How to Save Marigold Seeds – EASY Steps!

How to Save Marigold Seeds will give you step-by-step instructions on how to grow your own marigolds year after year without buying new plants. They are one of the easiest flowers to grow.

How to Save Marigold Seeds

How to Save Marigold Seeds - Marigold Flower Head
How to Save Marigold Seeds – Marigold Flower Head

If you’re looking for more gardening tips, The Best Cottage Flowers to Grow and How to Grow Roses will help you on your journey.

Fun Facts About Marigolds

  • Heirloom varieties of marigold blooms produce exact replicas of their parents, while hybrid marigold plants will grow flowers that vary from the parent plants.
  • Marigolds are edible flowers that look beautiful in salads and cakes.
  • The Aztecs believed that marigolds had medicinal powers besides being beautiful flowers.
  • Plant marigolds in your vegetable garden as an excellent companion plant to help with garden pests, and attract beneficial insects. Homesteaders like to plant marigolds around the perimeter of their vegetable gardens.
  • Marigolds are annual flowers, but you don’t have to repurchase more plants when you save the seeds and plant them in your garden beds.
  • For more fun facts about marigolds, check out this article from justfunfacts.com.
How to Save Marigold Seeds - Photo of Orange Marigolds
How to Save Marigold Seeds – Orange Marigolds

Creating a Cozy Life Group

Since you found this article on How to Harvest Marigold Seeds, I’m guessing you love all things cozy living. I created a Facebook group called Creating a Cozy Life with over 185,000 like-minded souls.

It’s a group where we share recipes, pictures of things that leave you in awe, and ideas on how to make your life just a little bit more snug. You can join here to be part of the virtual cozy cottage.

How to Harvest

Wait until after the first frost to cut off your dead marigold seed heads with clean shears at the base of each flower. October is usually the best time to save your seeds at the end of the season.

How to Dry

The best way to dry marigolds is to place them on a paper plate with edged sides and let them dry for at least a week. Remember that moisture is the enemy of seed keepers, so you want to ensure your seeds are thoroughly dry. The edges on the paper plates are an easy way to keep your seeds in place. You could also use another flat surface, like a paper towel or brown paper bag.

Keep the plates of dried marigold heads in a dry place in your home.

After the week is up, place the hulls between your fingers and rub them between your fingers to release the marigold seeds. The seed pods should easily remove the seeds.

What Does a Marigold Seed Look Like?

How to Save Marigold Seeds - Photo of Marigold Seeds in a Hand
How to Save Marigold Seeds

How to Save Marigold Seeds for Next Year

Save your marigold seeds in a glass jar, paper envelope, seed packet, or a brown paper lunch bag. Add a label to either the glass jar or envelope with the type of seed pod and the date. Place seeds in a dark place like a cool basement.

How to Save Marigold Seeds - Marigold Flowers in a Garden
How to Save Marigold Seeds – Orange Marigolds

Giving your family and friends your homemade seed packets as gifts is a wonderful way to spread the beauty of flowers. Create a gift basket with gloves, a gardening book, gardening gloves, and a packet of marigold seeds. They will remember you as the person who encouraged them to grow marigolds and will love you for it!

French Marigolds Seed Pods
What does a Marigold Seed Look Like? French Marigold Seed Pods

How to Plant Marigold Seeds

Start your marigold seeds indoors in starter pots before the first frost. If you prefer to plant your flower seeds in the garden, wait until after the last frost date.

Marigold seeds are best planted at least one inch apart, and place seeds no more than one inch deep in the soil. Plant your seeds where they will receive direct sunlight. You’ll soon have a new generation of marigolds to greet your visitors next season.

Saving marigold seeds is a simple and rewarding process, whether you are working with African marigolds (Tagetes erecta), Signet marigolds (Tagetes tenuifolia), or Pot marigolds (Calendula officinalis). The large seed heads for African marigolds will form on tall stems, while Signet marigolds produce smaller seed heads.

By saving marigold seeds, you can ensure a bountiful harvest year after year while saving money and preserving the unique characteristics of each variety.

How to Save Marigold Seeds - Vase with Marigold Flowers
How to Save Marigold Seeds

We’ve reached the end of How to Save Marigold Seeds for next year. I hope you enjoyed it!

Let me know in the comments below what your favorite type of marigold plant is and how you use the flowers. Once you start to growing marigolds, you won’t be able to stop.

Don’t forget to join the Creating a Cozy Life Group. You’re not going to believe how amazing it is!

I created a Harvest Flowers and Store Marigold seeds pin below for you to add to your Pinterest board below so you can refer back to it.

You can follow me here on PINTEREST. If you followed these tips, be sure to tag me on INSTAGRAM.

Thanks for stopping by. I’m so happy you found us!

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How to Save Marigold Seeds for the Next Growing Season - Here are step-by-step instructions on how to save your marigold seeds successfully. Harvesting Flower Seeds #flowergarden #flowerideas #gardenflowers #marigolds / Flower Garden Ideas / Garden Flowers / Pretty Flowers for the Garden
How to Save Marigold Seeds for the Next Growing Season

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5 Comments

  1. Pingback: 35 Best Fairy Garden Plants (& I've tried A LOT of plants!) | Fairy Garden DIY

  2. An avid marigold seed saver and planter, I read this article and realized that except for one thing, you are the ONLY source I’ve read who does this almost exactly as I do. This year I had marigolds all over my yard – in every bed and along the sides of my driveway, etc. Have never enjoyed more beautiful annuals, and there were hundreds. I plant mine using an abundance of seeds, and they grow into Marigold Bushes, as I call them. Areas sometimes 2 -3 feet by 2-3 feet. This year I had mixed colors everywhere of my burgundy and burgundy and orange flowers. Everyone who saw them fell in love, even my daughter in NY who has said she would never waste her time on annuals.
    Your photos of the seed heads were so great and so in keeping with the way I collect mine. I don’t purposely wait until they are brown and dried up, cutting them much earlier in the process, as your photos show. I also put mine on paper plates with edges and store them on top of my kitchen cabinets until Spring. The only thing you didn’t mention is that I either cut off or pinch off the remainder of the bloom and pull my seeds from the seed heads. Lots of trouble, but a fun winter project over the cold months. I find it very meditative. That way, my seeds are never stuck together – each one is separate. This year we got an early freeze, and I actually cut off some blooms rather than lose them. I’ll dry these the same way but have kept them separate just to see if they will germinate after being plucked so early.

    Thanks from one marigold lover to another. Kathy C in Hanover County, VA outside of the Richmond area. This is 1/23/22.

    Reply