seed starting Archives

Steps to Create a Simple Spring Seed Starting Plan

That’s Actually Fun!

This might sound like a drag, but I promise you, it’s pretty darn fun.

Seed Packets from some of our recommended companies

Creating a simple spring seed starting plan completely transformed my seed starting season.

What used to feel like a hair-pulling mess of guessing, second-guessing, and starting everything at the wrong time has become one of my favorite early-season garden rituals.😊

It helped me clarify, simplify, and focus, and in doing so, it shifted my entire spring garden experience.

For years, I struggled with the same questions many gardeners do – When should I start what? – What have I already planted? – Why does everything feel so chaotic?

Then one day, it finally clicked.🌟 I realized I didn’t need a complicated spreadsheet or a rigid system. I just needed a simple, intentional way organize my seeds by timing. 📆

What followed was a surprisingly easy process that helped me manifest a calm, well-timed, productive spring and summer vegetable garden.

If you’re starting seeds for your spring and summer garden and want a system that feels nourishing instead of overwhelming, the exact process I use is below.

Why Seed Starting Timing Matters More Than You Think

Have you ever wondered why some years your garden feels smooth and abundant, while other years feel rushed and out of sync?

Often, it comes down to timing.

❓Do you do this? –

Many gardeners start everything at once. Spring lettuces get started at the same time as summer tomatoes. Some plants shoot up too fast, others lag behind, and suddenly the whole season feels a little wonky.

When seed timing is off at the beginning, it tends to ripple through the rest of the season.

But when you set this up thoughtfully at the start, everything that follows becomes easier.

As spring unfolds and life gets busier, your garden rhythm is already established. You’re no longer scrambling, wasting time, or spending extra money buying plants because seeds weren’t started on time.

Starting from seed allows you to discover more varieties, uncover better flavors, and harvest a garden that feels truly yours. And it doesn’t have to be complicated.

A Gentle Seed Shift That Changes Everything

scattered seed packets and note paper on a table

I arrived at this system by doing it wrong many times.

Sometimes it felt pretty chaotic.

Each misstep helped illuminate what didn’t work, until this simple process emerged. It now takes me very little time, yet it helps me foster, sustain, and thrive through the entire growing season.

Instead of reacting, I feel prepared. Instead of stress, there’s flow. Instead of confusion, there’s confidence.

And that’s exactly why I wanted to pass this along to you.

My Simple, Step-by-Step Spring Seed Starting Plan

This is the exact method I use every year to create a spring and summer seed starting schedule that feels clear, calm, and doable.

light green number one is a dark green circle with a lavender outline

Step 1: Pull One Seed Packet Per Crop

From your seed stash, pull out one packet for each type of crop you want to grow.
One tomato, one pepper, one zinnia, one marigold, one basil, and so on. This keeps things focused and prevents overwhelm.

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Step 2: Read the Back of the Packet

On the back of each seed packet, you’ll find guidance on whether the seeds should be started indoors or direct seeded outdoors.

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Step 3: Create Two Simple Piles

Based on that indoor/outdoor information and your own past experience, separate your packets into two piles:

Seeds to start indoors
Seeds to start outdoors

This step alone can feel incredibly clarifying.

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Step 4: Sort Indoor Seeds by Timing

Start with the seeds you’ll be starting indoors. Put them in order based on how many weeks before your last frost they should be started.

This information is on seed packets from companies that support home gardeners.

I usually end up with piles like this:

10–12 weeks before last my frost
8 weeks before
6 weeks before
3–4 weeks before

For example, through experience I’ve learned that here in zone 7 Virginia:

Thyme and basil do best started 10–12 weeks early
Peppers and eggplants around 8 weeks
Tomatoes at about 6 weeks
Squash closer to 3 weeks

Your timing may be a little different, and that’s okay. This process helps you tend to what works in your garden by giving you a framework to start.

You can put sticky notes with the timing on the top of each pile if that helps you at this step.

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Step 5: Sort Outdoor Seeds the Same Way

Next move on to the seeds you’ll direct sow outdoors. Decide which ones you’ll start first, second, and third based on what is on the seed packets and your past experience.

I also separate out crops I’ll succession plant, like carrots.

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Step 6: Create Simple Time-Frame Baggies

Place each group of seed packets into its own baggie. On the outside, write when that set should be started and if it is started inside, outside or outside succession planted.

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Step 7: Add Your Chosen Varieties

Now go back to your full seed collection, pull the varieties you want to grow, and place them into the appropriate baggie.

