# Remember the Amaranth Fr... by @SarahTaber_bww on Twitter # Remember the Amaranth Fr... <cite>by @SarahTaber_bww on Twitter</cite> ## Metadata - Author: [[Sarah Taber]] - Full Title: Remember the Amaranth Fr... - Link: https://twitter.com/SarahTaber_bww/status/1426588330863611905 ## Highlights ### ([View Tweet](https://twitter.com/SarahTaber_bww/status/1426588330863611905)) > Remember the amaranth from last week? The seeds are now dried, threshed off the plant, cleaned the miscellaneous plant parts out of them, & chillin in a jar. 1/3 lb from 1 plant! Not even the whole plant, there are some seed heads on that same plant that are still ripening.    --- > This plant had a lot of space, about 4 square feet to itself. On a per-acre basis it clocks out to 3,600 lbs per acre. This is respectable; commercially yields around 1-2,000 lbs/acre are expected. https://t.co/i80nRCxbpz --- > Bear in mind this plant still has some mini seed heads still waiting to harvest & some seed got lost in my super crappy DIY thresh & winnow process, so 3,600 lbs/A is a lowball. extremely proud of my ability to grow noxious weeds like a boss✌️ --- > How I got the seeds off & cleaned: an extremely DIY approach that used whatever crap I had sitting around the house --- > 1. Cut the seed heads off the plant. I like to get em in a bag/pillowcase ASAP just so they're not shedding seeds around the yard & making weed problems for later  --- > 2. Dry. This will help ALL the seeds fall off. I did this by putting them on a fitted sheet to help keep any seeds that fell off from wandering. Put them in my office under a ceiling fan left on for about a week, bc the south is humid & you can't just assume stuff will dry lol  --- > Also this seed head was a monster that was so fat & juicy it could go moldy before it dried. So I cut some of the sub-branches off & spread them out, and turned each piece over every day or 2. That pic is of a slightly dismembered seed head. --- > 3. This morning I picked out the dried leaves, bunched up the sheet & tied a rubber band on to keep anything from falling out, & just heckin played piñata with it for a minute. This is called threshing! Dislodging the seeds from the rest of the plant --- > ps if anyone has kids they LOVE this part --- > 4. Now you have a sheet full of loose seeds & miscellaneous plant junk. Now you get to sort them! hang on lemme get a pic real quick --- > Behold an extremely sophisticated seed cleaning device, a colander & a plate  --- > Just dump a couple handfuls of threshed stuff into the colander. Stir it around until all the tiny stuff has gone through, & only bigger fluffy plant junk is left in the colander. Throw it out & repeat until you got the whole batch. --- > sry I don't have pictures of this, today was the first run so I just wanted to make sure it worked before Documenting It For Posterity lol --- > Now! You have all the tiny stuff you pushed through the colander! A lot of it is seed, but a lot of it is not! Just little flower parts & dust & debris. Great news, that stuff is small but it's way less dense than the seeds. Now we sort by density aka winnowing. --- > Winnowing 101: get a basic households fan & two trusty bowls/large measuring cups that have pour spouts. The spout really helps!  --- > Weird thread break, see if this helps https://t.co/Rb5Dh8pYkY