Here's a cool link I just found:

Here is a link that might be useful: How to tell when Lupine seeds are mature...

Excellent, MM! Thanks very much!

Very cool link. Thanks for asking that question and sharing that answer.

Bonny

i have a suggestion if your going to save the pods in the house to dry for next year. shake all the earwigs out of the pods before storing them in side. my house is now infested. i didnt think when i cut them and place them upside down in the sack that they had critters living in them. earwigs are everywhere in my house now. they even managed to get in my daughters bed. she was really excited about that to say the least.
tanya

OK, all together now -- earwigs in bed....

EEEEEeeeeeewwwwwwww!

Thanks for the warning, this has been a really bad year for earwigs! I'll be careful.

You have the same problem with hibiscus and disco belle seeds, so here's what I'm going to do.

As those lupin pods start to turn brown, they are going to get a nylon knee high over them so they fall in it. Once the seeds are all out of the pods, they will go into a ziploc bag, labeled with the seed name and date and into the freezer for 2 weeks.
Freezer kills the bugs and any larvae that might be left.

After 2 weeks they come out of the freezer, left in the zip lock bag for a few days to be sure no bugs. If I see anything moving, back in the freezer for another week.

Has worked for me for 3 years with hibiscus and the same bugs, so should work for the lupin as well.

My daughter would have died with earwigs in her bed. This 24 year old is afraid of moving bugs.

Fran

Great advice, Fran!

Had to LOL at your daughter, this 50+ year old is afraid of moving bugs too. So what am I doing out there in the garden every day? I must be nuts.

the earwigs werent as bad as the snake in her bed last yr. apparently it came thru the bathroom sink and ended up in her bed. she thought it was a rubber one her brother put in there. you should have heard the scream!!!! another one was in our bathroom and our oldest daughter was in the shower. when she came out she freaked so bad she broke the tank off the toilet. that was costly. it's happened once every yr for the last 3 yrs. we think we fixed the problem but we will see. to keep this on topic i use paper bags instead of fighting the hose. but, i will freeze the seeds and my hollyhocks as i have the dreaded hollyhock weavil.

Oh what fun, snakes in the bed. My elderly neighbor is afraid of the garter snakes in the yard. You can hear her scream all the way to the moon if she sees one.

Funny thing with my daughter, she teaches genetics and microbiology in HS. They have to do stuff with flies and that doesn't bother her at all, CAUSE THE D##N THINGS ARE DEAD, SO SHE CLAIMS.

She was visiting her roommate from college last summer, the roommate is from Florida and lives there now since graduation. One night the phone rang and on the other end of the phone was her old roommate and all I could hear was my daughter screaming at the top of her lungs.
Roomie says, "just wanted you to get a good laugh, she's staring down a huge palmetto bug and it's so funny."

I was laughing for days.

Must admit though, I kind of freak if a see a spider, but have a good reason. I'm allergic to spider bites, you don't want to see what happens if I get one. That's why I'm not allowed to prune any bushes that will have my face near or in the bush. One bit on my forehead or around my eye and the eye is swollen shut for 2 weeks and massive infections.

OH yes, freeze those malva seeds too. Weevils and their eggs die in there too.

Alison, you are crazy. Didn't you know that part of the definition of a gardener is crazy?
Think about it, we try to beat mother nature by growing things that the 4 legged critters love to chew up, we die of the heat, sweat like you know what, water, water, water, all to try and have beautiful flowers in our gardens. Half the time we loose the battle with mother nature.

Now we've become addicted to seed trading, Winter sowing, and we have even more seeds to start.

For Pete's sake, we are outside in the freezing cold in the winter, climbing through snow to put containers full of dirt with seeds in them outside to "germinate when mother nature says to germinate" and you wonder if you're nuts.

Yup, we're all nuts, and love every minute of it, don't we?

Fran

Actually, it is critters like earwigs, slugs, millipedes/centipedes, spiders (yes, I know they're beneficial, but they creep me out!), and stinging insects like wasps and hornets that bother me most.

I love snakes! I wish that big black rat snake that I saw in my front garden last fall would come back and eat up all these horrible chipmunks and little bunnies. I want them to die a horrible death, having the breath squeeeeeeeezed out of them!!

Alison, will drowning them work? Cause if it will can tell you how to easily do it. Just learned the method from a physical therapist tonight.
Best part is they actually drown themselves, all you do is provide the means for them to drown themselves.

There are tons of Lupines growing in the roadside ditches all around my area right now. There is a small patch near my house. i was hoping to figure out how to propogate them and found that seed is the way to go. I appreciate the information on harvesting seeds from the plants but can someone tell me about when I can expect the seed pods to form, then dry and then pop open. The ones in my area are wild and in full bloom now around the middle of May. When would I look to harvest the seeds?

Here is a photo of some of the plants near my home:

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Bruce