Saving tomato seed in five steps
The easiest seed to start with, and the messiest.

Tomato seed is wrapped in a gel that stops it sprouting inside the fruit. To save it, you let that gel ferment away.
- Pick a ripe tomato from a plant you liked.
- Squeeze the seeds and juice into a jar with a splash of water.
- Leave it somewhere warm for a few days. It will smell. That’s normal.
- Pour off the mould and floating seeds, then rinse the good ones that sank.
- Dry them on a plate, not paper towel, and label them.
Bring a labelled envelope to the seed library and you have done the whole loop.
Written for the Seedlark Commons concept. The garden, its people and the events described are invented.


