True-to-Type: Saving and Selling Cut Flower Seeds for Profit and Joy

by Erika Clarke

Saving and selling flower seeds is a profitable revenue stream for cut flower farmers growing on small acreages.

Seeds belong in the hands of farmers, but many are intimidated by the isolation distances, seed cleaning and the unknowns that come with seed saving.

Erika Clarke shares her knowledge of flower seed saving and selling through stories of her own mistakes over the past six years of running a seed farm and seed company in Nova Scotia, Canada. Clarke guides you from curious to confident, teaching crop planning, cultivating, harvesting, drying, cleaning, storing and selling cut flower seeds.

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“Am I not cut out to be a seed farmer?”

I couldn’t accurately describe the awful smell coming from the 100 ft row of stocks (Mathiola incana) I’d planted. The decomposing stems were supposed to be an abundant seed crop, but there was not one plant standing. Not a single seed pod.

I walked the row to assess the damage. My tears stung in the autumn ocean breeze.

Three years of failed stock seed crops.
I had read every cut flower book.
I started the seeds early.
I grew the seedlings cold.
I removed all the single flowering plants.
I kept only the fullest and the healthiest double flowering plants.
I did everything right.

But no seed pods developed.

There was a dusty spot on my bookshelf where a flower seed saving book was missing.

So, I wrote it.

This book is for you, because I don’t want to find you in a bed of rotten stocks. I want to empower you to save your own seeds.

Inside this book:

Part 1: Planning and Growing Flower Seeds

  • Starting with an open-pollinated variety
  • Isolating same-species varieties
  • Selecting traits you want next year
  • Weeding, watering, pests and disease

Part 2: Harvesting and Cleaning Flower Seeds

  • Harvesting and drying mature flower seeds
  • Threshing, screening and winnowing to clean seeds
  • Testing the germination rate
  • Storing seeds dry, dark and cool

Part 3: Packaging and Selling Cut Flower Seeds

  • Picking a sales outlet for your seeds
  • Checking for patents, trademarks and seed laws
  • Telling your seed story through packaging
  • Pricing as a seed company, not a farmer


Part 4: Crop-by-Crop Flower Seed Saving Profiles (50)

And a chart of the germination test parameters for 50 cut flower crops and additional online seed saving resources.

Harvest more than your flowers

You’ve done most of the work already. You know how to grow cut flowers. Seed saving is the next step. But there are so many unknowns. Join me, Erika, your fellow seed farmer, in the movement towards local flower seed production.

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Siliques - immature stock seed pods