Lyn, sorry, but moldy seed usually isn't viable. It's a hard lesson learned, but many of us are decorating our desks and dining room tables much of Summer and Fall with saucers, custard cups, salad plates of drying seed heads and seeds.

If you must bag them, use a paper bag and even then I'd give them a few days exposed to open air, circulating air.

I left my echinacea seed heads for the chickadees this year or I'd send you some, wouldn't be surprised if someone else has kept more than they need though...You may not have to buy.

Sorry to hear about your seeds. I'm a heavy-handed seed harvester--not too many escape me--but I keep paper cereal bowls on hand that I use to dry the seeds on racks inside my garage, often for a number of weeks after harvest. This also allows any multi-legged crawlies to leave of their own free will. Only after seeds are thoroughly dry do I bring them indoors. Dry seeds are stored in small 2 oz. plastic salad dressing cups with snap-on lids.

I harvested buckets of Echinacea seeds but while they were drying inside the garage, some sort of tiny worm ate each one from the inside out and left me only the empty seed husks. Sorry I don't have any to send you. You might check the Seed Exchange and maybe someone will have them for trade or postage.

I found some echinacea that is a year old. I was looking to see what else I had to plant and found some old seed! I'm going to give it a try.

Being a die-hard experimenter, I'd hit them with a 10% bleach/water mix, dry them off, and sow them...dead mold and all. I've received moldy seeds, both in trades and in purchases, and while germination rates haven't been as high as nicely-dried seeds, they have germinated. Echs self-sow vigorously in my garden, and it's hard to believe some of them haven't gotten moldy over the course of the fall and winter. If they're rotten, they won't germinate, but mold on a seed coat is a surface thing.

I've kept mine in brown bags. But I found some seeds dried out to ash. What is the best way to store seeds?

ladyrose, were you sure it was ripened seed, viable seed? Dry, and on the cool side if possible, is the recommended way to save most. The actual shape of the seed shouldn't be lost by drying, they can only get so dry....if it's got a seed coat to protect the embryo, should still be able to recognize it as seed. Fluctuating temps and high humidity can be hard on them - in my own house with heat pump, I don't have all that much moisture in the air, and on my desk or in a drawer works fine. I make sure seeds have completely air dried, then use the 2 x 3 zip locks, or sometimes glassine stamp collectors envelopes (still have a bunch of those from a box of 2000 I bought years ago).

There are a few I don't let dry more than a couple of weeks at most after harvesting - those go into sterile moist vermiculite in the tiny ziplocks. But these are exceptions to seed storing and not the rule - include dicentra scandens, epimedium, hellebores, saruma, cyclamen, trillium, couple of others...

I am storing my seeds in the unheated garage for the first time. We are having a mild winter so far (few days below freezing for any length of time) but that could change. Should I bring them in to where I usually store them (coolish dark closet indoors) or are they ok our there even if it freezes? It's dark most of the time.

I am so sorry you ended up with mold. It's a horrible feeling to think you have saved something for so long, to find them not in perfect condition. Depending on how bad it is, I'd still pant them anyway. The other option is to...throw them out? Nah! Give them a chance. I like the quick bleach idea, too, just make sure it is quick and does not soak into the shell.

I keep my seeds in plain old drug store type envelopes, in a plastic shoe box size bin, in the basement (dry and cool). A few envelopes collected late this fall are still in my car's center compartment because they never made it inside, and are experiencing any freeze that happens. I worry more about heat than cold for raw seeds. I kept a batch in the shed by mistake, and the shed can get pretty hot in the summer time. I have little hope for those, but will still plant them.