Seeds Link One Woman to Her Past


In her sprawling Iowa garden, Harriet Ausable grows her own heritage. There are the 'Rattlesnake' beans and 'Tall Telephone' peas grown from seeds from her maternal grandmother. And the 'Brandywine' tomatoes that remind her of the juicy fruits she ate as a kid.

Why Save Seeds?

Availability: To make sure you have your favorite seeds even if seed catalogs stop selling the variety.

Adaptability: Over several seasons, saving seeds of a particular variety can result in a strain that is particularly well adapted to your garden's unique microclimate and growing conditions.

Preservation: Many varieties are not sold through seed companies and are passed on through generations of gardeners.

Diversity: By saving seeds, gardeners help improve biodiversity and genetic diversity.

Action Steps:
Experiment with a few heirloom and open-pollinated varieties and see how you like them. Join a local or national seed exchange and learn about the seeds other gardeners have. If you have some heirloom seeds offer them to other members. Save your own seeds from your favorite open-pollinated varieties.

"The common plants aren't necessarily the best tasting," she said. "I like to grow the best plants. And the best means more than just what produces the most or the earliest."

Ausable is part of a growing trend in gardening: growing open-pollinated heirloom vegetables and flowers. These are varieties that, unlike hybrids, have the ability to cross-pollinate among themselves and produce seeds that will grow into plants similar to the parent variety.

Growing open-pollinated varieties helps preserve the genetic diversity of plants under cultivation at a time when more and more agricultural land is dominated by just a handful of varieties. For example, only two pea varieties account for 96 percent of the U.S. crop.

Growing heirloom seeds also opens up a world of possibilities for the adventurous gardener, from purple tomatoes and orange peppers to striped beets and long, tapered radishes.

Ausable saves many of her own seeds, especially peppers, beans and tomatoes. The rest she buys from seed companies or trades with neighbors.

"It's more interesting when you have different varieties and everything isn't the same," she said. "I suppose sameness is expected in the grocery store, but not in my backyard."

For more information
Seed Savers Exchange is the largest U.S. group dedicated to seed saving. It has 8,000 members who grow and distribute open-pollinated heirloom vegetable and flower seeds. For more information and their online catalog, go to their web site.

The International Seed Saving Institute has provided seeds to projects around the world.

If you have any questions or comments, please e-mail: info@gardeners.com

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