I didn't test my leftover purchased seed from last year. I just planted more than I needed in each soil block. So far, I have nearly 100% germination. To God be the glory.
A quick and easy thing I do when starting seeds, I use my oven. Place them between damp paper towels in a zip lock bag and place them in an oven with the light on. Creates constant temp, light and humidity. Don’t turn the oven itself on, just the light. Just remember they’re in then when ‘you’ preheat the oven.
Shoot! I just layered my seeds on the paper towel in the plastic bag, do you really think it is necessary to cover with the paper towel? Did you close the zip lock bag all of the way?
Just a testimony about MI Gardener seeds... Last year I had almost a 100% germination rate and all the seedlings were strong and healthy. I did so well I was able to give seedlings away to family & friends when I ran out of garden space. Thank you Luke for the excellent quality of seeds and supplies you offer us gardeners. I will continue to purchase MI Gardener seeds for years to come. :)
Learned this as a kid in school and have done it ever since. Probably one of the only useful and most useful things I learned in school. We used to fold the seeds in a moist paper towel and then put them in a plastic baggy and give it a few days- couple weeks.
My friend's son was a gardener and when he passed away my friend gave me all his seeds. He kept them in the freezer. I did a test on them and everyone of them grew. The surprise in all this was because of his health ,he did not garden again and so the seeds were forgotten. The date on the seeds---- 2009
I bought seeds from the Seed Guy 10 years ago, and have stored them in the freezer, in a vacuum sealed mylar bag since. I grew some Ace 55 and other seeds this past year, and the germination and growth was excellent!
I posted a video about this a couple weeks ago- didn't even think about including how to store the seeds!?!? However I didn't know about the correct way to store them, & I was storing them in a garage that got really hot, then really cold, over & over for almost 10 years, & they still are germinating. So don't just throw out old seeds & assume they're bad!
Very helpful, thank you. I'm starting my whole garden from seed for the first time this year, and was just debating whether or not it was worth trying some outdated tomatoes. Now I'll be able to know for sure!
I don't like to spend money and you helped me start gardening from seed, 2 years ago, with very little down😁 I LOVE your seeds!!! Now when I want to try something new or wasn't able to save my own, I go to your website!!! Thanks for inexpensive seeds that grow🌱🌱🌱
Awesome information. Can’t wait to begin this process today. I saw 37 thumbs down 👎 on this video. I can’t imagine anyone viewing this information thinking it wasn’t good. Geez people. Lighten up. 😃
I had a random tomato plant come up in a walkway area 8 years ago. It made the best fruit, so I saved some seeds. I replanted them and didn't think they'd sprout BUT they did! They were kept in a paper envelope inside a ziplock in the fridge. The key seems to be keeping them cool and dry for long periods of time.
I just did a germination test for the bell pepper and jalapeño, and black beauty eggplant seed I saved last year and its was great!!! I was so nervous that I didn’t do it right but almost everything germinated!
I'd always kept my seeds in jars in the fridge. Some years ago I found some seeds that were about 7 years old. I planted them all not anticipating anything to come up but about 60-70% did! 🙂
Hi, I did this last year, I had 2 packs of beetroot seeds, one from 2016 and the other was 2018. I sowed 6 cells of compost for each and labelled them with the year. As i suspected the 2016 seeds didnt germinate and the 2018 were still viable, so I used them all up over the summer. A great tip and money and time saving too!
I just tried saving seed from an heirloom cucumber last year. Thus sounds like a great way to see if I did it right before I actually plant them. Thanks!
Well, 5 days after watching this video, I am here to report that I am testing several different seeds. One packet is Snow Crown cauliflower dated 2005, and all 5 test seeds have popped out a li't root. Amazing. I store all my seeds ingallon Ziploc bags and within those bags, I subdivide veggie types and keep everything zipped up. All that goes into my spare fridge, where they stay all year.
Thank you so much for putting this seed viability video out.I took you up on this, a week ago and decided to test all my seeds, so I knew what was good and what percentages so I knew what would grow and what was no good. I did my first testing like I said a week ago and got really good results with that, I did have about 4 packages of seed that were no good, so I threw those away and have done a second set of seed viability so here in a couple of weeks when I indoor sow, I know what I can grow with some probability that it will grow. Thanks so much for putting this video out! I wished I had known about this last when some of my indoor seed sowing did not grow!
Fantastic. You could also put the names of the shops the seeds were purchased from, if you use more than one company or place to purchase. I discovered all my seed packets from one shop did not germinate while testing and never bought from them again as I realised they weren't looking after the seeds at all. The seeds were well in date and the brand from other shops germinated just fine.
I have nearly 100% germination rate from your seeds Luke. I have trays upon trays in different stages and some direct sow going. Like hundreds of little seedlings going already. Your seeds are awesome. I waited to order my peppers a few weeks since I had such a large order the first time and just got them in today. I cant wait for those little sprouts to pop up!
