How to Choose Seed Varieties

when it comes to Garden planning It's relatively easy to decide what to grow you know that you would like to have tomatoes maybe some peppers and spinach and squash and that's a great way to start but how do you choose the specific varieties of tomatoes and peppers and spinach and squash well join me today as I show you the process I follow to choose seed varieties foreign [Music] ER Scott and I have a lot of seeds these are just some of what I have in my collection and I've been accumulating seeds over many many years because seeds can be used from one year to the next without worrying too much about the viability most of what I'm going to grow in my garden this year will come from my collection of seeds plants like shishito and Anaheim peppers I want to grow them and I already have the seeds golden beets are going into my garden and of course all the seeds that I've saved like these black cherry tomatoes but I'm always looking for something new and especially for new gardeners who are just starting out trying to figure out how to choose something like black cherry or shishito peppers can be a bit of a daunting task I like to turn to the many seed catalogs I have but before I start looking at the seed catalogs I have some very specific plants in mind I know this year that I'm looking for some that have already started making a list of John Jude suggested that I grow Thornberry terracotta tomatoes so as I look through my catalogs I'll specifically be looking for that a number of you have suggested Jimmy nardello Peppers I'll be looking through the catalogs to try to find some Jimmy nardello peppers and Barry's crazy cherry tomato is a variety that was recommended to me by Eli from in the garden with Eli and Kate Channel on YouTube so this is a good way to start if you can get recommendations from gardeners in your area and even from those of us on YouTube as you begin looking through through the catalogs are maybe even through the seed display at your local store you have an idea of some varieties that have worked well for others and then that can be an opportunity for you to start in your garden there's also some other plants that I want to grow and I'm just not sure about the variety that I want to try I need to try to match the seeds that I find with my specific Garden so over the course of years I know what my weather's like I know how long my season is and I have a pretty good idea of what's going to work in my garden I just don't always know which variety to start growing in my garden and that's where the seed Cat glogs come in these catalogs offer thousands upon thousands of options to choose for your garden much more than you would find in a seed display at a big box store and by taking the time to look through the catalogs and read about the plants you can learn more about what these offerings are before you begin trying to decide from thousands of plants which dozen or two dozen plants you might grow in your garden it's helpful to know some very important information about your garden like how long your growing season is what is the time from the last frost date and spring to the first frost date in fall for me that's about 134 days and I like to give myself a two week buffer for unexpected weather on each side so as I'm looking through my Seed Catalog a hundred and 20 days is my magic number if I choose a seed that I like but it tells me that it's going to take 120 days or more before I can reach a harvest well then it's probably not going to grow in my garden unless I take extra measures for that weather protection you have to match your growing season with the plants that you're beginning to grow and it's also helpful to have that plan in mind rather than just randomly choose seeds because they look pretty try to choose something that you are looking for to save money and save time and save effort put your list together of what you want to grow the tomatoes the peppers the spinach the squash whatever it happens to be and try to limit yourself to those type of seeds and then of course if you can have a list of very specific varieties it makes the whole process that much easier so let me show you what that looks like as I begin looking through this Seed Savers exchange catalog I'll take time to read the articles and the new information that they offer each year but as I get to the plants I am thinking specifically about what I want to grow and when it comes to something like these poppies and these beans and most of the rest of these plants they're not on my list of what I'm looking for but I will stumble across something like this maiden's gold tomato that looks interesting to me it's not on my list it's not something I'm planning to grow but I'll go ahead and read the description and it says that I can expect to get fruit 60 to 75 days from transplant well that fits very well with my 120 day expectation so I've dog-eared the page I'll come back to this when I try to make my final determination the rest of these plants I have no interest in I already have asparagus I might come back to this page to find out more about it but for now I'm just going through Page by Page trying to see if anything that this catalog offers is going to match my garden and it doesn't need to take a lot of time but when you get to the actual vegetables like beans I'm not planning on buying any beans this year so I'm bypassing this section completely I have all the bean seeds I need already when I get to this section on soybeans well I do want to grow some edamame this year so I've circled this dog-eared the page and I'll continue looking through the catalog beets I have all the Beet seeds I need so scrolling right through to the lettuces and the broccoli and the collards and the Cabbage none of these are part of my garden plan because I've already got the seeds and I don't need anything new but if you don't already have the seeds then take the time to look at the pictures and read the descriptions like on these carrot Pages there are purple carrots and they're orange carrots and yellow carrots and short carrots and long carrots there's a lot to choose from and so taking the time to read each of the individual descriptions can help you decide if that's a type of carrot you're looking for if you're looking for carrots I am interested in some cucumber seeds this year so I'll slow down in this section and look at each of the individual pictures and descriptions I'm looking for pickling cucumbers and Bush cucumbers right up front there's the A and C pickling cucumber also known as Ace as I start to scan through it it has uniformly straight 10 inch fruits well when I make my pickles I like smaller fruits so I'm not going to stop here there are many and cucumber is actually a melon and I grew it last year wasn't real pleased and I think I still have some seeds passing right by that not interested in different colored cucumbers but here's one called bushy it produces bumper crops for fresh eating and pickling and as a bush cucumber it only takes up two to three square feet I can expect fruit and 45 to 50 days this sounds promising so I'll Circle that all the dog ear the page and keep looking Crystal Apple yeah not too interested in double yield looks like it could be promising four to five inch long cucumbers but nothing