeds from your garden.

Although all plants have seeds, not all seeds are good for harvesting. Open pollinating seeds are the best for harvesting, and in these videos you will learn all about what the terms “open pollinating seeds” mean, as well as where to get them. Once you have selected which seeds you want to harvest, you need to know how to harvest them. In these videos, you will learn how to harvest your seeds, and then store them until they are ready to be planted.

Video Transcript

"Today we’re going to harvest this aster seed. I planted a package daisies, and I got a whole row of daisies and one aster plant. The asters are in the same family as the daisy, but it should not have been in the daisy package. And now this plant has been growing for three years, and it’s made all these babies around it.

It is a perennial. So to harvest the seed, what I do is I cut off the stalk with the seeds on it after the seeds are fully dry. I put it in a clean container - this one has a few other seeds. So I’m going to make sure that it’s clean and there are no seeds in there. And I’ll put it in there to dry. And ever couple of days I’ll turn it and make sure it’s drying evenly- especially if the bowl was full. And then when the stems and leaves are totally dry, the seed will be totally dry, and I’ll take the seed out and store it."