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Step 8: Done!

That’s it.
Your spring and summer seed starting plan is complete.

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Optional: Note Days to Germination and Maturity

While you have the packets in hand, notice the days to germination and days to maturity. You don’t need to memorize them, just start to become familiar with the range.

Good seed companies will have this information on the seed packets.

Don’t get hung up here and you can skip this if it seems like too much. This info can be super useful later for garden design planning.

Your garden year is simplified not by trying to do it all at once, but by starting with a simple schedule.

Garden Planning Clarity

If you want more clarity and confidence as you plan your garden, I invite you to grab my free PDF – How to Start a Vegetable Garden Checklist. It will help you stay on track with all the tasks to start your veggie garden and set your garden up for success from the very beginning.

🌱 Get the free Start a Veggie Garden Checklist and take the next step in your garden journey.

More Pro Gardening Tips

You’ll also have an option to join my newsletter, where I share professional, practical garden guidance to help you simplify, focus, and grow a vegetable garden that’s productive, beautiful, and abundant.

And I’d love to hear from you, what part of seed starting feels most confusing right now, or what has shifted for you after reading this? Share in the comments and let’s grow together.

Your garden year is simplified not by trying to do it all at once, but by starting with a simple schedule.

Debby, Your Garden Coach

5 Simple Steps to Seed Starting Success

Debby WardLeave a comment

Fellow gardeners take heart that spring will come and the snow will melt! In the meantime, starting seeds indoors helps keep the winter blues away.

Here are 5 simple steps to successful start your plants indoors:

Choose high quality seed from a reputable seed company. As an organic grower, you understand the importance of your food choices. By choosing seed companies who have a reputation for sustainability, you have a valuable voice in shaping how seeds are grown in the future. For the criteria I used to vet seed companies, click h ere.

Pick crops to start indoors that transplant well like tomatoes, peppers, basil, marigolds, squash, melons and cucumbers. Read your seed catalogs or the back of seed packets to see if that type of plant is good started indoors. Some crops like spinach an corn don’t like being transplanted and need to be direct seeded.

Use quality organic seed starting mix. Either choose an organic mix from a reputable company or make your own with a peat substitute like coco fiber, mixed with organic vermiculite and perlite. If you are buying a product, look for it to have mycorrhizal fungus in it to boost root production. If you are making your own mix, add it in.

Give your seedlings lots of light and warmth. You can set up a simple home seedling rack with 3’ shop lights over a shelf that can hold 5 seedling trays. Building it yourself will save you money.

Read my post on building your own seed starting rack, here.

Start your seedlings at the right time. Seed catalogs and packets will tell you when to start your seedlings. For example, tomatoes can be started 6-8 weeks before your last frost date. Cucumbers, melons and squash are generally started 2 – 4 weeks before they will be planted out. Remember to add in time for hardening off. Read my post on hardening-off here.

Maximizing Garden Abundance: The Rationality and Economics of Indoor Seed Starting

Debby WardLeave a comment

In the aspiration of an abundant and thriving garden, indoor seed starting emerges as a pragmatic and economically viable approach.

It offers a myriad of benefits that cater to discerning organic gardeners like you.

By germinating seeds indoors, we embrace a fun time-honored method rooted in science and efficiency, optimizing the growth cycle and enhancing our return on investment (ROI) for our gardening endeavors.

Scientifically, indoor seed starting capitalizes on the principles of germination, leveraging controlled environments to provide the optimal conditions for seedling development.

This method harnesses psychological insights, recognizing the impact of environmental cues on plant growth.

Studies in cognitive science underline the importance of consistent stimuli for fostering robust growth, a phenomenon parallel to the controlled settings of indoor seed starting.

Furthermore, the economic advantages of indoor seed starting are important for most gardeners. Through the reduction of external dependencies on store-bought seedlings, economies of scale manifest themselves, enabling gardeners to maximize their yield at a fraction of the cost. 💰

This practice aligns with the principles of sustainability and fiscal prudence, offering a means to harness resources efficiently and reduce unnecessary expenditures, a sentiment cherished by every organic gardener.

This all translates to our opportunities:

To provide seedlings with ideal environments from which to grow and
Allows us to grow the varieties we want so we have
More diversity in our garden, both for our food harvests and the beauty of our flowers and
Saves us money.

Contrary voices may raise concerns regarding the initial investments in indoor seed starting setups, positing that the costs may outweigh the benefits. However, a comprehensive analysis reveals the long-term gains eclipsing these initial expenses, especially if you build a seed starting rack yourself.

