Anyone have any good tips for drying out tomatoe seeds for later use?

Question

i guess using a strainer to rremove the excess pulp and juice from the seed would be a good start .. however i dodnt have a strainer at the time..any other ideas? preferably from someone with a little gardning experience

Answer 1

Just smear the seeds on some paper towel and put on top of your kitchen cupboard to dry out and leave them there till you need them.  My dad swears by this and he is the best tomato grower I know.  That's where mine are corn and cucumber are there with them.

Answer 2

The easiest thing to do is spread the pulp on any kind of paper you have available – newspaper, brown paper bag paper, paper towel, even a piece of cloth (not terrycloth which will make it difficult to remove the seeds) and place them the seeds somewhere that is warm and dry - on top of the refrigerator, on top of a cabinet or hutch (not a radiator or heating element), even the kitchen counter would be OK for a few days. Let the pulp dry and remove the seeds. Let the separated seeds dry a bit longer after you have removed them from the pulp, the same way – on a piece of paper for another day or two. Place them in a paper envelope or paper bag and make sure they stay dry until you are ready to plant them.

If you store then in a jar with a lid, make sure they are thoroughly dry and add a paper towel or other piece of paper into the jar before you put the lid on – to absorb any residual moisture.

They will be ready to plant when you need them.

The important thing is to make sure they are thoroughly dry before you store them for future use and they are kept dry. Otherwise they will either sprout or mold and not be viable next spring.

Answer 3

Basically treat like pumpkin seeds.  Remove as much pulp as possible, pat dry with paper towels, then lay between two fresh paper towels and store when dry.  Happy seeding.

Answer 4

Put the seeds on a window screen and hose the pulp. Let them drip-dry a little (hour or two), then put them on newspaper. Put em in the sun, or just let em lay out in the house a few days. The newspaper will speed up the drying. When dry, just label and seal them in a regular mailing envelope. No trouble. Don`t worry about how you dry them Tomato seeds are EXTREMELY hardy. They are even know to survive the heat and decomposition of a compost bin.

Answer 5

Slice the tomatoes thinly and remove as much of the fruit as you can. Place the slices on a paper towel or a brown paper bag that has been flattened and place them in the sun. Make sure you keep them dry.

As the slices dry, remove more and more of the seeds. Leave them in the sun until they are completely dry.

When you store the seeds, do not use plastic, as they may mold. Instead, either keep the seeds in a glass jar or, even better, keep them in waxed paper loosely wrapped and then place the seed packet in a small paper bag.

You can then just plant them next year.

Good luck.

By the way, I am a certified Master Gardener.

Answer 6

Tomato seeds need to be fermented for a few days before cleaning and drying. the fermentation process will kill off a lot of viruses and bacteria that can cause seed born diseases later. Plus fermenting breaks down the pulp so it can easily be washed from the seed. This is how all the professional breeders and seed houses process tomato seeds. And it is amazingly easy.

Cut a tomato across the equator and squeeze out the seeds into a container that you have written the seed variety on. Add a bit of water to cover the seeds and goop and than set the container aside out of direct sunlight where none (including cats) will knock it off onto the floor. Check the seeds daily and when a stinky scum of mold has formed put the seeds and good into a small strainer (which you can buy at any dollar store for under $3) and rinse well so that all the fermented goop is gone. Than plop the wet seeds onto a cloth or coffee filter (I find paper towels stick to the seeds badly so i don't like using them) that you have written the seed type on (incredibly important if saving more than one variety of seed-you will not remeber which is which after a few days) and let dry out of direct sunlight for a couple of days than pack into well marked envelopes (state year saved and type of seed along with any other information you need to remember).

This sounds a lot more complicated than it is and it is the correct way to clean and save tomato seed. I have several containers fermenting in my kitchen as I write this, along with several varieties drying on coffee filters