Growing Sesame

[GoDawgs]

This year one of my garden toys is sesame, something I've never grown before. I grew four of them and being OP, all four were different in habit. Pretty white tube-shaped flowers that the bumbles loved.



The pods are now maturing and I've cut off a lot of them. It seems like some were already empty, having spewed their seeds on the ground already so there might be plenty of volunteers next year in that spot. There are three of these plates of seeds drying, tons more pods on the plants.



Here's a pod up close. On the left is how they split on the plant and on the right is half of a pod that I pulled apart.



Those pods are really hard inside. The seeds are in two tunnels that run down each side of the pod halves. I tried breaking the tunnels open to release the seed but found that was very hard to do without getting something metal to pry them open. Then I tried shaking out those tightly enclosed seeds and found that for the most part, they just pour out! Maybe when the seeds dry they shrink a bit to allow that.

Since the pods grow vertically on the plant, I'm wondering how they can dump the entire load of seed without somehow turning upside down, which they don't do. A mystery of the universe.



So I've got the plates under the lights on the plant stand to let the pods dry more since I cut a lot of those that were just starting to split, not completely popped open and halfway turned from green to brown. Maybe I shouldn't and just let them finish drying on the plants and risk losing some seed. Oh well, there's plenty of that!

[PlainJane]

I can’t imagine the scale you’d need to plant to get a jar full. Think you’ll do this again?