I’ve been too busy to post about them until now, but there have been some very exciting additions to the Blogger’s Seed Network recently.
I posted before about Bishop’s Homegrown. For any gardener having access to a plant breeder is a really exciting thing. It gives you a chance to try new things that no one anywhere near you will have in their gardens. If you’re a little more adventurous, it also gives you the chance to try some things that ‘aren’t quite ready yet’, a fantastic opportunity to get an insight into what’s behind plant breeding and to selectively save your own seeds and create a special breed custom made for your own garden with most of the work already done for you.
Mike of Braamekraal Farm in South Africa hasn’t had a chance to update his seed list for this year, so you may have to contact him for more information as to what he has available. He’s also in the southern hemisphere, meaning his growing season is 6 months out of sync of those of us in the northern hemisphere, so he will almost certainly be posting updates to his seed lists accordingly. Mike has a great blog too! Mike mentioned he is working on seed trading software, that will maintain lists of wanted and offered seeds and attempt to match them. It will be open source, and anyone interested in helping out should get in touch with him for more details.
Urban Food Gardening in Ireland is a blogger who is offering several different seeds from her garden.
David of Worldwide Seed Trader is working on a very interesting concept for a seed company, almost a cooperative by the sounds of it. It sounds like he has a number of the same goals that I do in setting up this seed network. He is very interested is people who will grow and give him feedback on the seeds he offers. Anyone with a blog who is willing to write a post about their experiences should certainly get in touch with him, but his seeds are available to anyone with or without a blog. I think it’s fair to say he has the largest collection of seeds and is offering more varieties to this seed network than anyone else so far.
Grunt and Grungy’s Garden located in Canada near the US state of Idaho, with more than a century of gardening experience between them, is building a their own seed bank for future generations. They are both interested in contributions to their effort, as well as offering their seeds to others. They are really wonderful and friendly people, and welcome gardening related questions and correspondence.
The Seed Ambassadors, who travelled through Europe recently, blogging about their experiences as well as collecting and distributing seeds, have also agreed to make their seeds available via the Bloggers Seed Network. At the time of this writing they have not published their 2009 offerings, but I think it’s coming soon.
We now have 18 participants in 10 countries. There are likely thousands of varieties of seeds available for the asking. What are you waiting for? Make some friends, ask for some seeds!
If you have any questions or comments on the seed network, be sure to let me know. To be clear, this is a network intended to serve the people offering and growing the seeds, and improving it is a lot easier if you let me know what you think about it. All feedback gratefully accepted!
If you have seeds you want to offer in this way let me know. If you don’t have a blog, it’s no problem, I will post your offerings here on my blog.
Although I’m still blog-less, count me in as well, I still have to make my seed-list, and I’ll find a way to publish it,
Frank
I finally decided to join the network though I have not much to offer. With time I will have more and more seeds to offer (I hope), so count me in!
Hi Gintoino and Frank, great! I’ll be in touch with both of you in the coming weeks or so to work out the details.
To be clear to anyone reading this and thinking about joining. If you don’t have any seeds to share, you don’t need to join. Just get in touch with the people in the network and ask them for seeds.
Everyone has their own policies on trading and payment, but I have been in contact with everyone listed here, and they all agree to offer their seeds to anyone and everyone, either for free or small payments, possibly even in different currencies. Most people offering seeds don’t have expectations for big profits, but perhaps some would like to recover the costs of sending the seeds.
Some people also limit the countries or regions where they will send their seeds to, and occasionally have other conditions.
Patrick, Many thanks for adding me to the network and for your kinds words about the blog!
A suggestion for people (waves at Frank 😉 who are looking for ways to host their seed lists but don’t want to get into the whole blog thing would be to use Google Sites as an easy (and free) way to publish their lists.