How do you sort and store your seeds?

[barleychown]

How do you sort and store your seeds? 

Do you have them in drawers, boxes, filing cabinets?

How do you keep them straight?

Do you have them in alphabetical order?

Do you sort by type, or by planting date?

As the years go on, I get more and more varieties of seed, and it's getting hard to keep them in some sort of order.

[Wrennie]

I have mine in a plastic shoebox. I have flowers, then herbs, then food crops. Every couple of years i go through and compost the really old ones. They are in small clear ziploc bags, store bought packs, and small manilla envelopes.
Its not the most efficient filing system, but i try to keep it compact.
A seperate box for flowers vs edibles might be better.

[Patty S]

I kept mine in plastic shoe box size totes for... I dont know how long... for want of a "better" system. (Didn't work very well!)   Then I found my "seed library". (Pic posted in the "Got Thrift shop and Yard Sale Treasures?" thread - Gardeners Chat.)

It's working absolutely great for me!  I wouldn't expect that too many people are going to run across discarded display cases like mine, but I'm thinking that those nuts & bolt organizers that are sold in the hardware or tool departments at Lowe's & Walmart would serve the purpose just as well.

I have my flower & veggy seeds separated, but other than that, they're all in alphabetical order. (Also, the bottom drawer is for seeds that I've gotten from other people... just cuz I have the space to do it. That way, I can be sure to let them know how their seeds did for me!) I've been thinking about putting a little color-coded spot sticker on the individual compartments, to depict planting times. (The round stickers that you can buy for marking yard sale stuff.)

Most of my seeds are in little 1" zip-lock baggies, & some are still in little bindle-type paper packages, cuz they weren't all the way dry when I cataloged them. For the most part, plenty of seeds fit in those, & if I have more than that, I dont need them. (Ideally, seeds are better kept in paper though.) Larger seeds, like beans & peas, are in larger zip-locks, in the bigger compartments of my library.

I've taken my "extra" seeds to garden club meetings, to share with the ladies who might want them.  Since many flower seeds don't remain viable after a year or two, it's a real shame to waste the extra ones, so I might suggest that people take their extra seeds to a food pantry, so those who might want to have flower gardens but can't afford the high prices they've reached these days, can enjoy having a garden. (For the most part, vegie seeds seem to have a longer "shelf life".) The county extension office is another excellent place to drop off extra seeds... if they can't find people to give them to, they'll probably use them in their Master Gardener nurseries, for their annual plant sales.

[christy]

i keep mine in a the cubard  some are in  papper seed packs in lil boxes, one for flowers n one for vegies, i also use jars when i dont make seed packs.  also cause i have a carry bucket i keep jars n big paper packs in for when im collecting seeds in the garden, its just easy to grab the bucket n go.  then i just toss it in the coubard till im ready to sort in lil packets for trading.  i just keep a list of what all i have,  i am thinkin of getting another lil box foe winter sowin or hardy seeds, to seperate from the  tender annuals seeds.

[landofoz]

I keep mine in a regular shoebox that I hot glued some fabric too.  I also glued in a strip of cardboard down the center of the box going lengthwise, so I get 2 long, skinny channels.  I made a template and cut out good sized tags out of cardstock, put 1 letter on the top of each, and then covered it with clear packing tape.  These set inside the channels and divide up the seeds alphabetically.  I make all my seed envelopes the same size and they fit in the channels perfectly.  And because I have nothing better to do, I also keep all of my seeds organized in Excel alphabetically with a column for everything such as: water, sun, poisonous/not, bloom color, height, etc.  This way I can data sort the items for whatever requirement I'm needing, such as full sun, orange bloom.  Have I confused ya yet?

[Tonya]

Mine are all willy nilly in an old cigar box and a BIG bubble envelope(except my veggies which are in the freezer). Doug's "Honey-do" list has a seed box onit, but who knows how long it will take him to get it done. I don't have too many seeds as of right now, so the cigar box/envelope work well for me. I soooo need to organize it, tho.