Hi! Luke, Thank you for sharing about seeds viability. It does make sense to start checking some stored seeds before planting time it save time and expenses. I procrastinate sometimes it’s a good reminder Luke thank you. Can’t wait to receive those seeds i ordered it has been processed.👍👍👍
Perfect timing for me. I have been gathering, sorting and filing seeds that I have found squirreled away around my house in plastic pill bottles, small pimento jars, paper bags, and assorted envelopes. I was wondering if some of the old ones were worth planting. Having no school age children at home I DO have Ziploc bags. I will be doing germination testing tomorrow. Thanks so much for the info.
master gardener here had a great season last year with all your seeds 90-99 percent germination except on cali wonder peppers 70 % great video I do that with seeds I saved from pervious years not really a need to test seed you ordered especially from MIgardener
Was that your only pepper seed? I find peppers love presoak and heat heat heat you can get some pretty bad germ without that. The problem is wet soil is generally cold soil ! So if you don't have the humidity to maintain warm moist soil its tough.
I know for sure that we get 2-3 seasons if we dont use them all up. I will ask Grandpa what the longest is. He told us that the cold especially helps when saving your own seed because it is like a fake winter!
One of the companies I ordered from had 17 seeds in the package. I just plant them and make sure there is a bit more than I need and if all grow I just share them with my neighbor.
you should write a book and compile tips for growing. I would love that! I personally have a hard time remembering all the info in your videos and it would be helpful to have a reference for sure.
I save a lot of seeds from my harvest. I place the seeds in a mason jar with the two piece lid in the refrigerator. Any airtight container works. This is my storage solution for the long term.
The seeds i bought from you i did this exact text with almost every variety had 100% germination . Then I just use the test sprouts and plant them to see how long it takes to get transplant size . Then I'll know when to start
Awesome advice Luke! I have a MUCH smaller garden than you, but I did pick up my seeds last weekend at a trusted garden center. I did check each pack to ensure that all are from this year so I should be good there. I might do some test germination this weekend as well. I’m in SW Ohio, we won’t be getting in our garden til prob mid to late April. But I will definitely put my seeds in a ziplock bag, I had them just in a cabinet, Thanks for the tip!
Thanks for the video (and the many other great videos you've made). I don't want to be a fault finder but in the end you mentioned planting 2 seeds each with 50% viability in order to get a near 100% chance of one germinating. Probably a slip of the tongue on your part. For any who are not familiar with how probabilities work, if you plant 2 seeds, each with a 50% chance, your odds of at least one sprouting are 75% (25% chance of 2 sprouting, 50% chance of one sprouting, 25% chance of neither sprouting).
I don't complicate things that much. If I plant 2 seeds that have .50% It just gives me more chances. Heck, I might plant 3 seeds and get even closer but after 3 seeds if none of them germinate then the seed sucks and I will just buy new seed.
It’s not complicating things to know that if a seed has a 1/N chance of not germinating, then 2 seeds will give a 1/(N*N) chance of none germinating. And 3 seeds will give a 1/(N*N*N) chance of none germinating. If it is a 1/2 chance of not germinating, 2 seeds have a 1/4 or 25% chance of none germinating. 3 seeds: 1/8 or 12.5%. If it is a 1/10 chance of not germinating, 2 seeds have a 1/100 or 1% chance of none germinating. 3 seeds: 1/1000 or 0.1%. Statistics like that provide a picture that with some more expensive or rare tomato seeds (I’ve heard of $.80/seed!!), if the germination rate is 9/10, don’t bother double seeding a cell out of concern that a cell may have none germinate; that would happen like 1 time in a 100 (while ~81/100 would have two seedlings, which either need to be thinned or split apart).
@@MIgardener Thanks again for the work you do! I just came back to the comments section to find that others had since pointed out the same point, sometimes with a harsh tone. I hope my comment was not taken in that way and I apologize if it was. I really have learned a lot from your videos and wouldn't want to contribute to the negativity that can sometimes come from people being overly eager to criticize.
@@nathanbarnes4721 It is a balancing act: Not wanting to criticize, but also not wanting to let basic statistical problems get solved blatantly (sorry, but yes) to yield substantially incorrect results, leading to people not knowing how to interpret data and recognize what is correct and what is not. Factually. Not a judgement. Aside from statistics, being able to recognize obviously incorrect misinformation is a huge problem, in the USA, at least. I added the following to another thread on this: In the last minute of the video when Luke says "50% germination plus 50% germination, you have nearly 100% chance of something growing in this cell", adding a text annotation into the video that pops up and says 'ok, not exactly "plus"' and another that says 'and 75%, not 100%' would have polished up an excellent video to be even better. Without that, there will be a portion of future engineering/math/scientific viewers whose alarms will go off, like hearing fingernails scratching a chalkboard!, cringing at probabilities being combined incorrectly and inaccurate conclusions being drawn (even though Luke hits the essential point by planting 2 or 3 seeds in a cell).
I am currently starting super hot peppers. I was surprised when the Trinidad scorpion took over 3 weeks to germinate when all the rest of them were growing already.
kelp extract & vitiman B extract ... plus depending on the species of plant microrizal spores coated on seed will raise chances drastically also container with air root controll
Thanks, Luke! Always good info! I should do this as I have tons of old seed packets that I didn't even get to open from last year. Can I ask if you recommend to refrigerate seed packets? Thanks again!
