All in a day's work at Heritage Farm

These photos were taken within 30 minutes of each other yesterday—just another beautiful, busy day at Heritage Farm![uds-billboard name="all-in-a-days-work-at-heritage-farm" ]

Honoring the earth, celebrating our members!

With Earth Day just around the corner, we'd like to say "THANK YOU" to all SSE members for supporting our mission of preserving the earth's genetic diversity. Please leave a comment below telling us why you became a member!

Learn more about becoming a member of SSE

Welcome to the family

Please help us welcome the newest—and cutest—member of the SSE family, calf number 1801!

SSE's herd of Ancient White Park cattle is one of only five major herds in the U.S. White Park were recently upgraded from critical to threatened by the American Livestock Breeds Conservancy; threatened means that there are fewer than 1,000 annual registrations in the United States and an estimated global population less than 5,000.

Read more about Ancient White Park cattle and Heritage Farm

Webinar: Planning Your Garden for Seed Saving

This month's SSE webinar episode will highlight best practices for planning a garden for seed saving. Learn the difference between open-pollinated and hybrid seed and gain an understanding of plant taxonomy, reproductive structures and pollination methods. View the archived recording of this webinar below.

• View the SSE Webinar series schedule
• Find other archived webinar videos on the SSE YouTube page.
• Become a member today to get access to the SSE Yearbook

Part 1

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=C4BBByHROhg[/youtube]

Part 2

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yBeleZmEyt8[/youtube]

Part 3

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dVGfQDWViuk[/youtube]

Click here for information about SSE's seed donation program

Webinar: How to use the SSE Yearbook

The Seed Savers Exchange Yearbook  is one of the greatest sources of heirloom varieties in the world. This member-to-member exchange offer over 12,000 unique varieties! The Yearbook is also a meeting place where gardeners share varietal-specific growing tips and stories. In this webinar, you'll learn how search, select and request varieties from both the online and print versions of the SSE Yearbook.

View the archived recording of this webinar below.

• View the SSE Webinar series schedule
• Find other archived webinar videos on the SSE YouTube page.
• Become a member today to get access to the SSE Yearbook

How to use the Seed Savers Exchange Yearbook

Part 1

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uGU1nf3dTkg&feature=youtu.be[/youtube]

Part 2

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8T0tgPA7MtQ&feature=youtu.be[/youtube]

Part 3

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Gu5gvG3Byio&feature=youtu.be[/youtube]

Webinar: Welcome to Seed Savers Exchange

Learn about the history, work and latest projects of Seed Savers Exchange (SSE) from co-founder Diane Ott Whealy. View the archived recording of this webinar below.

• View the SSE Webinar series schedule
• Find other archived webinar videos on the SSE YouTube page.
• Become a member today to get access to the SSE Yearbook

Part 1

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cafJHIDdROI&context=C4fe3a97ADvjVQa1PpcFOB3e9BMtgHncqoPFbjnnHkw9D0yZFXtyA=[/youtube]

Part 2

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qD24vnIfAlw&context=C4006626ADvjVQa1PpcFOB3e9BMtgHneUptJrj-hZ8lCIpswK2X0A=[/youtube]

The story of Seed Savers Exchange

"In Gathering: Memoir of a Seed Saver, Diane Ott Whealy takes the reader gently by the hand and retraces a journey that began when her great-grandparents emigrated from Deuschendorf, Germany, and settled outside the tiny immigrant enclave of St. Lucas, in northeast Iowa. Two seeds that they carried with them on that journey became the motivation for a life’s work in preserving and protecting heirloom seed varieties..."

