August 10, 2011 - Seeds-R-Us

If you have ever started a plant or an entire garden from seed, you know that it is quite a job to make it all work. You need to know when to start the seeds, what the conditions need to be for the seed to sprout, when to transfer the seeds to the garden, the depth to plant the seed and the part of the garden where the seeds should be planted in order to rotate the crops and provide the ultimate conditions for each particular plant to successful. The list goes on, but the benefits are great when the crop makes it from seed to producing plant.

But what if there were no more seeds? I have been reading an extremely interesting article in National Geographic. This article, "Heirloom Seeds:  Diet of a Hungry Planet," presents many thought-provoking ideas, but one of the most interesting is based on the fact that, according to this article, 90% of our varieties of historic vegetables and fruits have vanished. For instance, in the 1800s there were 7,000 varieties of apples, but now less than 100 of these varieties remain. Similar variety extinction has been happening to livestock breeds, i.e. 8,000 livestock breeds have been reduced by 1,600 breeds that are now extinct or on the list of being endangered.There have been seed banks started to prepare for the day when valuable crops brink on distinction and to protect heirloom crops that have been around for 100's of years. If specific crops do not continue thriving, it may not be so simple as gong to "Seeds-R-us" for more packets of seeds. It is important to think about where food really comes from.

Reduction in varieties can be attributed in part to the development of new and “improved” species and breeds in search of plants and livestock that are high-yielding and resistant of various diseases. In the process, plants and animals that are suitable for specific regions and climate conditions are disappearing as they have been replaced with hybrids. Countries have been planted in hybrid seeds to help feed their starving people only to later realize that in clearing the land for fast-growing, high-producing hybrid seed, the crops that had been accustomed to growing in the country's particular conditions had been replaced.

So back to the question, “What if there were no more seeds?” Saving and planting heirloom fruits and vegetable seeds can be at least a partial answer to this question. More valuable still is the knowledge and wisdom from those who have spent their lives in agriculture. Tapping these minds about what it takes to raise the seeds to produce gardens and fields of productive plants with bountiful crops…this is where we will find the answers to crop questions for all the various regions and climates of the world. These people know things that just aren’t always documented in textbooks. They can say, “Been there. Done that!”