@@taxigirl5637 oh I ordered from migardener as I wanted to support local business in my state not sure but heard lots of seeds are flying off the shelves as soon as they put them up. Keep trying check farm stores dollar stores as well as they are starting to put them out now hope you get everything you need and are looking for
@@j.h.9191 totally!! Luckily, while baker creek was closed they were reupping their inventory and got restocked with a lot of things!! But still, I’m watching their inventory numbers and things are selling like crazy. Luckily I have everything I *need* but there is no such thing as enough seeds
Please don't take this as a nerdy comment, just a helpful correction. If the germination rate is 50% and you put two seeds, the overall germination rate will be become 75% (not almost 100%). This is because the probability of non-germination for both is (1/2) * (1/2) = 1/4. So with 3/4 probability at least one will germinate. You can use a similar calculation to compute the germination rate of any multi-sown seed, if you know the germination rate of your individual seeds.
I would assume most people are doing something wrong not that they have bad seed. I've used old seeds and always have to cull more plants than I plant. The only seeds I've had problems with are pepper seeds.
I store all my seeds in the freezer. I've never had a problem with germination. Question though and I may have missed it; but what are we looking for specifically when a seed has germinated? I have soaked my seeds before and saw a little "tail" sticking out of one end. Is that what we need to be looking for?
Stephanie McCown, you mentioned you put your seeds in freezer, do you keep them in for short period, like a month, or permanently leave them there .. I just got seeds from Floret (misc. Flower varieties) I'm assuming I need to put them in freezer also??
Thank you for that information, wow will it save us from disappointment ....like last year. Then late starting round 2 of seeds, which equaled =not much harvest before Michigan's early frost.
I ordered my seeds but they're not here yet for me to plant. Where are they? JK, I ordered them a few days ago and I'll be happy if I get them in the next two weeks because there is so much in the mail right now. Thank you for being a seed provider.
You might want to actually go to his website for the store and email customer service ,but I can tell. His shop is just as busy as the rest of seed shops some are closed so they can catch up and shortages due to the pandemic we are all living in . They will email you when they ship and then it's up to the postal service to get them delivered and not in his control
@@rondacorkhill1654 you are not the first person to post something like this ,it's on his social media sites and to see this on a video ! Ya don't find it humorous ! Glad you find it to be funny that people are out straight and posting something like that but your just a special person cause you been buying from him ,were I come from that's called short bus special .
@@willow8094 As I said, jk. I've been buying from him since he started selling. I will always choose MIgardener before any other company. I've read posts where people are complaining when their seeds are a week later than what was posted. The USPS has never been reliable. MIgardener has waitlists for everything to accommodate everyone. If it's something I can't wait for, I will look else where. Additionally, after spending three years in Afghanistan, I learned that having a relaxing time growing seeds is helpful. I'm not going to pander to anyone regarding my sense of humor. If the "JK" doesn't make you understand I'm letting him know I feel for their challenges, you have missed the message. As for the short bus, that's a quite provocative statement. Are you saying you have a problem for those who have challenges? Wrong message, wrong time.
@@rondacorkhill1654 many people have seen this kind of disrespect and no one who watches him and supportive to his business is ok with it and glad you made the final comment about the postal service I will surely let my farther the post master know .
all good stuff. buy from reputable seed companies with germination rate stated. stop buying heirloom tomatoes from ebay lol, you know you have too many packets of those laying around. my seed packets are in the shed, which is an oven in summer etc., but i have a tiny cooler they sit in. by far the biggest difference in germination is the media itself. i have nothing to do with the company but mikskaar commercial seed starting mix have very high germination rate. top of the line home market seed starting mix, below 50% germination rate. did a side by side comparison, keeping media moist every day. one year old seed, pop in extra seed into each plug and thin afterwards. seed any older goes in bin. time, space and work is more valuable than a few bucks for a fresh seed pack. one of these days you will wean yourself from those large (individual plug) trays to commercial grade tiny plug sturdy trays, that grow seedlings better and less space. you just need to fertilize. apart from peppers, starts need to go into ground sooner rather than later, with a good root system. maybe you can do a side by side comparison of the tray pictured and a commercial grade tray.
A little insight that SELECTING ONLY 5 SEEDS IS EFFECTIVE: If a set of 10, 100, or 1000 seeds has a 90% germination rate, but you do not know that, selecting 5 at random will produce: 59% of the time, 5 will be selected that germinate 33% of the time, 4 will be selected that germinate 7% of the time, 3 will be selected that germinate 0.8% of the time, 2 will be selected that germinate 0.045% of the time, 1 will be selected that germinate 0.001% of the time, none of the 5 will germinate This is a binomial distribution. wikipedia if you want. A basic point to make is that there can obviously never be 90% of the 5 that germinate; that would be 4.5. Say it was a set of 100 seeds to start. 59% of the time, it would look like all 100 must be good seeds. 33% of the time 80 of the 100. 7% of the time, 60 of the 100. On down, til 0.001% of the time, or around once in every 100,000 such experiments, none will germinate. You could have had a set of 100 seeds or even just 10. The percentages remain the same. If you created the same distribution for a set of seeds where 50% of the large set germinate (but you do not know that), about 3% of the time 5 will germinate and another 3% of the time none will. About 16% of the time 4 will germinate and another 16% of the time only 1 will. And about 31% of the time 2 will. And 31% of the time 3 will. This provides a little insight into how confident you can be in your conclusions if you test only 5 of your precious favorite few remaining pepper seeds. Suppose you have only 10 seeds left and test 5 ahead of time so you know if should order new seeds instead. If all 5 germinate, you might think all 10 were good. However, if only 90%, meaning 9, were good, you would still think, 3% of the time that all were good even if only 50% were. In this case, the 5 remaining would therefore all be bad (again, 3% of the time, when 5 of 10 are selected and 50% are actually good). If 90% of 10 were actually good and the 5 selected are all good, then 4 of the remaining 5 would all be good. This is a pretty extreme case, but it shows that testing just 5 seeds can provide a lot of confidence. And it illustrates a bit of the framework for exploring other scenarios. For example, if only 2 of the 5 germinate, you can be pretty sure that you did not start with 90% of the seeds being good, as this happens ~0.8% of the time. Or ..... just buy more seeds!
