How to Save Zucchini Seeds: 2 Things You Need to Know!

For many gardeners, zucchini are one of the easiest and most prolific vegetables to grow. Find out how to save zucchini seeds successfully so you can continue growing your favorite variety year after year!

How to Save Zucchini Seeds

 

With a few special tricks, zucchini are easy to save seeds from.

The most common mistake in saving seeds from zucchini is not hand pollinating the fruits you wish to save for seed.

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1. How to Keep Zucchini From Crossing with Other Kinds of Squash

 

Zucchini is insect pollinated and can cross with other kinds of squash growing within 1/2 mile.

As part of the most common squash species, Cucurbita pepo, zucchini can cross with any other C. pepo squash. This includes other kinds of summer squash, most pumpkins, acorn squash, spaghetti squash and small ornamental gourds.

How to save zucchini seeds without any unwanted crossing? Most seed packets list the squash species. Zucchini will not cross with other species of squash, such as C. moshata, C. mixta or C. maxima.

You can easily hand pollinate a few zucchini to get pure seeds. You’ll want to start this process at least 6 weeks prior to your last frost, to give the seed zucchini time to mature.

To hand pollinate, select a male and female flower that have not opened yet. If possible select male and female flowers from two different plants.

 

To hand pollinate zucchini, take a piece of masking tape and tape shut a male flower and a female flower that are orange at the tips, but still closed. These flowers would naturally open the next day, but you want to tape them shut so the bees don’t get in there.

As shown in the pictures above, male squash, including zucchini, have a flower attached to a long stem. Female flowers have a small fruit at the base, even before the flower opens, like the scalloped squash above.

The following morning, pick the male flower and remove the petals. If the flower was ready to open, there should be sticky orange pollen inside. Carefully remove the tape from the female flower. It’s okay if the tips of the petals come off with the tape, but you don’t want to remove the entire petals since you’ll be taping it shut again.

Reach inside the female flower with the male and dust the pollen around at the base of the flower.

Immediately tape the female flower shut again so the bees don’t get in there and mess up what you just did!

Be sure to mark your hand pollinated zucchini somehow so you don’t forget which one it is! You can tie a string around the stem or lightly scratch a marking onto the surface with your fingernail.

 

2. Harvesting Zucchini Seeds

 

Wondering how to save zucchini seeds when zucchini don’t really have much of a seed to save? Zucchini are usually picked for the table when they are still young and immature. But for saving seeds, the fruit needs to get large and develop a thick skin like a winter squash.

The Italian zucchini pictured above was over two feet long! But size is not as important as time and the toughness of the skin. If possible, let your seed zucchini mature on the plant for six weeks or longer. I like to leave mine on the plant until frost threatens and I pick all of my squash.

When you cannot pierce the skin with a fingernail, the zucchini is mature enough for seed saving. At this point, it is more like a winter squash and will potentially last for months once picked. There is no hurry to remove the seeds!

When you are ready to take the seeds out, cut or crack open the zucchini. You can use a hammer if needed!

 

 

Remove the seeds and separate them from the fibers and pulp. Rinse them with a little dish soap. You can soak them in soapy water for an hour or two. The seeds will still have some pulp attached. You can remove by hand as much as you would like, it just depends on how clean you want your seeds!

The rest of the zucchini makes great chicken feed!

Drain the seeds and pat dry. Spread them out somewhere out of the way to dry. Keep an eye on them the first day or two to make sure they are drying out and not molding. To hurry the drying process up a bit, you can place them in a dehydrator set at 95 degrees fahrenheit, or in the backseat of your car. Setting them by an air vent or fan will also help. Don’t them get hotter than 100 degrees.

When the seeds are completely dry, they will snap instead of bending.

Zucchini seeds will last for many years if kept in a dry place. Two of the packets I grew this year were 8 years old stored at room temperature in a shoe box! You can find out more about seed storage here!

 

 

Learn More About Seed Saving

 

You can check out more of our free seed saving articles right here, where we cover everything from how to save zucchini seeds to where to find seed saving supplies!

Seed saving is an important part of food security, as we saw with the seed shortages this year!

If you would like to get serious about saving seeds from your garden, you can learn everything you need to know in just a couple hours with our online seed saving course!

The course includes handy seed saving reference charts and printable seed packets.

It’s the fastest way to start saving seeds from your garden! You can find out more about the course right here!