No problem at all with several packs of Rutgers packed for 1992. When looking I found a pack of Ace listed for 1986. For the fun of it I will try a couple of seeds tomorrow. No special storage-just in the normal packs in dry Colorado climate.

No problem growing older tomato seeds if they have been properly stored in the freezer. I have tomato seedlings up and growing from 1988, 1992 and 1993 seeds now.

I still have a few hundred seeds for Mozark, sent to me from Dr. Trinklein at University of Missouri-Columbia, dated 1964. The germinated at 70% for me in 2007. Trinklein also got germination at 50%. I'll bet they'll still sprout this year, if I cared to try. But I have fresh seeds now.

I have some old packages around. Ones stored in the refrigerator (I don't have any in the freezer) I'm sure will germinate after 10-15 years. I'm not sure what to expect from some others I received from various sources since I have no idea how they were stored. I'll toss them in with the next batch I'm germinating and get back to you. One is Rutgers packed for 1976. I think that came with others, mostly from the 80s. Pretty sure they came from my dad when he moved awhile back. I know he germinated very old seeds stored in his cool basement with no trouble...and did it in cooked sandy garden soil, no less. Still remember the smell from my childhood days, yuck. Guess it is time to either grow these seeds or toss them. I recently went through ALLLLL my seeds and it is definitely time to take charge of this obsession.

They claim some seeds can last 40 years plus stored in the freezer.

I'm in the middle of experimenting with seeding trays filled with potting mix and popping them in the freezer.

The reason behind this is to seed several months ahead of time, and pull trays all seeded out on a certain schedule. In order to spread out the work load.

Similar to the way a restaurant pulls things out as they get orders.

So far I've just tried some cheap pepper seed and the germ on the frozen trays seems to be quite comparable to the unfrozen (control) trays. I have 5 more trays to pull out of the freezer tommorow. The first batch was only frozen for a week, tomorrow's batch will have been frozen 3 weeks.

I'm going to take some pictures on this.

Special thanks to Elaine Grassbaugh and Mark Bennett from Ohio State Seed Science department on some insight. She clued me in on making sure the moisture level in the seeding media must be at or below that of the seed. And typically she said seed is at about %17 or so.

So ... you pull them out of the freezer and wait how long to water the trays?

I cover them with vermiculite, let them sit on the greenhouse bench a couple hours to thaw, then water.

So far, so good. I tried researching the topic this winter but could find no information on freezing trays already seeded.

"Once a seed begins to imbibe water cell expansion occurs. If cell division occurs, I think freezing would be extremely harmful to the seed. The internal structures would be damaged because the freezing of the water inside the seed crystallizes and expands. This damage is irreversible and probably would render the seed unable to continue germination. Once cell division occurs, stopping the germination process drops vigor and is likely to leave the seed nonviable.
If the seeds are fairly dry (storage level of moisture) and placed in plug trays with dry media mix, they should be okay. Testing this on a small scale as Tim is doing should be repeatable as he states." -Elaine Grassbaugh

I soaked several varieties overnight and wrapped them in moist filter paper today and set them in a warm spot. The varieties were from the 1970s and 1980s and not stored particularly well. We'll see what happens in the next few weeks.....maybe not the oldest, but at least I can clean out my seed box :)

Well, I was pleasantly surprised to realize 100% germination on 5 of 5 Black Plum seeds from 1998. I do store in the freezer and as Carolyn has said several times in the past you must be very careful that the seeds are absolutely dry before they go in the freezer.

Here's the flip side, I purchased a $3.50 packet of Giant Belgian seeds from Burpee, hoping to get true high quality seed. So far, o% of 10 seeds have germinated! I'm sure they will honor their warrenty but it looks like no Giant Belgian for 2009! Also, some seed swap Indian Moon has failed to germinate and that is an equal disappointment.

But I feel good that only 2 of 72 varieties did not make it
this year and the great majority were at 80% or better on germination.