Very interesting and informative as always, Luke, but your maths is very wrong. If your seeds have 50% germination rate, then sowing two seeds per module gives you around 75% chance of at least one seedling germinating, not close to 100%. Think of it like tossing a coin where "heads" = seedling, and "tails" = fails. The overall average will be around 50-50, but two consecutive tails will come up around 1/4 of the time. Three seeds per module gets you to about 88% chance, and 4 seeds gets you to around 94% chance of at least one seedling per module. MANY will have more than one, and some will still be empty.
Check out Stasher Bags instead of ziplock bags, btw. Just mentioning bc you mentioned your kid growing through zip lock bags. :) I love them and heads about them from a different youtuber.
Thank you for posting this. I forgot that I put some lemon seeds in a window to germinate. Sure enough, I have four thick healthy sprouts, my second ziploc bag, I put in the window a couple of weeks ago. Anyone have suggestions what soil do I transfer them into? Thanks!
I can't wait until you hit 1 million subs
I feel like that should result in some kind of party!
I didn't test my leftover purchased seed from last year. I just planted more than I needed in each soil block. So far, I have nearly 100% germination. To God be the glory.
A quick and easy thing I do when starting seeds, I use my oven. Place them between damp paper towels in a zip lock bag and place them in an oven with the light on. Creates constant temp, light and humidity. Don’t turn the oven itself on, just the light.
Just remember they’re in then when ‘you’ preheat the oven.
Shoot! I just layered my seeds on the paper towel in the plastic bag, do you really think it is necessary to cover with the paper towel? Did you close the zip lock bag all of the way?
Just a testimony about MI Gardener seeds... Last year I had almost a 100% germination rate and all the seedlings were strong and healthy. I did so well I was able to give seedlings away to family & friends when I ran out of garden space. Thank you Luke for the excellent quality of seeds and supplies you offer us gardeners. I will continue to purchase MI Gardener seeds for years to come. :)
Awesome testimony! Thank you for that!
oh yeah! MI Gardener seeds were great in my garden last year too.
same here!
Learned this as a kid in school and have done it ever since. Probably one of the only useful and most useful things I learned in school. We used to fold the seeds in a moist paper towel and then put them in a plastic baggy and give it a few days- couple weeks.
My friend's son was a gardener and when he passed away my friend gave me all his seeds. He kept them in the freezer. I did a test on them and everyone of them grew. The surprise in all this was because of his health ,he did not garden again and so the seeds were forgotten. The date on the seeds---- 2009
Thank you for bringing seeds to us so we can grow our own foods to survive.
I bought seeds from the Seed Guy 10 years ago, and have stored them in the freezer, in a vacuum sealed mylar bag since. I grew some Ace 55 and other seeds this past year, and the germination and growth was excellent!
I posted a video about this a couple weeks ago- didn't even think about including how to store the seeds!?!? However I didn't know about the correct way to store them, & I was storing them in a garage that got really hot, then really cold, over & over for almost 10 years, & they still are germinating. So don't just throw out old seeds & assume they're bad!
Very helpful, thank you. I'm starting my whole garden from seed for the first time this year, and was just debating whether or not it was worth trying some outdated tomatoes. Now I'll be able to know for sure!
I've started preaching germination testing. Just because I have 5 or 10 year old seed doesn't always mean it's no good. Great video on how to!
I love germinating with paper towel method. Saves time and seed :)
I don't like to spend money and you helped me start gardening from seed, 2 years ago, with very little down😁 I LOVE your seeds!!! Now when I want to try something new or wasn't able to save my own, I go to your website!!! Thanks for inexpensive seeds that grow🌱🌱🌱
Awesome information. Can’t wait to begin this process today. I saw 37 thumbs down 👎 on this video. I can’t imagine anyone viewing this information thinking it wasn’t good. Geez people. Lighten up. 😃
I had a random tomato plant come up in a walkway area 8 years ago. It made the best fruit, so I saved some seeds. I replanted them and didn't think they'd sprout BUT they did! They were kept in a paper envelope inside a ziplock in the fridge. The key seems to be keeping them cool and dry for long periods of time.
