Why Save Your own Seed?

[macmex]

Thought I'd start a specific thread on this. At the time of writing this, there are quite a few folk lamenting that seed companies are overwhelmed, seed stocks are in jeopardy, due to rushes on them, and delivery time is often super slow, due to mail issues. This is one reason to save seed. Last year I got busy and didn't even order any seeds, yet our garden went on. This year I have ordered some seeds. Hopefully they arrive in a timely manner. I ordered from Sandhill Preservation Center, which doesn't accept online or credit card orders. To order from them you have to mail in your order and a check. In this day and age this deters some people from using them, something I'm kind of counting on!

There are other reasons to save seed! Let's talk about them here. Green Country Seed Savers' purpose, in part, is to encourage and educate others so that they can be seed savers.

This can be a good thread to tell us your ordering woes or triumphs.



Gardening and Seed Saving Go Hand in Hand

[theozarkan]

Just got some tomato seeds in the mail today. If they can just go in a regular envelope and not be treated like a package they seem to go faster.

I got these off ebay but it was from someone that I had bought from before. Actually I've had nothing but good luck with ebay seeds but I have heard horror stories as well. One thing I would do is make sure they have been a member for several years. There is a seller there right now that has a ton of tomato seeds listed with good prices but they only started selling this fall so I had to pass on those. I noticed that one of their positive feedbacks said "I hope these are real". lol If they are con artists they will be long gone before anyone could tell what kind of tomato they are actually growing.


I wasn't going to buy anymore tomato seeds this year but when I was looking through my seeds awhile back I couldn't find my blush seeds I had saved from a couple of years ago. The blush has become my favorite cherry and was the only cherry I was going to plant this year but when I couldn't find them I guess that was all the reason I needed to make another order. I now have sunrise bumble bee and barrys crazy cherry in my collection. I've seen mixed reviews on the taste of the crazy cherry but I figure they can't be any worse than yellow pair.


I'm still waiting on some okra seeds but I don't think they have been mailed yet. They have on their website that they are not taking orders until Feb 1st so they can catch up. Another place seems to only keep their site open for orders for a half day so they can keep up.

[macmex]

You are correct. I've had some good things come out of eBay too. There's a vendor there, from the Appalachians, somewhere, who sells bean seed. It's very nice. That's how I got my start of Old Timey Long Cut Greasy, a very find pole bean.

Have to be especially careful with vendors from China. I've been ripped off by them too many times. They're most famous for selling something like Bell pepper seed labeled as some exotic hot pepper. By the time the buyer figures it out, they're gone.

[theozarkan]

The last of my seeds have arrived. Mailed out Monday from FL and arrived in north AR on Friday. Maybe the mail is starting to normalize. I guess that will be a wrap on my 2021 seed buying. I'm glad they all made it in but in a way I will miss the anticipation of there possibly being something good in the mail. Now it's back to junk mail and bills.

[john]

A very relevant topic George. My wife gave me the heads up last summer that there could be seed shortages this year due to many factors. So like a wise husband I listened and I ordered my hybrid sweet corn seed last summer. (corn is the only crop I grow that I can't seem to find open pollinated equivalence with modern hybrids)
As it turns out, there are definitely shortages and the seed companies are finding that the reserves are down, so if they run out they might not be able to order from their supplier so they can do a back order.
For many years people like George have been spreading the news that it is important to save your own seeds. Unfortunately it looks like we are approaching that day when his words seem prophetic. There is much wisdom on this site, and people will come here to learn about how to save their own seed. When I first got into seed saving the internet wasn't really a thing so I bought this book for a buck or two. It is written by Johnny's selected seeds founder Rob Johnston. It is still available and it describes in simple practical terms how to save seed from just about everything. (types of seeds that most seed savers don't really venture into, like cabbage, carrots and cauliflower. It can still be had for a couple bucks. Not a bad reference book to have just in case.
www.johnnyseeds.com/tools-supplies/books/growing-garden-seeds-rob-johnston-jr.-9877.html.

[macmex]

Thank you John. I am hoping to get into the production of cabbage seed. Just growing the minimum number of plants needed for maintaining a variety would produce enough cabbage seed for the entire county! I'm a little rusty on the brassicas, but I think, essentially broccoli, cabbage, Brussels sprouts and collards will all cross. So a person needs some real isolation distance or a really large screened cage, to produce pure seed.

The beauty of a group like we have, is that an individual could conceivably produce the pure seed or a variety for the rest, and others could produce pure seed of some other demanding variety, to share with the group too.