How to harvest amaranth seeds

Josh CentersContributor - July 27, 2021

Advice

If you’re growing amaranth in your garden this year, you might be wondering how the heck to harvest the grains. Our pal David the Good published a video on how to harvest them.

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IMO, he is working too hard, but I guess that is not an issue if he is just getting enough seed to replant next year.  I’ve found it is much easier to just cut off the seed heads and store for a few weeks in a spot that is cool & dry.  At that point all the seed will release & release easily.  I recently purchased a set of 5 sifters from Amazon.  They are pretty heavy duty, as they are used for the sifting of wet soil in the hunt for gold.  The mesh sizes are 1/2″, 1/4″, 1/8″, 1/12″, 1/20″. 

I think these folks have a better way of collecting the seed, especially if you want to collect a lot… say in a survival situation.

 

My wife recently got a food sensitivity test done and it told her what foods she should avoid and which are safe. Amaranth was on there as a safe one and I pointed it out to her because I know what it is now because of this forum! 

Hope we can grow it here soon and try it out. Thanks for the video on how to harvest it.

 

Credit for finding this article goes to Josh who was sharing it on our Slack channel:

‘It could feed the world’: amaranth, a health trend 8,000 years old that survived colonization

I still can’t believe I’ve never tried amaranth before but everyone seems to be talking about it.

 

That is a very good article except for the part where they state each plant produces hundreds of seeds.  The actual number is thousands to hundreds of thousands per plant.

I tried growing red stripe amaranth this year, and if failed on me.  I assume it is the variety, as I’ve never had any issue growing amaranth.  I mean, it is noted for growing like a weed.  All my other varieties have.  This variety is considered to have the mildest, sweetest leaves so I’m guessing it has also lost a lot of the “weed” amaranth characteristics.   I don’t babysit my amaranth & expect it to easily outgrow any grass or weeds that come up at the same time.  Red striped didn’t… so I got rid of it.  Looks like it needs to be started in trays & then planted.

 

Thought you would like that article Redneck. Glad you were able to read it.

Are you going to try red stripe again next year?

 

No, I think I will go back to a grain (seed) variety.  They are big, tough plants best suited for a prepper garden.  You can still eat the young, tender leaves.  They might be a touch strong flavored & probably would be best for most to add to a soup.  The leaves are incredibly nutritious.   I’ll probably plant golden giant again.  That thing truly grows like a weed and needs no special care.