[Patty S]

Tonya, why do you keep your veggie seeds in the freezer? I've never heard of veggie seeds needing stratification, as most veggies don't self seed... (because their seeds don't survive freezing temps!) 

Maybe I don't have the correct information. How long have you been doing this?

[MassMama]

I keep mine in a box as well... I was planning on getting some of those a-z cards and sorting them and never got around to it.. I have all my veggies in one bag and all my flowers in another... special seeds in their own little bag

[Tonya]

Patty- I was told(by the guys at the local farm store) to store any left over seeds in the freezer so that they last longer I may be doing the wrong thing by doing that, but then I get to go get new seeds(and maybe just happen to get some new palnts in the process..... ) I'll let ya know how mine do this year, 'cause up until now(last 6 months)- they were in the cigar box with the rest of my seeds....

[landofoz]

I think a lot of veggies do just fine if frozen.  I always get tons of cucurbits, darned cilantro, and tomato seedlings in my garden every spring -- and 1 gosh darned iris rhizome that I never can find and remove. 

[Triss]

I keep mine in a drawer here in my desk.  I always try to organize them but always fail.  I plant the things I like throughout the garden in places I like then I tend to scatter misc seeds in a different part of the garden to see what will come up there.  I am not at all organized.

[duh]

I have one of those rubber maid drawers and the plastic a to z 4 by 6 dividers for my species garden.  That is one packet of seeds of each variety I get.

Then I have a cardboard box divided into 3 columns where I warehouse extra seeds.  These are also kept alphabetical but the dividers are small envelopes. 

The problem is that if a row isn't full the seeds slide around quite a bit.  I'll work on a better system when I get moved and settled.

[barleychown]

All of these are great ideas. Thank you all.

I think putting seeds alphabetically would help me a lot, as well as separating annuals, perennials, and veggies into their own boxes.

[Patty S]

Tonya, did your frozen seeds turn out OK & germinate for you?  I planted some of the seeds from the bean pods that were hanging on my bean trellis all winter... I wasn't sure what to expect, but they all came up!   Something tells me that melons seeds wouldn't fare well after being frozen, but last year there were a couple cantaloupes that came up on my hill, that the birds must have planted... & they must have planted them in the fall, cuz there weren't any cants for them to get seeds from after the cold weather was over.

Here's an idea for storing seeds, that's working out pretty well for me.  I bought a Rubbermaid storage drawer unit at Walmart ($18) & loaded all the garden stuff into it, that was taking up too much space in our craft cabinet.  (BG wasn't happy about that.)   After moving my tall plants from the middle of the entertainment center (that LaRelle was going to take to the dump) it fit perfectly, on the shelf next to my "seed library".
     
(I don't have a pantry or a root cellar, so I store my canning behind the glass door of the entertainment center.  I painted the door though, cuz jars of food looked sorta tacky in my computer room!)

I use one drawer for misc stuff, like garden gloves, ziplock bags for seed-swapping, marking pens, paint pens & plant markers.... (mosty, popsicle sticks.)  The other drawers are for my extra seeds, for sharing, & separated according to type, such as veggies, annuals, perennials, etc., leaving my seed library for the ones I want for my own gardens (so I don't give them away, by mistake).  The big drawer is handy for large bags of seed pods that I haven't cleaned yet.  Presently, most of the drawers are full of empty seed packets & bags... cuz I might need them someday! 

The unit came with 7 drawers, but it was too tall for the space in the entertaiment center, so I snapped off the 2 bottom ones & made a little "studio kitchen" for Lily, where she can keep her toy dishes & foods.
     

The nice thing about using a drawer unit like this for seeds, is that it would fit nicely at the floor of a closet during the "off" season... (That's where I suppose "normal" people would keep it!) But when it gets brought out, there aren't shoe boxes & seed packets scattered all over the place.

[barleychown]

Patty, I love that idea!    I bet with the different drawers and such, I could divide my seeds by type, and then even put them in alphabetical order, inside each drawer. 

Then, I'm sure I can muck out the floor of a closet in this house, so it can be out-of-sight when not in use. The shoeboxes get a bit messy looking.