Seed saving November 29th 2023

These are the seed stalks of bok choy (also known as caixin) which I had to bring indoors last week as they were getting eaten by the birds. They also did not seem to getting dry as it rains most days and the humidity is generally high here in Malaysia.

I was wondering how I was going to get them dry enough to save as although there might be several hours in the day of hot sun, they just get wet again when it rains. So I brought the seed stalks indoors but they didn't seem to be getting very dry or the pods popping open to shed the seeds. They looked like they were just shedding dust.

But when I looked more closely I could see that the 'dust' was actually the very small seeds and that a lot of the pods had popped open. So this morning I decided to collect all the seeds I could find.

I was able to collect and bag up our first farm grown seeds.

As the original plants were f1 hybrids these seeds probably won't grow very well. Hybrid plants are a cross of two varieties, but the seeds they produce 'revert to type' and grow like either of the two varieties used to make the hybrid. We will go on growing them, however, and over several generations will have seeds that produce plants that are adjusted to the growing conditions in Chempaka Kuning. This will mean that the plants are able to resist the pests and diseases there. Although I don't think it will work with the birds!