Seed Hunt Report 2021

[Pulsegleaner]

Well, I never thought I'd be doing one of THESE this year, between being unable to go into the city to hunt, and the general improved purity of packaged goods making there being basically nothing to hunt FOR. But yesterday, I had to kill some time in order to order from somewhere for lunch and went into my local Korean supermarket and actually found some material.

1 large Bag black soybeans - The surprise here was fragments of what turned out to clearly be a head of emmer wheat, which is and odd find in a bag of soybeans (maybe the farm in New Jersey which grows them was also growing farro for the organic market)
Also one swirly skinned soybean.
Also noted a lot of beans with those white scars on the sides of the seed coat. @Zeedman, you know a lot about soy, are those a growth problem, a disease problem or something genetic?

2 bags green peas (Chinese production)- one bag had a nice purple spotted pea, and one had an odd soybean

1 bag senna seed (Chinese) the real finds of the trip. I noted a wild type rice bean in the bag when I bought it, but it also contained some morning glory seeds (by now I can tell morning glory from the other bindweed species) and biggest surprise of all, an actual WILD soybean seed. One more for my grow out this spring.

 

[Zeedman]

Also one swirly skinned soybean.
Also noted a lot of beans with those white scars on the sides of the seed coat. @Zeedman, you know a lot about soy, are those a growth problem, a disease problem or something genetic?

By "swirly skinned", are you referring to color, or texture? I have a striped soybean in my collection, but that is a very rare trait in soybeans... so if you have a soybean with such a seed coat, it may be worth saving.

I do occasionally find flawed seed coats in some of my soybeans, most notably black or brown varieties. Although I can't rule out growing conditions as a cause, it appears to be a trait genetically tied to specific varieties. There are no indications of disease, the plants of those varieties are vigorous, and the seed is otherwise normal in all respects. As standard seed saving policy, I select away from such undesirable traits, and never plant the flawed seed... so I don't know what those seeds would produce.

If there are wet conditions as the seed is maturing, any soybean can have cracked seed coats... but in those cases, the damaged skins are accompanied by visible swelling, or other deformity.

 

[Pulsegleaner]

By "swirly skinned", are you referring to color, or texture? I have a striped soybean in my collection, but that is a very rare trait in soybeans... so if you have a soybean with such a seed coat, it may be worth saving.

I do occasionally find flawed seed coats in some of my soybeans, most notably black or brown varieties. Although I can't rule out growing conditions as a cause, it appears to be a trait genetically tied to specific varieties. There are no indications of disease, the plants of those varieties are vigorous, and the seed is otherwise normal in all respects. As standard seed saving policy, I select away from such undesirable traits, and never plant the flawed seed... so I don't know what those seeds would produce.

If there are wet conditions as the seed is maturing, any soybean can have cracked seed coats... but in those cases, the damaged skins are accompanied by visible swelling, or other deformity.

Color it's black with brown swirls. And I know it is rare. As far as I can tell, patterned seed coats are the minority in soybeans. There's the "saddle" (what some of your beans have a a ridge of another color or Agate has) the "speckle" (red or yellow specks on the coat, seems to be a minor trait in several Chinese blacks) the "wooden" (brown or grey, looks like wood grain) and one in a blue moon, a true eyed soybean (circular ring around the hilum, as opposed to the figure eight like shape the "saddle" makes if you were to lay it out flat.)

I think the genetic is likely as well, given that 1. the breaks always occur in the same places (along the sides) the seeds show no other damage and it only seems to apply to the outer seed coat (the inner, white seed coat layer remains unbroken).

 

[flowerbug]

i've noticed various seed coat flaws on soybeans i've grown over the years, i just put it down to a growth condition issue because of how many other seeds on the same plant that look ok.

 

[Zeedman]

Color it's black with brown swirls. And I know it is rare. As far as I can tell, patterned seed coats are the minority in soybeans.

Interesting; that sounds similar to the one I have, which is black & brown striped. It was supposed to be grown in 2020, but had germination issues... it will be started as transplants this year using rescue protocols. I have 10 varieties with saddles (only one of which I grew this year) and some that have black or brown mottling over a lighter base color. The soybean photos next Fall should be more interesting. I'll have to see if any of mine have that "eyed" trait you mentioned. If I read the GRIN codes correctly, none of mine are listed for that trait.

 

[Pulsegleaner]

Not surprising. I've only seen in once, on one, maybe two seeds. And I have no idea where they came from. I was planting out the random small soybean I had found during my rice bean searches years ago when I noted one had a brown ring around the hilum on a otherwise cream skin. I DID get it to sprout, but it caught pythium and died. One other may have had traces of it (in that case though, it was more of a pair of "whiskers" coming out of the hilum, like on a catfish (or given soy's Asian heritage, a dragon.)
Another one I wish I still had was a super tiny (tinier even than my wild soybean seeds) greeny white one that popped out of some Indian coriander seed. Presumably, some sort of fodder/ green manure type (since true wild soybean does not occur that far west in Asia)