Bountiful Blossom Bagging

THE SEEDS OF EACH well-loved heirloom cultivar are an unbelievable gift, because within each seed coat are the genes that make that cultivar unique: the incomparable taste of a tomato well-adapted to your community, the unbelievable color or form of a flower given by an old friend, or a superb cultivar purchased through a seed exchange that you hope to propagate for years to come.

Saving seeds from species that are capable of cross-pollination is an exciting challenge for seed savers. Home gardeners who want to save the seeds of cherished heirlooms that fall into this category, such as cultivars of tomatoes and peppers, should look no further than the relatively simple process of blossom bagging. Blossom bagging allows gardeners to grow more than one cultivar of a crop type at a time and save seeds of multiple cultivars in