- CivilEats.com

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Join Diane at one of the following upcoming events:

January 23-26, 2013                            Pacific Grove, CA The 33^rd annual ECO Farm Conference Talk: Seed Saving Art & Practice: Preserving our Vegetable Heritage 8:30-10:00 AM Book signing (Gathering) January 23, 2013 at 1pm in the Exhibitor Tent

February 10, 2013                            San Luis Obispo, CA Speaking/book signing/seed swap (Bringing seeds from SSE collection) San Luis Obispo Grange Hall The venue address is SLO Grange, 2880 Broad St., San Luis Obispo, CA 93401 https://www.facebook.com/events/144634362360129/

February 23, 2013                            La Crosse, WI Keynote 10:30-11:30AM La Crosse Public Library, 800 Main St, La Crosse, WI 54601

March 2, 2013                            La Crosse, WI Keynote, "Growing Heirlooms in Your Garden" Bluff Country Master Gardeners "Spring into Gardening Details

March 2-3, 2013                         Minneapolis, MN Speaking/book signing Minnesota Home & Garden Show March 2, 4:00 PM  "Planting and Saving Heirloom Seeds" March 3, 11:30 AM "Planting and Saving Heirloom Seeds" Details

March 16-17, 2013                         Harrisburge, PA Presentation & Workshop Slow Food Harrisburg March 16, 6:00-9:00 PM "The History of SSE" presentation March 17, 2:00-5:00 PM "Saving heirloom seeds" workshop

March 22-23, 2013                         Janesville, WI Presentation & Workshop Slow Food Harrisburg March 22, 6:00-8:00 PM Spring Garden Symposium book fair/celebration March 23, Rotary Botanical Gardens, Spring Garden Symposium

April 7, 2013                          Kennett Square, PA

Branching Out Lecture Series Details

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Diane Ott Whealy is the Co-founder of Seed Savers Exchange (SSE). Founded in 1975 as a non-profit organization, SSE has more than 13,000 members, made up of gardeners, orchardists, chefs and plant collectors—all dedicated to the preservation and distribution of heirloom varieties of vegetables, fruits, grains, flowers and herbs. Diane currently serves as the organization’s Vice President. Regarded by many as the “Mother of the Heirloom Seed Movement,” Diane has been a national leader and strong advocate for the protection of the earth’s rare genetic food stocks for over 37 years. Her recently-released memoir, “Gathering,” is available in book stores throughout North America.

In 1986 Diane helped develop Heritage Farm, SSE’s scenic 890-acre headquarters near Decorah, Iowa. Heritage Farm is a unique educational center designed to maintain and display collections of endangered food crops. She also founded the Flower and Herb Exchange where members offer over 2000 heirloom flowers and herbs for exchange each year. Today she is a featured speaker at garden shows and botanical gardens throughout the country. She also head curator and designer of the flower and herb display gardens at Heritage Farm.

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For further information and bookings, please email education@seedsavers.org

Where to start: How about peppers? How about today?

‘Grandpa Ott’s’ morning glories cover the south face of the iconic barn behind the Lillian Goldman Visitors Center at Seed Savers Exchange. But don’t be fooled by the scenery, this barn is much more than pretty postcard scenery—especially come harvest time!

Behind that wall of sleepy morning glories lies one of the busiest seed saving operations in the country—the first hint of which is the unmistakable sweet aroma of ripe melons drifting from the open double doors. Colorful piles of ripe fruits and veggies sit waiting in buckets while fans blow gently over screens of tiny seeds on drying racks. The colors, smells and sounds are almost as overwhelming as the neatly printed to-do list on the staff white board.

But of course it hasn’t always been like this. SSE’s seed saving operation started in a kitchen, probably much like your own, more than 36 years ago. That’s where we started and that’s where the seed saving renaissance is taking place today! If you’re reading this blog, it means that you’re part of this movement—or at least you could be. You can start saving your own seeds yet this season—today in fact!

Getting Started You don’t need any special tools or equipment to start saving pepper seed. Saving pepper seeds also gives us a chance to review some essential seed saving info on pollination.

Unlike hybrids seeds, seeds from open-pollinated and non-hybrid plants can be saved and replanted to produce plants that retain most of the characteristics of the parent. This means that if you’re growing some heirloom peppers from SSE, you don’t have to buy the same seeds from us next year. In fact, if you learn how to prevent cross-pollination and save the seed properly, you’ll never have to buy that seed again. But let’s not get too ahead of ourselves here!