Yes, no need to sit around all winter waiting for spring. We can be testing, experimenting, researching seeds all winter!
Love the longhair aesthetic, what a gardening legend
I just did a germination test for the bell pepper and jalapeño, and black beauty eggplant seed I saved last year and its was great!!! I was so nervous that I didn’t do it right but almost everything germinated!
Great job hun!!!
That's awesome!!! Good for you!
You are such an awesome teacher. Thanks.
I'd always kept my seeds in jars in the fridge. Some years ago I found some seeds that were about 7 years old. I planted them all not anticipating anything to come up but about 60-70% did! 🙂
If these are outside of the packets: Do you put anything in the jar with them, like cotton wool, to stop moisture or are they fine?
The scrap book picture storage system is the best in terms of storage as well as cataloging. JMO
Hi, I did this last year, I had 2 packs of beetroot seeds, one from 2016 and the other was 2018. I sowed 6 cells of compost for each and labelled them with the year. As i suspected the 2016 seeds didnt germinate and the 2018 were still viable, so I used them all up over the summer. A great tip and money and time saving too!
Excited about testing my seeds. This is my second year gardening and you have helped me so much
I just tried saving seed from an heirloom cucumber last year. Thus sounds like a great way to see if I did it right before I actually plant them. Thanks!
Well, 5 days after watching this video, I am here to report that I am testing several different seeds. One packet is Snow Crown cauliflower dated 2005, and all 5 test seeds have popped out a li't root. Amazing. I store all my seeds ingallon Ziploc bags and within those bags, I subdivide veggie types and keep everything zipped up. All that goes into my spare fridge, where they stay all year.
Thank you so much for putting this seed viability video out.I took you up on this, a week ago and decided to test all my seeds, so I knew what was good and what percentages so I knew what would grow and what was no good. I did my first testing like I said a week ago and got really good results with that, I did have about 4 packages of seed that were no good, so I threw those away and have done a second set of seed viability so here in a couple of weeks when I indoor sow, I know what I can grow with some probability that it will grow. Thanks so much for putting this video out! I wished I had known about this last when some of my indoor seed sowing did not grow!
Testing germination is really important if you save seed. If the seed you saved isnt good, it gives you time to replace it.
Fantastic. You could also put the names of the shops the seeds were purchased from, if you use more than one company or place to purchase. I discovered all my seed packets from one shop did not germinate while testing and never bought from them again as I realised they weren't looking after the seeds at all. The seeds were well in date and the brand from other shops germinated just fine.
So glad I watched this I had no clue and been storing them wrong!!
I have nearly 100% germination rate from your seeds Luke. I have trays upon trays in different stages and some direct sow going. Like hundreds of little seedlings going already. Your seeds are awesome. I waited to order my peppers a few weeks since I had such a large order the first time and just got them in today. I cant wait for those little sprouts to pop up!
I am grateful for your channel Luke. Its a valuable resource for me. So thank you thank you thank you
Hi! Luke, Thank you for sharing about seeds viability. It does make sense to start checking some stored seeds before planting time it save time and expenses. I procrastinate sometimes it’s a good reminder Luke thank you. Can’t wait to receive those seeds i ordered it has been processed.👍👍👍
Perfect timing for me. I have been gathering, sorting and filing seeds that I have found squirreled away around my house in plastic pill bottles, small pimento jars, paper bags, and assorted envelopes. I was wondering if some of the old ones were worth planting. Having no school age children at home I DO have Ziploc bags. I will be doing germination testing tomorrow.
Thanks so much for the info.
This is awesome! I ordered last week and I didnt even know you had a UA-cam! Definetly subscribing!
I just got my seed order from you yesterday......I can't wait to plant them!
sounds like ~10% sounds good. Thanks for the heads up/reminder that NOW is the time to start this up.
Thank you for this!! Over the years I have thrown out many seeds maybe when I didn't have to.
Thank you! I’m getting ready to start seeds!
Just Do It!!! Yay! I love gardening. Thank you
I am so excited for spring planting!
master gardener here had a great season last year with all your seeds 90-99 percent germination except on cali wonder peppers 70 % great video I do that with seeds I saved from pervious years not really a need to test seed you ordered especially from MIgardener
MIGardener seeds are the best!
Was that your only pepper seed? I find peppers love presoak and heat heat heat you can get some pretty bad germ without that.
The problem is wet soil is generally cold soil ! So if you don't have the humidity to maintain warm moist soil its tough.
@@eric4946 I had about 12 different pepper kinds the purple bells were so cool I have a germination tent
Our family seals the seeds and stores them in the freezer. Not sure why, but grandpa did it that way too.
How long do they last that way?
I know for sure that we get 2-3 seasons if we dont use them all up. I will ask Grandpa what the longest is. He told us that the cold especially helps when saving your own seed because it is like a fake winter!
I keep mine on the freezer as well!
Watching this vid after I got my seeds in today from MIgardener....Thanks! I'm on year #2...last year was great! Got some new varieties to try out.
This is so helpful. Unfortunately I do have a lot of older seed that I need to test. But your video has come at the right time for me to get started!
That note about onion seeds has made me now realize why my 3 year old onion seeds have not sprouted ha
Thank you…I always learn so much from your channel
Great idea, need to test some of my older seeds.