The ability to nurture and monitor seedlings from their inception enables precision gardening, empowering gardeners to select the healthiest seedling for transplantation, ultimately contributing to the garden’s overall vitality.

It also often gives us the opportunity to gift 🎁 others in our community with any extra plants, thus building positive cooperative relationships.

The rationale behind indoor seed starting stands fortified by the amalgamation of scientific understanding, economic prudence, and sustainability consciousness.

For the organic gardener seeking to optimize yields and foster a flourishing garden, embracing indoor seed starting proves not only logical but also economically astute.

Plus, folks, it is a fun activity 😀 in winter to nurture your seedlings as they bring you the renewing joy of spring.

By delving into the scientific principles and economic sensibilities underpinning indoor seed starting for your spring and summer garden, gardeners can manifest a bountiful and gratifying harvest, underscoring the inherent value of this meticulous, strategic and empowering approach.

Illuminate Your Seed Starting with my Free Seed Starting Checklist.

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Designing Your Spring Veggie Garden

Debby Ward1 Comment

Bak choi is a great spring crop — Bak Choi

A client of mine, Deanna loves spring greens yet was daunted by lack of success with her spring garden. She realized she didn’t really know how much space different plants needed. She also wasn’t certain what spring plants grow well with each other. She had grown Bak Choi successfully, but that was about all. She wanted to add more greens and cool weather root crops like radishes, carrots, beets and turnips, yet she was not sure how to integrate them with the greens.

In previous years, the root crops ended up being small at best and the greens ended up rotting. She was tired of buying what she felt like was wasted seed. She had tried a couple times and wasn’t happy with the outcome. When she came to me, this was one of her major concerns to insure productivity in her garden. She was so happy when she learned that some simple adjustments could make a huge impact on her productivity.

Here are a few ways she improved her spring garden.

Plant Spacing

When you direct seed it is harder to get plant spacing right. Many folks only direct seed because they do not have a setup to start seeds indoors. This was Deanna’s situation. She was direct seeding all her crops. Seeds are small and can be hard to handle, so folks at the seed companies tend to expect you to scatter all the seeds in a packet in a row and then “thin” them so they have room to grow. This is one way to give your plants more space, but a wasteful one.

It is far better to seed with wider spacing. My rule is to seed at about 1/3 the spacing listed on the seed packet as the final plant spacing distance. This allows you to harvest smaller root crops or greens as they begin to crowd and leave some to get larger. You also don’t waste seed this way and can have one seed packet often last for a couple of years. Very handy to keep costs down.

Avoid scattering seed close together and then leaving them that was as they get larger. This is how Deanna had rotting plants. Not only, were so close they could not get any air circulation and rotted, but they did not have the space to grow to full size and produce the yield you would want.

If you fingers struggle with small seeds consider these options:

Buttercrunch lettuce from Territorial Seed Company — Territorial Seed Co.

Buy pelleted lettuce and carrot seed which is much easier. Check Territorial Seed Company for a variety of pelleted lettuce seed.

You can also get an inexpensive hand seeder that will allow you to dispense smaller seeds a bit easier. These can be super simple up to more sophisticated. Territorial has a selection of these also. One advantage is they can be used for all kinds of seeds.

If you have the advantage of being able to start greens seedlings indoors, it is easier to give each plant the space it needs. I still tend to transplant a bit close together and harvest every other or third one as they begin to crowd each other. This extends the harvest and allows the remaining plants to get larger for harvest later and fills in the space so you are not wasting space in your garden.

Timing

Another key to spring garden success is timing. Granted this is trickier as the weather gets less predictable and computer models are unable to keep up with climatic changes, yet there are some tricks you can employ.

First is to succession plant. This is where you plant a new batch of the same crop about every two weeks. This gives you a couple advantages and can be done with either indoor or outdoor seed starting.

Outdoors, if weather turns too warm/hot/wet/dry for a crop, you can try again. Additionally, and perhaps more importantly, it is another way to spread out your harvest. This means you don’t harvest at once. This is especially useful for root crops where you are harvesting the entire plant.

Valmaine Lettuce is great in all seasons — Valmaine Romaine Lettuce

Indoors, succession plant your spring greens and then transition to following those on with summer greens. Some lettuces will take much more heat than others. A couple of my warm weather favorites here are Valmaine and Jericho romaines. These can follow-on after cooler loving lettuces such as most of the butterheads.

