Dear Wild Ones members:
As I was out walking the fields, enjoying the lovely scent of flowering milkweed, my thoughts turned to seed collection and our upcoming native plant celebration and seed swap. Now is the time to begin collecting seeds of spring and summer flowering plants.
On my walks, I have completed collecting wild columbine (Aquilegia canadensis) and I am watching wild geranium (Geranium maculatum), pale beardtongue (Penstemon pallidus) and ninebark (Physocarpus opulifolius).
Next time you visit your garden, you can help Wild Ones share the joys of native plants? Help us by collecting a few seeds so we can ensure a great variety at the November seed swap?
Our partners at Wild Ones have lots of tips about when and how to collect seeds.
The Wild Ones Front Range Chapter in Colorado offers a helpful video: https://frontrange.wildones.org/collecting-cleaning-native-seeds/
Learn more from Margaret Roach’s A Way to Garden podcast interview with Tim Johnson of the Native Plant Trust about collecting native plant seeds: https://awaytogarden.com/saving-native-seeds-with-tim-johnson-of-native-plant-trust/
And here’s a tip sheet from the Twin Cities Chapter in Minnesota: https://twincities.wildones.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/32/2022/12/Native-Plant-SeedCollecting-web-20221214.pdf
See you November 15, 2025, at Thacher Park for the Wild Ones Native Plant Celebration and Seed Swap. (Details are here.)
Rosemary Mix
Chapter President
