I still get a thrill when I see tiny green shoots pop up out of the soil, from seeds that may have been no bigger than pepper dust. Veg seeds in particular come in all shapes and sizes, from broad beans, which can be the size of your thumbnail, to minute carrot and lettuce seeds. Sweetcorn, pea and bean seeds are recognisable as the vegetables they will become, but most are not, although I’m sure seasoned gardeners would have no trouble identifying them.

Anyway, my article isn’t aimed at ‘the pros’. As a relatively new grow-your-own gardener, I want to convince readers who haven’t tried growing from seed to have a go.

About four years ago, sales of vegetable seeds started outstripping those of flowers. This is still the case, apparently, as the popularity of garden veg patches and allotments continues unabated: we don’t want the chemicals, we don’t want our veg flown in from halfway round the world and, finally, we don’t want to pay the earth when it’s possible to grow veg ourselves.

Not that packet seeds are actually cheap to buy these days – I bought a packet of Italian winter squash last year that cost £2.50 for five seeds. But, I saved the seeds from my ‘crop’ of two squashes, and now have dozens and dozens of seeds, all dried out and ready to plant in the spring.

Unfortunately I didn’t keep the original seed packet (do try to keep them if you can), so I can’t check to see if they were F1 hybrids.

Crossing specific parent plants produces a hybrid seed (plant) by means of controlled pollination. To produce consistent F1 hybrids, the original cross must be repeated each season – in plants this is usually done through controlled hand-pollination, which explains why F1 seeds are often expensive. I may get no germination at all or plants that don’t replicate those I had last summer.

But I’ve been successful in growing the seed of squashes and peppers I buy in the supermarket. It is always worth saving the seeds and having a go. Now, I need to find a fellow enthusiast to swap squash seeds with – the plant from just one seed can take over your plot like a triffid.

The autumn before last I collected the seed heads of marigolds and onions, kept them dry in paper envelopes over the winter and planted the seeds in the spring, in trays in the greenhouse, or sprinkled them in the warmedup soil. Both germinated well.

Allotment old-timers wouldn’t dream of paying for bean seeds, but allow the pods on one plant to grow big and knobbly at the end of each season, let them dry, remove the beans inside and store them for spring planting.

Few of us have the greenhouse or windowsill space to grow flowers as well as veg from seed – and, anyway, we all want the instant gratification of flowering plants bought from the garden centre, ready to go into borders and pots. I’m far more patient with vegetables and love watching the seeds come up in easily identifiable, weedable rows. However, when foxgloves, poppies, nigella, marigolds, honesty and aquilegia are so generous with their seeds, it seems a crime to waste them. Left uncollected they’ll happily seed themselves all over the place anyway.

Time to sow?

• When you sow your seeds will vary from year to year – in the South you can often sow two weeks earlier than further north. However, in an untypically cold spring, sow later than usual: later sowings will catch up and do just as well as sowings made in cold weather.
• It will say on the seed packet whether seeds need total darkness or light to germinate. Until germination, trays of seeds requiring light should be placed in subdued lighting, out of direct sunlight.
• Use a reputable seed compost but never one with additional fertilisers.

A good read

It may sound obvious, but do read the instructions on the seed packet: for example, if it says ‘greenhouse variety’ don’t plant it outdoors.

Label all your saved seed, and your seed trays, or you’ll never remember what you collected/ planted. Lots of seedlings, particularly those in the cucurbit family (cucumbers, courgettes, squashes etc.) can look almost identical. Tomatoes too, can trip you up, especially if you plant a ‘Big Boy’ beefsteak tomato in your hanging basket instead of a Tumbling Tom!

A novice could do worse than consult my much-thumbed ‘bible’– The Vegetable Expert by Dr DG Hessayon (now available as The Vegetable & Herb Expert Transworld £7.99). There is such a lot of illustrated information packed between the covers of this inexpensive book. ‘Seed facts’ for each vegetable include an illustration of the seed, expected time of germination, how long it can be stored, ease of cultivation etc. Jekka McVicar’s Seeds (Kyle Cathie for the RHS, £14.99) is a comprehensive tome for bedtime reading rather than greenhouse ready-reference, however if you want to take your study of seeds further and gain a deeper understanding of how germination works, then this is everything you need in a reference book.

Gardening magazines abound, from the instructional to the aspirational. Which? Gardening (in the fi rst category) has investigated the germination of seeds from diff erent companies and has found a wide variation in success rate, with companies such as Plants of Distinction, Tuckers and Suff olk Herbs scoring highly alongside the better known Suttons,  ompson & Morgan and Mr Fothergill. 

These three were particularly praised for the useful sowing and cultivation information on their websites and packets. T&M publish a germination guide at www.thompson-morgan.com

Race against time

The future of our planet could depend on work being done by botanists at Kew’s Millennium Seed Bank in Sussex.

The enormous bomb- and radiationproof bunker hidden deep beneath the Sussex Downs is the stuff of science fi ction. Built to last 500 years and to keep seeds viable for at least 200 years, it has been described as a giant Noah’s Ark for seeds. This is Kew’s Millennium Seed Bank Project (MSBP) at Wakehurst Place, and the largest off-site conservation project ever conceived.

With its international partners, it will have banked seed from 10 per cent of the world’s wild plant species – some 24,000 – by the end of the decade. These will include the rarest, most threatened and most useful species known to man. The world’s arid zones are a priority, however in Britain we can rest easy knowing that seeds of all our native plants have already been gathered in and stored here.

Under the cold, dry conditions of a seed bank, seeds can survive for hundreds, possibly thousands, of years depending on the species. Each batch of seeds that arrives is carefully dried and cleaned before going into storage at -20ºC. The technicians were putting seeds into what looked to me like Kilner jars – and this turned out to be exactly what they were: “If they are good enough for the WI, then they’re good enough for us!” said one in answer to my question.

At this stage the viability of the seeds is tested by measuring the germination rate of a sample. This test is repeated at intervals during storage to monitor the seeds’ continued viability.

In the future, scientists will be able to reproduce the plant by germinating its seed. This means that, should a species become extinct in the wild, it will not be lost forever if its seed is secure in a bank.

But the MSBP is much more far-reaching and complex than the casual visitor to Wakehurst Place might imagine. The Noah’s Ark analogy is accurate to the extent that saving what’s left of the world’s fl ora could be a race against time to save our very planet before population increase, habitat destruction, climate change and desertifi cation do their worst. But alongside this is the work being done to develop protocols for all the seeds collected in order that they can be safely restored to their original or other habitats.

Then there is the necessary forging of international partnerships. Scientists from all over the world come to the Millennium Seed Bank to undertake collaborative research programmes, taking the knowledge they gain back to where it may be desperately needed. The week I visited, the botanists were fl ying to China where, thanks in large part by MSBP expertise, a new seed bank was offi cially opening. Unfortunately there are still countries with little or no seed banking experience, trained personnel or facilities.

Members of the public can observe seed research, cleaning and conservation in action in the laboratories through specially created glass walls, while a permanent exhibition helps visitors understand the seed bank’s work and its vital importance. Further details at www.kew.org/msbp