A Great Non-hybrid Seed Source!

Ottawa, Ontario, March 6th, 2011

One of the best places to purchase your non-hybrid seeds is at your local Seedy Saturdays meeting. Seedy Saturdays are seed exchanges where small seed suppliers, gardening clubs and gardeners can buy, sell, exchange and learn all about seeds. It’s a marvelous way to find pure non-hybridized strains of flower, vegetable and herb seeds. We invite everyone to help promote the sustainability of non-hybrid seeds by attending your local Seedy Saturdays seed exchange.

There was a major rain warning in Ottawa for March 5th, so we thought the turn out for this event might be negligible. We waded through the slush and entered a very crowded Ron Kolbus Center. There were about 40 venders selling an assortment of products. As well as seed suppliers selling vegetable, flower and herb seeds, there were vendors selling products like honey, baked goods, and carpets made of recycled materials and organic chocolate. At times the crowds of shoppers were so thick, that we couldn’t determine what items were being sold at a particular booth.

Some of my favorite small venders, like Terra Edibles and Greta’s Organic Gardens, were present. These are both excellent seed companies who sell heirloom seeds as well as organic seeds. Terra Edibles has been an excellent source for non-hybrid tomato seeds like Stupice, Striped German and Moskvich. Terra also features a line of heirloom sweet peas. During our seed search we discovered new suppliers like the Cottage Gardener, where we remembered to get our Romanesco Broccoli. We also discovered La Vie en Rose Garden and picked up Rhododendron seeds for Zones 3 to 8. La Vie en Rose Garden’s specialty is bearded iris and we’re looking forward checking out this supplier in the spring.

As a collector of perennials, we thought that the star of the show was the Ottawa Valley Rock Garden & Horticultural Society! The Society’s booth featured used gardening books at extremely reasonable prices ($1 to $5) and a wonderful collection of rare non-hybrid seeds. We arrived an hour after the show opened, and the book and seed selection was still excellent. Some of the rare seeds we purchased included Magnolia stellata, digitalis ferrunginia and something called, molosperum peloponnesiacum.

Seeds of Diversity, the show’s host, is a national organization of gardeners and farmers dedicated to preserving the heritage, and biodiversity of Canada’s food plants. Food plants include edible grains and vegetables. The organization provides an annual rare seed directory listing over 3,000 varieties of non-hybrid seeds, and cross references this list with Canadian suppliers of food seeds.

Supporting small growers and seed suppliers is an excellent way to promote our seed biodiversity and to sustain the small seed growers. It’s the small companies who really keep our seed heritage alive, promoting and selling heirloom and non-hybrid seeds. We invite all our readers to locate a local Seed Savers or Seeds of Diversity event, to buy a couple of seed packets and to help preserve the biodiversity and sustainability of our seed supply.

Heirloom Seeds Saving Organizations:

USA
Seed Savers

Canada
Seeds of Diversity

Heirloom Seed Sources:
Terra Edibles
Gretas Organic Gardens
The Cottage Gardener
La Vie en Rose Gardens