One thing to know right away is that, while peppers can pollinate themselves, insect pollination is also very common. This means that if you have more than one variety of pepper in your garden— open-pollinated or hybrids—there’s a good chance the seeds you save will be crossed. You can still save the seeds, but the plants will probably be different from the parent.

By using isolating techniques, which we’ll cover in later posts, or only planting one variety of pepper in your garden, you can be more confident that the seeds you save will be true-to-type (i.e. produce the same plant as the parent). Here’s how:

Saving Pepper Seeds Cut open and remove the core from a fully mature pepper. You’ll know it’s mature because it has changed to its final color. To find out what color your peppers should be when mature, see the description on its seed packet or on our website. Rub the seeds onto a paper plate and set them out to dry away from direct sunlight until they are paper-dry.

If you’re handling hot peppers, you’ll want to use rubber gloves. Also, make sure you’re in a well-ventilated room to avoid respiratory problems.

If you’re trying to save seeds from very small peppers, try using a blender. Cut out the stems and blend the peppers with a little water at low speeds. The flesh and immature seeds will float to the surface and can be removed. Add a little more water and repeat until the seeds are clean. Drain the remaining mixture with a strainer before setting them out to dry (coffee filters work well).

Put the dry seeds in a paper envelope labeled with the seed variety and the year, and store in a cool, dry, mouse-proof area. This will help ensure that your seeds dry properly and stay that way. If you’re confident that your seeds are totally dry but not confident that you can keep them that way (i.e. your storage area might experience increased humidity in the summer months), you might consider storing the envelope in a mason jar. Adding silica gel to the jar will help take care of extra moisture that would otherwise rot your seeds.

You’ll know you did everything right when you’re harvesting a beautiful pepper of the same variety next season. And if you get something different, you’ll still learn a lot in the process. Like any adventure, the hardest part is simply getting started!

Give seed saving a try this season with peppers or tomatoes and let us know how it goes by leaving a comment below. You can also find more seed saving tips on the SSE forum.

Thanks to SSE staff member Colin Curwen-McAdams, advisor Suzanne Ashworth, and board members David Cavagnaro and Rosalind Creasy for their contributions to this article.

• For more seed saving tips, check out Suzanne Ashworth’s seed saving classic “Seed to Seed.”
• Learn more about what to consider when saving seeds

The results are in!

The ‘Dester’ took home the blue ribbon at the 6^th Annual Tomato Tasting and Seed Saving Workshop at Heritage Farm last weekend. With over 40 varieties in the lineup, the competition was steep for this year’s unlikely winner.

The ‘ Dester’ tomato was something of a Cinderella story from the SSE trial gardens. Every year our commercial crew grows out a number of new varieties from the collection or from member-growers to discover new offerings for the SSE catalog. This year a champion was born! The ‘Dester’ is a large, full-flavored, pink beefsteak tomato. It was the first tomato on the sampling line, yet the flavor stuck in visitors’ minds when it came time to cast their vote—more than 40 tomato samples later.

Other top finishers included last year’s favorite, ‘Lemon Drop,’ a small yellow-green cherry tomato with a sweet—almost tart—flavor, and ‘Black Sea Man,’ a Russian heirloom with brownish-pink fruit and full-bodied or “complete” flavor, as one participant put it. The salsa tasting line featured 14 homemade recipes. Ironically, the blue ribbon went to Anne Sheahan’s Mango Salsa, proving the eclectic pallets of this year’s voters. (We’ll try to get the heirloom tomato version of the recipe for next year!)

Visitors passed through the display gardens snapping pictures of the towering, 10-foot-tall ‘Hot Biscuits’ amaranth, and the barn wall completely covered in ‘Grandpa Ott’s’ morning glory on their way to seed saving workshops.

SSE tomato advisor Craig LeHoullier was back by popular demand to provide a personal and passionate introduction to the cult of the heirloom tomato, including a list of the tomatoes he would choose to be stranded with on a desert island. (In case you’re wondering, or planning for a "three-hour tour," his list included ‘Cherokee Purple,’ ‘Lucky Cross,’ and ‘Cherokee Chocolate’.)