else about this really stands out and so I'll keep going through the pictures to see if any of this I find interesting the jelly melon is also known as a horned cucumber as I look through it this is one of those that sounds interesting might be fun to grow in the garden but it doesn't match what I'm looking for this year so I'm avoiding the temptation of trying something new and sticking with what I'm looking for and I'll keep doing this going through every page in this book I love looking at pictures I love reading the descriptions but when it comes to choosing specific varieties this can be a pretty quick process because like these eggplants I've got plenty of eggplant seeds I don't need to stop here I don't need any more leek seeds let me get to the lettuces I'll slow down a little bit I've got some lettuce seed I've got them set aside but there might be something about these pictures or the description that might sound interesting and if that's the case then I'll go ahead and circle it and dog ear it this is not my final selection this is just the process I used for candidates of what's going to grow in my garden because I'm doing this with all the different catalogs I'll probably grow one new Bush variety and one new pickling variety if you number after I go through all the catalogs I'll look at the ones that I've highlighted the bush varieties and the pickling varieties and then narrow down my choice from there looking through the peppers I already have all the hot pepper seeds that I'm planning on growing this year but I'm looking for specific sweet peppers and specifically within the sweet peppers the Jimmy nardellos and right here the Jimmy nardellos are being offered by Seed Savers exchange so I've circled I've dog-eared the page it's really nice when you see something like this note that says staff favorite this pepper is a good grower and producer and the description matches it is an 80 to 90 day pepper which is a little bit longer than I prefer and so even though I'm looking for Jimmy nardellos I'm planning on growing Jimmy nardellos I'll compare it with one like this Italia sweet pepper which I can expect fruit 70 to 80 days so this is where I'll consider maybe two peppers like this it's tough do I choose the one that's 70 to 80 days or choose the one that's 80 to 90 days do I take a recommendation from the staff and a viewer and choose this one or do I look at this and decide that maybe these five to seven inch long peppers are better suited for my garden and even though I like to experiment I like to try new things and in most years the Italia might be one that I would choose I'm going to go with what's recommended I'm going to go with the pepper that others have told me do well in their Garden so this year it's the Jimmy nardellos there's no reason to spend any more time on the peppers found what I was looking for and I can keep scrolling through to the other plants that I'm looking for and when it comes to the squashes I'm looking for some very specific winter squash this year I grew some delicata squash last year and really liked it so as I'm looking through the winter squash I'm looking in the description for it to say that it's a delicata type of squash so this honey boat is a gold orange green striped delicata that has irresistibly sweet nutty flavor and stores well I want a delicata this sounds great as a delicata so it's circled and it's dog-eared and I don't see any other options as far as the specific delicata variety and so the winter squashes are complete as I come across the Tomato section I'm really only looking for those two specific Tomatoes right now the Thornberry terracotta and berries crazy cherry and so a lot of these tomatoes look wonderful but this is my stack of tomato seed packets that I already have so I really don't need to experiment with anything new I'm just looking for those too and I don't see them [Applause] so that means with all of these dozens and dozens of tomatoes that are being offered for Seed Savers exchange I'm gonna have to go online to see if I can find those varieties so doing a quick search of Thornberry terracotta tomato I find out it's actually Thor Burns terracotta tomato rare seeds which is Baker Creek offers it true love seeds it looks like there aren't a lot of companies that carry it here's San Diego seed company that carries it I'll go ahead and make note that I can get it from Baker Creek and I've been wanting to buy from San Diego seed company so maybe that'll be a place to start and then let's go ahead and see if we can find a place for berries Crazy Tomato and it looks like I can also get those at rareseeds.com that's Baker Creek I'll scroll down and see some of the other offerings and there's a few but since I buy so much from Baker Creek this may be where I choose to go to get these specific varieties for now since I know those two tomatoes that I was looking for are in the baker Creek catalog I can go ahead and start right at the front go through the whole process try to see if there's something that matches what's on my list and what's interesting if I go to the Tomato section is I don't find those two varieties in the catalog I don't find the crazy berries or the thorn Burns terracotta so that goes to show that even though there are dozens and dozens and dozens of seeds to choose from in these catalogs it doesn't include everything so if there's a company that you really like to do business with but you can't find the seeds in their catalog don't hesitate to go online because you may be able to find what you're looking for with just a simple search I know that this looks like it can be challenging and I will spend a day or two on this process but that's because I have a big garden and I'm looking to plant a lot of different plants I love the catalogs that's why I have a lot of catalogs but if you're new to gardening or if you have a small space you don't need to do all of this maybe just start with a single catalog like Botanical interests and go into it to choose those few seeds that you want it helps to start with the general idea if you want to grow tomatoes it helps to know whether you want to grow the big slicing tomatoes or the small cherry tomatoes so that when you get to the Tomato section you can speed up the process a little bit if you don't have that initial idea you can just enjoy the pictures and choose the ones that look and sound best ultimately what we're trying to do is find the varieties that will do best in our respective Gardens even though I have all of these seeds not all of them have done well in my garden I save the packets mostly as a reminder of What Not to Buy in the future and occasionally as a reminder of what to buy in the future like the shishito or like the black cherry that I saved the tomato seeds from if you want to learn more about saving and collecting seeds and what we'll do best in your garden go ahead and watch one of these videos next I'm Gardner Scott enjoy gardening [Music]

Channel: Gardener Scott

Views: 15,203

Keywords: gardener scott, gardner scott, best seeds, plant varieties, vegetable seeds, seed catalogs, how to choose seeds, what seeds to grow, how to pick seeds, choosing garden seeds, choose garden plants, seed varieties

Id: Lc1ClmUT16o

Length: 18min 20sec (1100 seconds)

Published: Thu Jan 19 2023