posted: Jul 20, 2008

The summer progresses and now that the weather has been hot and dry for a while, the seeds are steadily becoming ready to harvest.  The prairie smoke (Geum triflorum) is ready on the plot and so we check it daily in an effort to harvest the seeds before they scatter with the wind.  The feathery appendage attached to the seed helps the seed disperse in nature.  Our challenge is to collect the seed after it has ripened and before it blows away.  We have found that a Shop-vac powered by a generator does a great job of sucking off the seeds that are ripe and leaving those that are not ready on the plant.  Katie is having fun vacuuming the seeds off and we have found that two Shop-vacs going at once really gets the job done quickly!



The prairie smoke makes our job easy by showing us clearly when the seed is ready to be harvested.  The seed head begins upright and twisted like a flame (See Picture #1 below) after emerging from the petals of the flower.  Then as the seed develops and it begins to dry out the feathery awns attached to the seed begin to spread out and eventually flatten. (See Picture #2 below).  The flattened out heads is our cue that the seeds are ready and are easily plucked by fingers, blown by the wind, or sucked off by the vacuum in our case.  This is one of my favorite plants!  I think all of the stages are incredible and I'm so glad I get to experience them all.
-Brenda


Picture #1


Picture #2