Thanks for this! So helpful, Luke.
One of the companies I ordered from had 17 seeds in the package. I just plant them and make sure there is a bit more than I need and if all grow I just share them with my neighbor.
thanks for this, i never thought to do this but now i will
you should write a book and compile tips for growing. I would love that! I personally have a hard time remembering all the info in your videos and it would be helpful to have a reference for sure.
I save a lot of seeds from my harvest. I place the seeds in a mason jar with the two piece lid in the refrigerator. Any airtight container works. This is my storage solution for the long term.
Good vid reminder for those with lots of seeds
Great idea since I have a lot of seeds left from last year that I was planning to use. Will start tests this weekend.
Just sprouted 5year old tomato’s lettuce broccoli herbs no problem
I did not know about the dates on package THANK YOU.
Hi from Imlay City! (Lapeer county) Thank you for always making the most helpful videos ever!!
Love this. Seems like I may need fresh carrot seed but we will see.
The seeds i bought from you i did this exact text with almost every variety had 100% germination . Then I just use the test sprouts and plant them to see how long it takes to get transplant size . Then I'll know when to start
I found 10+ year old seeds in my basement. This is perfect!
They prolly will be out of date
Unless kept frozen
Ive grown 5 yo peas dried
They've grown seeds from the pharaohs tombs so you've got a great chance
There have been seeds found in old caves from native Americans. So seeds can last a long time.
My lettuce seeds from last year are still good to go.
Awesome advice Luke! I have a MUCH smaller garden than you, but I did pick up my seeds last weekend at a trusted garden center. I did check each pack to ensure that all are from this year so I should be good there. I might do some test germination this weekend as well. I’m in SW Ohio, we won’t be getting in our garden til prob mid to late April. But I will definitely put my seeds in a ziplock bag, I had them just in a cabinet, Thanks for the tip!
Hey dude, I was watching your old seed starting vids about the pain of sowing old seeds. Give Lock Pinning Tweezers a look, they work awesome.
Thanks for the video (and the many other great videos you've made). I don't want to be a fault finder but in the end you mentioned planting 2 seeds each with 50% viability in order to get a near 100% chance of one germinating. Probably a slip of the tongue on your part. For any who are not familiar with how probabilities work, if you plant 2 seeds, each with a 50% chance, your odds of at least one sprouting are 75% (25% chance of 2 sprouting, 50% chance of one sprouting, 25% chance of neither sprouting).
I don't complicate things that much. If I plant 2 seeds that have .50% It just gives me more chances. Heck, I might plant 3 seeds and get even closer but after 3 seeds if none of them germinate then the seed sucks and I will just buy new seed.
It’s not complicating things to know that if a seed has a 1/N chance of not germinating, then 2 seeds will give a 1/(N*N) chance of none germinating.
And 3 seeds will give a 1/(N*N*N) chance of none germinating.
If it is a 1/2 chance of not germinating, 2 seeds have a 1/4 or 25% chance of none germinating. 3 seeds: 1/8 or 12.5%.
If it is a 1/10 chance of not germinating, 2 seeds have a 1/100 or 1% chance of none germinating. 3 seeds: 1/1000 or 0.1%.
Statistics like that provide a picture that with some more expensive or rare tomato seeds (I’ve heard of $.80/seed!!), if the germination rate is 9/10, don’t bother double seeding a cell out of concern that a cell may have none germinate; that would happen like 1 time in a 100 (while ~81/100 would have two seedlings, which either need to be thinned or split apart).
@@MIgardener Thanks again for the work you do! I just came back to the comments section to find that others had since pointed out the same point, sometimes with a harsh tone. I hope my comment was not taken in that way and I apologize if it was. I really have learned a lot from your videos and wouldn't want to contribute to the negativity that can sometimes come from people being overly eager to criticize.
I ❤️ smart comments! I also married a math major. Lol.
@@nathanbarnes4721 It is a balancing act: Not wanting to criticize, but also not wanting to let basic statistical problems get solved blatantly (sorry, but yes) to yield substantially incorrect results, leading to people not knowing how to interpret data and recognize what is correct and what is not. Factually. Not a judgement. Aside from statistics, being able to recognize obviously incorrect misinformation is a huge problem, in the USA, at least. I added the following to another thread on this:
In the last minute of the video when Luke says "50% germination plus 50% germination, you have nearly 100% chance of something growing in this cell", adding a text annotation into the video that pops up and says 'ok, not exactly "plus"' and another that says 'and 75%, not 100%' would have polished up an excellent video to be even better. Without that, there will be a portion of future engineering/math/scientific viewers whose alarms will go off, like hearing fingernails scratching a chalkboard!, cringing at probabilities being combined incorrectly and inaccurate conclusions being drawn (even though Luke hits the essential point by planting 2 or 3 seeds in a cell).
I am currently starting super hot peppers. I was surprised when the Trinidad scorpion took over 3 weeks to germinate when all the rest of them were growing already.
