QUESTION: My okra plants are healthy and growing well. Can I save okra seeds for next year? – Timothy W
ANSWER: If you are interested in saving okra seeds from the species growing in your garden, you need to make sure that the plants are isolated and growing well out of distance of any other okra varieties, otherwise your seeds might end up being hybrids. Okra is pollinated by insects, so if an insect brings pollen from another okra variety to your plants, the seeds may end up having seeds that are hybrids of the two different plants. This can be prevented by only growing one variety of okra in your garden.
If you are growing okra seed pods to eat them, they should be harvested when they are three to five inches long. However, gardeners who are growing okra for seed harvesting need to wait for the seed pods to grow and develop as large as they can before picking. For seed harvesting, allow the seed pods to dry on the vine and begin to crack or split before removing. Once the pods have started to break open, remove them and split or twist them into a bowl or container.
There will be no fleshy materials on the seeds, as you allowed the pods to dry out before harvesting them, so there is no need to wash the seeds prior to storing. However, you should allow them to dry further in the open air for a few days before storing. Once they have had a chance to fully dry, place the seeds into an airtight jar and put them in the refrigerator.
Some okra seeds will remain viable for as many as four years, but other varieties produce seeds that don’t have nearly the same longevity. Either way, it’s best to play it safe and use the collected seeds within the next growing season. For the best results germinating your okra seeds, soak them in water for a day or two before planting, or put them in the freezer overnight the night before planting them to help break the seed wall.
Am a female youth planning to venture into Okra farming. Am in Zambia and the weather is getting warmer now. I would like to learn and know how to grow the Okra plants not to become taller but produce and yield health and very good pods and am growing them organically. Kindly advise on hits.
Thank you in advance
Hi, I see you have gotten no reply and your post is old but I will try to answer.
I am in the US, in the state of Florida with a similar growing cycles and temps to your country. ( Very little freezing and very hot in summer). You may have a higher elevation than we do.
Okra loves both heat and water so getting it started in early September in your area appears to be your best bet.
(Similar to corn) You should get good production by November if you can keep the water steady and pests under control. We use a large amount of both goat and sheep dung for fertilizer with a health dose of wood ash from burning tilled into the soil about 1 month before planting. We also substitute with extra NPK using liquid fertilizer 24-8-16 biweekly between planting and flower production to get our plants pushed into the best possible conditions.
If you have a natural low area that stays more damp (not saturated) it would make watering easier overall. My grandparents use to plant it along a swamp and let it grow out naturally.
Like most flowering plants you can force okra into blooming well by shocking it slightly by withholding water for a few days and drying the soil…. For us, the heat and temperature swings do a good job of doing this naturally. Do however reapply water before the fertilized flower starts to set or you will cause the fruit to crack from swelling.
With only about dozen plants we will get about 3 kilos of okra in optimal weather conditions.