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Hyde Park, Utah USA

So experts! What’s the best way to preserve giant pumpkin seeds? Long term storage. Older and newer alike? I’ve heard/read that airtight bottles in freezer, no? Should you use some sort of “kitty litter” or other desiccant?

7/3/2020 4:33:10 PM

Syracuse, NY

no, no desiccant. i use to think that the drier the seeds were, the better. i could still be sprouting seeds from '00 and older if i had read up on long-term storage. i used ones from large copier unpackings. it was part of a seed-hoarder's dream!
have a look at Charleston's diary - i think he had sprouted something that was over 20 years old:
http://www.bigpumpkins.com/Diary/DiaryViewOne.asp?eid=311815
if i were to do it, they be stored in MASON JARS, tightly closed and frozen in a non-defrosting freezer in my basement. imagine how much that would cost me per year X 21...the same way but unfrozen and under my bed would be free and ALMOST as good---eg

7/4/2020 5:29:24 AM

Centennial Colorado

I store them in a wine cellar. It is kept at a consistant 56.5 degrees which is the temperature of the ground. It is a concrete room with no insulation near the ground, but much from the rest of the basement. I have been able to start 15 year old seeds this way. Every seed I have tried to start has started.

7/4/2020 9:34:47 AM

Syracuse, NY

hmmm. . . i've not thought of that, lol---
temperature stability...darned plants like to be undisturbed; maybe the 'root' of the viability problem goes way back! well, it'll be in my next lifetime, but live and maybe learn, lol--thanks---eg

7/4/2020 10:35:50 PM

Scientists have started 32000 year old seeds. That was in the news this week and I believe they were in the ground.

7/5/2020 5:47:49 AM

Here is a link. Sure would like to know what nutrients they used to germinate.



https://www.theweathernetwork.com/ca/news/article/scientists-study-arctic-plant-revived-in-laboratory-after-32-000-years

7/5/2020 5:54:50 AM

Indiana

Have never frozen and then grown pumpkin seeds....but I have froze and grown other vegetables...just for shits and giggles I tried some 6-year froze
Seeds last year and had 100%germ rate....the key is to freeze them and do not get them out until you are ready to use immediately!!

Put it this way if you have something you like and don’t want to loose, make a lot of seed and freeze some...keep some at your house, friends house, and a family member so the chances of loosing them
In an accident are small....just my 2-pennies...

7/7/2020 10:36:41 AM