Craig’s talk was followed by a lively question and answer session, which gave him a chance to show off his encyclopedic knowledge of heirloom tomatoes and their histories. He even managed to dispel a few myths before breaking for a trip through the tomato tasting line. (Don’t believe the hype, says LeHoullier there’s no such thing as a low-acid or disease-resistant tomato!)

“The joy of gardening is that there are no absolutes,” said LeHoullier before prompting the crowd for their favorite qualities of heirloom tomatoes.

Meanwhile SSE staff led a hands-on workshop on saving tomato seeds.

“One thing I try to remember when saving seed at home is that I don’t need 100 fruit to get started,” said workshop facilitator and SSE Horticultural Technician Gabi Masek. “Two to five is really all you need!”

The workshop covered everything first-time seed savers would need to know to start saving their own seed, including ideas of what to do with extra seeds, like trying a home germination test.

While the adults took notes at the workshops and tasting tables, the kids displayed the fun factor of heirloom tomatoes with a tomato toss and ketchup-making activity led by SSE Display Gardener Grant Olsen.

“I already have a few ideas of how to make the tomatoes a little sloppier for next year’s toss,” said Olsen with a grin.

Whether you were tasting, tossing, or taking notes, we hope everyone walked away from this year’s Tomato Tasting and Seed Saving Workshop with a little inspiration for their own gardens.

 And if you missed the event, here are a few tomato seed saving tips to help you get get started:

In nature, ripe tomatoes fall from the plant and slowly rot exposing the seeds, allowing natural weathering to break down the slimy gelatinous coating on the seed.  This is easily replicated through the process of fermentation.  To save tomato seed, seed savers must deliberately remove the coating from the tomato seed. Here’s how:

• Take the seeds out of your best looking tomatoes and put them into any container that can hold liquid.  Don’t worry if there is pulp in with the seeds.  Keep as much juice with the seeds as possible.
• Some seed saving techniques suggest adding water to the mixture.  We recommend not adding water unless the mixture evaporates before it starts fermenting.  This can be done by adding about ½ cup of non-chlorinated water to 1 cup of tomato seed and pulp.
• Fermentation should happen in 24 hours-4 days.  This depends on many variables such as air temperature or how ripe the fruit is.  A layer of white mold may grow across the top.  Once this mixture has fermented continue to the next steps so seeds do not germinate.
• Think about where to put the tomato seed mixture because inevitably it will smell. You may want to cover your mixture with a mesh screen to keep out fruit flies.
• After fermenting, add water and stir.  Mature seeds will sink to the bottom.  If the seed is light enough to float, it is probably not fully formed, mature, or viable.  Don’t save these seeds.
• Pour off pulpy mixture, but not the viable seeds in the bottom of your container.
• Pour the remaining liquid into a kitchen strainer and wash thoroughly under the faucet until clean.
• Drain, and then spread the seeds out thinly on surface to dry.  Any substrate to help them dry as quickly as possible will work: coffee filter, paper plates, paper towel, or wax paper.  It is best to dry seeds out of direct sunlight; this could take up to 4 weeks.
• Store the seeds in an envelope or seed packet and place in a dry, cool location.  You can assess the quality of your storage conditions by adding the room temperature in Fahrenheit plus relative humidity.  Try to keep that number under 100; the lower the number the better the conditions for seed storage.

But don’t forget to follow the most important rule:  Put a label on everything, every step of the way.  Because in the words of our collection curator, “No one wants to plant something, thinking they have one variety and end up with something else.”

Note from a seed saver: Tomatoes will, most commonly, self-pollinate, so seeds saved will remain ‘true to type’ without worrying about cross-pollination.  However, there are always exceptions.  Some tomatoes can cross pollinate, this is dependent on many factors such as flower shape, environment, and biodiversity.  To ensure seed purity you may want to plant only one variety or spread different varieties throughout your garden.