Lettuces, cabbage and chard are cool loving crops and you’ll get an earlier harvest if you can start these indoors while it is still too cold to start them outdoors. After you harden them off, they can be transplanted into the ground for your first greens harvest. Spinach though, doesn’t transplant well so start that one directly in your garden.

As always there is trial and error in your specific microclimate and this is another reason for not scattering all your seed at once.

Companion Planting

Spinach and beets are great spring companion plants

Another way to increase the use of your spring garden space is to interplant root crops with leaf crops. Gratefully this is pretty easy with cool weather crops because most greens and roots combine just fine.

Lettuces are happy with all the cool weather roots. Spinach and chard go well as they are in the same plants family. Same idea with kale, cabbage, kohlrabi, turnips, rutabagas and radishes, which are all in the brassica family.

peas can feed the kale so they make great companions — Peas and Kale

Don’t forget a star of your spring garden – peas! Peas thrive in spring so plant some of your pleasure be it snow peas, snap peas or shelling peas. We love shelling peas best, granted they hardly make it out of the garden as I tend to just pick and eat them, fresh, raw and oh so sweet!! My favorites are Green Arrow and Alderman/Telephone Pole. Check the vine height of pea varieties to be sure they match your pea fence. If you don’t have a pea fence, get one what doesn’t need support like Sugar Ann snap pea. There is a reason why you may have heard “peas and carrots” they go tougher in the garden. Plant your carrots in front of your pea fence.

Pulling this all together

May people have asked me about how to design a spring veggie garden, so lets pull some of these tips together.

Choose your varieties and see when they will mature, if they can take some heat and how big they will be full sized.

Next use the companion planting tips to choose which plants to put in which bed.

Then decide how long you want to harvest each type of plant to create a succession planting schedule. This will tell you when to start your seeds, be it indoors or out. Remember root crops are all direct seeded.

Finally, choose a block of your garden for each set of plants for example, one for brassicas, one for peas and carrots, once of lettuce and radishes, etc. Split up each block by how many rounds of succession planting you want. So if you want three rounds, split it up into three sections. Plant the first section, two weeks later the second section and three weeks later, the third session. Tada! You’ve designed your spring garden.

Don’t want to design your garden yourself? Manifest a beautifully designed garden with Debby’s Professional Custom Garden Designs. Get Yours!

Companion plant cabbage and broccoli with root crops like carrots, betts, turnips and radish — Spring Boundy of Companion Planted Cabbages, Carrots, Beets, Brocolli and more!

Process & Budget Tips to Get Ready for Seed Starting

Debby WardLeave a comment

Sometime in January or February I really start honing in on starting seeds indoors for my spring and summer plants. It occurred to me, the steps I take to get ready to start my seeds could be useful for you, so here we go …

I start by deciding what I want to grow in the spring and follow-on for the summer. Make a list of what you want to grow, using variety names where you know them. Also make notes about what you’d like to try that would be new for you. Include any types of crops you would like to replace because they did not do well. This could be a type of crop, like broccoli, or it could be that a variety that didn’t do well, so you want to find another one to try.

image of seed inventory spreadsheet page — Your seed inventory can be in a spreadsheet, notebook, jotted on a peice of paper or on your phone.

At some point in this process, do an inventory of your seeds and see what gaps you might have between what seeds you have and what is on your list of plants to grow.

By Mid-January I have received most of my seed catalogs, although there are a couple stragglers in February. Once you have your list of what seeds you need, then you can go through your catalogs and see who has what you want.

When looking for a new variety, compare not only different choices in one catalog, but in more than one. If you think you have found a variety you want to try, see if any of your other seed companies carry it and read their description also. More information on the variety helps you hone in on the best variety for you to try based on your goals.

Granted, I tend to go through each catalog when I get it and then multiple times thereafter. I’ll put a tick mark by anything that looks interesting and I might want to get.

I make a photo copy of the order form so as I start to hone in on what I want to get, I can use the form while looking at the catalogs. That way I am not constantly looking in each catalog for where the order form is. I don’t send the forms in, I will call (first choice) or order online, but having the list makes the ordering processing faster, simpler and easier, plus I can calculate any tax or shipping for budgeting. I can also check my list against the packing list when the seeds come in.

I’ll fill out the forms in pencil, so when I see the total cost of them all, which is pretty much always more than I want to spend, I can go back and erase what I cut out to stay in budget. Alternatively, I’ll star the items I am not going to order, or erase the price, so it does not end up in the total. This way I have the list of everything I wanted to grow in case my budget allows for another seed order later.