I am from Trinidad. The hotter the pepper, the longer it takes to germinate. I use the paper towel method to germinate and I always get good results
@@redcurrant2023 True that. The Carolina reaper and Moruga scorpion yellow and the rest germinated in half the time. Over 95% successes
That’s what sucks about buying hot pepper seeds, you only get like 10 and they already have a lower germination rate just for being hot peppers!
The upside is one successful plant will yield a lot of seeds from one pod that you leave to age.
Agreed!
@@rondacorkhill1654 yes, but you want to have a couple of plants so you have a mixed "gene pool."
@@GardenJensJourney I concur. I try two plants per seed variety. It usually works out for me.
@@rondacorkhill1654 yesssss that’s what I’m doing!!
Once you do the germination test you can use those germinated seeds to start plants.
Thank you, I was wondering that.
kelp extract & vitiman B extract ... plus depending on the species of plant microrizal spores coated on seed will raise chances drastically also container with air root controll
I started doing this last week. :) Great minds!
I just got my MI Gardener seeds in!! Yay!
I need to start peppers, and cool weather spring crops in January.
Thanks, Luke! Always good info! I should do this as I have tons of old seed packets that I didn't even get to open from last year. Can I ask if you recommend to refrigerate seed packets? Thanks again!
I wish I did this with my spinach seed last year🤦♀️ when none germinated I looked at the pack it was from 2014 🙄
You need to germinate now he says. Waits for my shipment of seeds to arrive. Positive note got my shipment confirmation today so they are on the way.
I’ve been trying to order from baker creek and it won’t let me meanwhile things are selling out that are in my shopping cart lol
@@taxigirl5637 oh I ordered from migardener as I wanted to support local business in my state not sure but heard lots of seeds are flying off the shelves as soon as they put them up. Keep trying check farm stores dollar stores as well as they are starting to put them out now hope you get everything you need and are looking for
Well not NOW literally, just sometime before seed starting so you don't push your time back by weeks.
Awesome! Just got the last bit of my seeds today. I have at least 99% germination from their seeds.
@@j.h.9191 totally!! Luckily, while baker creek was closed they were reupping their inventory and got restocked with a lot of things!! But still, I’m watching their inventory numbers and things are selling like crazy. Luckily I have everything I *need* but there is no such thing as enough seeds
Thank you... I am learning so much from your videos!
Please don't take this as a nerdy comment, just a helpful correction. If the germination rate is 50% and you put two seeds, the overall germination rate will be become 75% (not almost 100%). This is because the probability of non-germination for both is (1/2) * (1/2) = 1/4. So with 3/4 probability at least one will germinate. You can use a similar calculation to compute the germination rate of any multi-sown seed, if you know the germination rate of your individual seeds.
I was helping my mom organize her seeds yesterday and we found some seeds from 1979. 😂
Little tip for reducing moisture. Buy a bag of the moisture absorbing packets. I think i got a bag of 500 for a couple bucks
I will try it.
Great info! Although living east coast Australia I have no problem with basil self-seeding 😂
I would assume most people are doing something wrong not that they have bad seed. I've used old seeds and always have to cull more plants than I plant. The only seeds I've had problems with are pepper seeds.
Germination testing how difficult paper towel. Use a coffee filter also for seed saving.
I did this for sugar snap peas I saved. Not sure why I never thought about testing my purchased seeds🤦♀️😂
Ty that's really awesome man freaking loveeeeeeeeee your channel !
Thank you for the kind and thoughtful reminder :)
Some seeds, probably just flower seeds, it states for better germination to soak for 24hrs before planting. I assume to soften the shell.
I store all my seeds in the freezer. I've never had a problem with germination.
Question though and I may have missed it; but what are we looking for specifically when a seed has germinated? I have soaked my seeds before and saw a little "tail" sticking out of one end. Is that what we need to be looking for?
Yup, that's the beginning of a root. They look like comma punctuation.
Stephanie McCown, you mentioned you put your seeds in freezer, do you keep them in for short period, like a month, or permanently leave them there .. I just got seeds from Floret (misc. Flower varieties) I'm assuming I need to put them in freezer also??
@@jeanniehall1440 yes. I keep mine in the freezer all year long including flower seeds.
Great tip!!!! ❤ Thanks Luke!
Thank you for that information, wow will it save us from disappointment
....like last year. Then late starting round 2 of seeds, which equaled =not much harvest before Michigan's early frost.
Great video keep up the awesome work you do with your team
Thank you John! :)
I ordered my seeds but they're not here yet for me to plant. Where are they? JK, I ordered them a few days ago and I'll be happy if I get them in the next two weeks because there is so much in the mail right now. Thank you for being a seed provider.
You might want to actually go to his website for the store and email customer service ,but I can tell. His shop is just as busy as the rest of seed shops some are closed so they can catch up and shortages due to the pandemic we are all living in . They will email you when they ship and then it's up to the postal service to get them delivered and not in his control
@@willow8094 That was sarcasm. I've been buying from him since he started selling seeds. LOL
@@rondacorkhill1654 you are not the first person to post something like this ,it's on his social media sites and to see this on a video ! Ya don't find it humorous ! Glad you find it to be funny that people are out straight and posting something like that but your just a special person cause you been buying from him ,were I come from that's called short bus special .
