Seeds and seedlings

[igenlode]

I finally got round to winnowing the flax that I harvested last autumn, via the age-old method of crushing the seed-heads and allowing the chaff to blow away on a windy day while pouring the crop again and again from one hand to the other -- even when combined with the packet of 2024 flax seed that I hadn't planted after I failed to find it last year (but which turned up later) there was only about a tablespoon at most. About the same as before; plenty to sow and barely enough to eat. I have saved twenty or so seeds and put the rest into the 'seed mix' bag I use for salads, which already contains "golden linseed" according to the label!

Potted up the sweet peas from the jars, since some of them were shooting vigorously. I have four of the six 'saved' peas germinated and two of the 'shop' peas, a ratio presumably corresponding to the respective ages of the seed; most of the rest had simply gone mouldy, although a couple were plump but not shooting yet, and I buried those in the same pots, along yet again with the usual ration of amazingly-still-alive worms from the lovely dry friable compost :-)
I should probably be starting some more of the dwarf peas for eating.

I also pricked out the rocket seedlings, which have been showing a tendency to collapse sideways in their shallow bowl, and threw away the old stumps -- although in the process I discovered what looks very much like a self-seeded rocket seedling just coming up in one of the pots, so I have let that be alongside its more vigorous transplanted counterpart! (Although I see that it is actually almost a month since I planted them on February 14th, so with their first true leaves only just beginning they really haven't put on that much growth...)

The lettuce/mixed salad seed has definitely germinated, though not especially thickly, presumably because it was old seed. Sowed dill and coriander, the former very thickly as the packet was dated 'use by December 2022"! (But I added some of my saved dill seed, so should get something coming up.)

And after multiple obviously-not-tomato things came up in the tomato pots (including at least one of the usual 'how on earth did a seed that large sneak in without my noticing' calendula seedlings, by the looks of it), we appear to have germination of four or so Roma tomato seedlings and maybe the first couple of towel-tomatoes, after only just over a week :-)

Comments

[watervole]

My brain instantly turns to flax as fibre...

But retting it would be a very smelly process, and you wouldn't get a useful amount from what you're growing in any case.

[igenlode]

Apparently it's the wrong sort of flax for that -- fibres much too short. You grow one kind for stems and one kind for seed... or so I was told by a friend who was helping out on a make-your-own-linen project!

But in order to get a useful amount for eating (or linseed oil) you'd still need to be growing this variety as a crop in far larger quantities than I have either the space or the desire to do; it's pretty, but I don't want a whole field of it :-)

[watervole]

I used linseed to prevent constipation. I soak it and then add it to my breakfast cereal. Works very well.