Purple of Sicily Cauliflower
I first wrote about this cauliflower 6 years ago. Bayu who lives in Indonesia left a comment asking if I had any spare seeds I would send for free, but I don’t have these any more. Does anyone have some seeds, or would like to buy some seeds, and send them to Indonesia for free? If so, please let me know and I’ll forward the email address.
These are pretty ordinary seeds. If you live in the US, they are available for example at Baker Creek. There are similar varieties with different names, so if you have something that looks the same it probably is.
Dan Jason and Owen Bridge on Seed Saving in Canada
Thanks to Mike who mentioned these videos in a comment on my last post. These videos are of Dan Jason of Salt Spring Seeds and The Plant Sanctuary for Canada, and Owen Bridge of Annapolis Valley Seeds, representing Canada’s two coasts at a Seedy Sunday event from earlier this year.
It’s really a great example on how in different parts of the world we have slightly different battles and laws, but in the end our overall problems and goals are the same. Here is Europe we are fighting the battle of legalizing seed saving, but in North America they’re not only fighting to keep seed saving legal, but also facing the real prospect of aggressive police action if they are unsuccessful.
Recently some laws were changed in Canada and other parts of the world like Europe to protect the pharmaceutical industry from the competition of natural foods and herbal remedies. This resulted in raids in Canada where unlicensed vitamins were confiscated by swat teams at gunpoint. It’s very possible heirloom seed companies will one day see their stocks of seeds confiscated in the same way.
We all need to act locally and think globally. We should grow seeds in our own gardens that are locally obtained and suitable for our local climate, but we shouldn’t forget seeds can be obtained elsewhere if necessary. In the same way, we should be fighting our own battles locally, but not forgetting there’s a whole world out there with other people fighting the same battle.
Resilient Seed
Ella von der Haide has produced Resilient Seed, a film about the action days in Brussels last April. The film includes interviews with many interesting people who attended and/or organized the event. If you know where to look there are a few glimpses of me, and Bifurcated Carrots is mentioned in the credits at the end.
This is the English version, and they’ve promised to make versions in other languages as time permits. Especially as someone who participated, it’s really nice to watch the film and think back on a great weekend, with great people, that so many worked so hard to organize.
Untitled from sab inee on Vimeo.
Dutch Article on EU Seed Laws
A friend of mine, Erik D’haese has written a Dutch language article for MO magazine on the current state of EU seed laws. Regular readers of this blog will have seen a lot of it before, but he mentions a few things I didn’t, and it’s really the best article with everything laid out in one place I’ve seen anywhere. Google translate works pretty well translating it into English.
Junaluska Apple
Last year around this time I was looking for fruit tree scion wood, and my search led me to the website of Tom Brown in North Carolina in the US. Even though Tom was willing to cooperate, we quickly discovered the Netherlands doesn’t allow the import of apple tree scion wood from the US without lots of red tape, so the discussion ended.
So much of Tom speaks to what it means to collect and share heirloom and heritage varieties. Tom not only has a very impressive collection of heritage apples, mostly from the US south, but he’s done everything possible to collect stories and other documentation to go along with them. The roots of Tom’s interest in his apple collection lie in his childhood and passions as a young man.
Not only has the world lost so many heritage plant varieties over the years, but we’ve lost the passions that go along with growing, documenting and hunting for them.
Tom recently rewrote and reposted the story of how found the Junaluska apple, and sent me a link. Note too the link on the bottom of the page that leads to the various descriptions of the apple he found. Many of us grow the Cherokee Trail of Tears beans in our garden each year, and now thanks to Tom a Cherokee apple from that time is also available.
If you live in the US and are looking for an apple tree to grow, consider buying this or others from Tom via his website.
