Harvesting & using the poppy seeds

The poppy, also wild poppy or Corn poppy called, can be used for cooking, but other baking ingredients are used sorts, such as blue poppy or gray poppy. The names indicate the color of the seeds. A well-known growing area for poppy seeds is Austria. Different types of poppy seeds are grown there that have only a low morphine content.

When do you harvest poppies?

If you have poppy seeds for that sowing If you want to harvest next year, it is best to do so on a dry day. The capsules should already be dry, then the seeds are ripe and can be released from the capsules by gently shaking them. Store the seeds in a dry and cool place until sowing.

About four to six weeks after the blossom the seed pods are ripe and can be harvested. Industrially grown poppies are mostly harvested in August or September. However, the exact harvest time always determines the degree of ripeness of the capsules. This can be recognized by the brown color and the rattling of the loosened seeds when shaken.

How do you harvest poppy seeds?

If the poppy seeds are to be harvested by hand, it is a very time-consuming undertaking. The stems become single cut and combined in bundles. The bundles are then shaken upside down to allow the seeds to loosen. These fall into a container in which they are collected.

Machine harvesting is now widespread. The ripe capsules are harvested with converted combine harvesters and collected in a storage facility. Capsules that land on the field rather than in storage are used as fertilizer. Mechanical harvesting is much faster because the combine harvesters can harvest around one hectare in three hours.

The most important harvest information:

• Main supplier for baked poppy seeds: Austria
• Harvesting by hand is very time-consuming
• mostly mechanical harvest

Tips & Tricks

If you want to bake or cook with poppy seeds, then use German or Austrian poppy seeds, the cultivation of which is approved. Other types of poppy may contain more morphine.