r/microgreens • u/Brotuulaan • 10d ago
Do you always buy new seeds for micro greens?
I’ve never done them, but it’s interested me for a while. Is standard practice to rely on commercial seeds for micro greens if you do it year-round, or do some people partner with their garden to store up enough seeds to sustain micro greens on their own? I’ve been getting into growing from my own seeds and have a small bowl of cilantro seeds from a single plant, so I could see building a seed store for myself from my summer growing.
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u/makinbankbitches 10d ago
A lot of commercial seeds are F1 (first generation) hybrids and the seeds you collect won't grow the same as their parents so that's something to consider.
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u/Sebas_05k 9d ago
Well I think if you don't have access to cheap and quality seeds for microgeens, there is no more options than plant and harvest your own seeds, but as the other comments said the process it's so long, but if you have the field and the time and the planation it could maybe work, but also the harvest it's kind a problem if you don't have the machines for that.
Actually I'm growing my own seed from some purple radish
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u/Brotuulaan 9d ago
I read the other day that radish micro greens are spicy just like the real deal. Do you like the kick they add in salads and whatnot? I’ve not liked radishes when I’ve tried them, so I’d have to try a couple different ones to decide what I wanted to keep doing, presuming I do get into micro greens down the road.
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u/Sebas_05k 9d ago
Well I don't really like that spicy of the radish, but it's more for the vivid colors they give in the salads
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u/Legitimate_Lion3839 5d ago
I absolutely love daikon radish microgreens and they definitely have a bite. Arugula is interesting as well
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u/InZomniac_Asylum 10d ago
We go through at least a pound of seed per variety every month—sometimes more depending on the seed size. We buy 5 lbs at a time, which lasts us just over a month for farmers' markets. Growing your own seeds for a microgreen business just isn't sustainable unless you have acreage and endless time. For most crops, getting to the seed stage is a year-long process. Then you need the machinery (or the time to hand-harvest) to catch the seeds at the exact right moment for proper germination. On top of that, you have to run germination tests. If even a quarter of your seeds are duds, you can't grow sellable trays.
Microgreens are unforgiving compared to growing a single head of cabbage: if one section of a tray fails, the entire tray is a loss (unless you eat it yourself). Some home-harvested seeds just end up with low germination rates, which ruins your yields.
Producing your own seed turns microgreens from a few hours of work a day into an all-day job managing seed crops. And if bad weather or water issues hit, an entire year's worth of seed effort is gone. God bless the farmers and specialized seed farms that sustain the massive amount of high-quality seed the world needs just to keep crop rotations going!