@@willow8094 As I said, jk. I've been buying from him since he started selling. I will always choose MIgardener before any other company. I've read posts where people are complaining when their seeds are a week later than what was posted. The USPS has never been reliable. MIgardener has waitlists for everything to accommodate everyone. If it's something I can't wait for, I will look else where. Additionally, after spending three years in Afghanistan, I learned that having a relaxing time growing seeds is helpful. I'm not going to pander to anyone regarding my sense of humor. If the "JK" doesn't make you understand I'm letting him know I feel for their challenges, you have missed the message. As for the short bus, that's a quite provocative statement. Are you saying you have a problem for those who have challenges? Wrong message, wrong time.
@@rondacorkhill1654 many people have seen this kind of disrespect and no one who watches him and supportive to his business is ok with it and glad you made the final comment about the postal service I will surely let my farther the post master know .
all good stuff. buy from reputable seed companies with germination rate stated. stop buying heirloom tomatoes from ebay lol, you know you have too many packets of those laying around.
my seed packets are in the shed, which is an oven in summer etc., but i have a tiny cooler they sit in.
by far the biggest difference in germination is the media itself. i have nothing to do with the company but mikskaar commercial seed starting mix have very high germination rate. top of the line home market seed starting mix, below 50% germination rate. did a side by side comparison, keeping media moist every day.
one year old seed, pop in extra seed into each plug and thin afterwards. seed any older goes in bin. time, space and work is more valuable than a few bucks for a fresh seed pack.
one of these days you will wean yourself from those large (individual plug) trays to commercial grade tiny plug sturdy trays, that grow seedlings better and less space. you just need to fertilize. apart from peppers, starts need to go into ground sooner rather than later, with a good root system. maybe you can do a side by side comparison of the tray pictured and a commercial grade tray.
The company that I buy my seeds from has the germination rate and test date on everything, not just the packed date.
A little insight that SELECTING ONLY 5 SEEDS IS EFFECTIVE:
If a set of 10, 100, or 1000 seeds has a 90% germination rate, but you do not know that, selecting 5 at random will produce:
59% of the time, 5 will be selected that germinate
33% of the time, 4 will be selected that germinate
7% of the time, 3 will be selected that germinate
0.8% of the time, 2 will be selected that germinate
0.045% of the time, 1 will be selected that germinate
0.001% of the time, none of the 5 will germinate
This is a binomial distribution. wikipedia if you want.
A basic point to make is that there can obviously never be 90% of the 5 that germinate; that would be 4.5. Say it was a set of 100 seeds to start. 59% of the time, it would look like all 100 must be good seeds. 33% of the time 80 of the 100. 7% of the time, 60 of the 100. On down, til 0.001% of the time, or around once in every 100,000 such experiments, none will germinate. You could have had a set of 100 seeds or even just 10. The percentages remain the same.
If you created the same distribution for a set of seeds where 50% of the large set germinate (but you do not know that), about 3% of the time 5 will germinate and another 3% of the time none will. About 16% of the time 4 will germinate and another 16% of the time only 1 will. And about 31% of the time 2 will. And 31% of the time 3 will.
This provides a little insight into how confident you can be in your conclusions if you test only 5 of your precious favorite few remaining pepper seeds. Suppose you have only 10 seeds left and test 5 ahead of time so you know if should order new seeds instead. If all 5 germinate, you might think all 10 were good. However, if only 90%, meaning 9, were good, you would still think, 3% of the time that all were good even if only 50% were. In this case, the 5 remaining would therefore all be bad (again, 3% of the time, when 5 of 10 are selected and 50% are actually good). If 90% of 10 were actually good and the 5 selected are all good, then 4 of the remaining 5 would all be good. This is a pretty extreme case, but it shows that testing just 5 seeds can provide a lot of confidence. And it illustrates a bit of the framework for exploring other scenarios. For example, if only 2 of the 5 germinate, you can be pretty sure that you did not start with 90% of the seeds being good, as this happens ~0.8% of the time.
Or ..... just buy more seeds!
Hey I like to grow stuff I got a good crop last year
Thanks
Great video. Thank you.
Thanks!
Very interesting and informative as always, Luke, but your maths is very wrong. If your seeds have 50% germination rate, then sowing two seeds per module gives you around 75% chance of at least one seedling germinating, not close to 100%. Think of it like tossing a coin where "heads" = seedling, and "tails" = fails. The overall average will be around 50-50, but two consecutive tails will come up around 1/4 of the time.
Three seeds per module gets you to about 88% chance, and 4 seeds gets you to around 94% chance of at least one seedling per module. MANY will have more than one, and some will still be empty.
Check out Stasher Bags instead of ziplock bags, btw. Just mentioning bc you mentioned your kid growing through zip lock bags. :) I love them and heads about them from a different youtuber.
Thank you for posting this. I forgot that I put some lemon seeds in a window to germinate. Sure enough, I have four thick healthy sprouts, my second ziploc bag, I put in the window a couple of weeks ago. Anyone have suggestions what soil do I transfer them into? Thanks!
This was great! Very informative. What about pelleted seed. Would you test it, and the same way, or would you need to remove its coat?
You do not need to remove the coating on pelleted seeds- it dissolves when damp.