Which leads to another budget tip. Spread out ordering from your preferred companies. Order from the ones who have the first seeds you need to start and order last from companies with varieties you can start later. I will sometimes adjust who I am buying what from for this purpose. If I see something I want to grow in the fall, I will often wait to order those varieties until June when I’ll be needing to get them started.

Enjoy a cup of tea and browsing those seed catalogs!

FREE Seed Starting Checklist – Spring forward your indoor seed starting!

Build Your Own Seed Starting Rack

Debby WardLeave a comment

Hi folks, I friend messaged me this week asking if I could recommend a seed starting rack. She is in Wisconsin, so getting started now with her seed starting.

I confess I have little experience with pre-made seed starting racks and systems. I have been gifted with one, but I don’t like it as well as the one my sweetheart made.

Here is the Materials List:

Found plywood, 2×2, 2×4
Shop lights
Chain
Hooks
Screws
Wire
Switch box/s
Timer

General process to build your own seed starting rack:

Decide where you want to put your rack. It is best if you can place it in front of a window that gets good light as this will enhance the productivity of your rack. I can also say, it is really nice if you can place it in a permanent location. Ours was built with screws so it can be taken down an reassembled, but frankly, since I am four season gardening, I just keep it up.
Consider how much space you need for seed starting. Small scale home gardeners may not need much. My rack holds 14 seed trays and that is not enough for all I grow. Most folks can get away with one bank of lights which will cover two to four standard sized seed trays. A double bank will give you space for four or five seed trays.
I prefer to use found wood instead of buying new since so much is thrown out these days. We used wood found in a dumpster in back of a store, and some left over from a job.
Build the thing. It can be as simple or complicated as you make it. I have the advantage of having a partner who is a contractor, so he built and wired switches for me.

The best way to show you how we build it is in photos .. so here you go …

DYI Seed Starting Rack — My homemade three tired seed starting rack – front view. The rack has three shelves and uses old shop lights. We found some of these in the trash, some were from a friend who was getting rid of them. Each shelf has two banks of two lights. I use old fashioned ones to have the heat for summer seedlings. One cool and one warm in each bank which is less expensive than “grow lights”.

make your own seed starting rack — Outside corner of the rack.

build a place to start seeds — Inside corner.

seed rack height — We used hooks and chain, attached to a bar on the outside of each shop light to raise and lower the lights to accommodate different height plants.

put your seed rack next to a window for more light — Inside where the chain is attached to the rack.

The top bank we just had lights so made a really simple holder.

grow plants from seed — The top bank we hung from the ceiling.

Wiring for switches. We have a switch on each side so we can turn on one set of lights on each bank. This allows us to put the trays in either direction for growth or saving electricity if we don’t need both sets of lights at once in a bank.

how to start seedlings — Bottom who shelves filled. I will sometimes put trays on top of the lights until they germinate to make more room, as in this picture.

Sow True Seed – 2017 Seed Catalog Reviews

Debby WardLeave a comment

We love these folks more and more each year. Every time I open their catalog, it makes me happy. Their mission statement sort of covers why: “.. to preserve our shared botanical heritage and grow a new era of sustainable culture and ecological wisdom. We support independent, regional agricultural initiatives that foster vibrant, sustainable economy, and true food sovereignty.”

They carry only open pollinated varieties that ‘grow true from seed”, meaning when you save seed and plant it, you’ll get the same variety. Although they are not 100% organic, they support small farms who cannot afford organic or biodynamic certification. They provide seed from their network of skilled regional growers and independently-owned North American seed producers. That often means you are supporting small family farmers when you buy seed from Sow True Seed.

Want custom printed seed packets for your special event, business or fundraiser? You can get them from Sow True.

Sow True Seed has an impressive, very well rounded section of seeds, which can be hard to find from companies who don’t carry loads of varieties for each plant. It is obvious they really take care in varietal selection. This is a standout aspect of Sow True. They could easily be your only seed company and you’ll have a great garden.

Some of our favorite selections include: Jericho lettuce, Ashe County, Red Ruffled and Tangerine pimento sweet peppers, Hearts of Gold melon, Red Acre cabbage, Snowball self-blanching cauliflower, Ronde de Nice summer squash, Blue Hubbard winter squash, and Bush Pickle cucumber which is great for containers. They also carry Tam Jalapeno, a variety we grew years ago to make salsa for those who can’t take much heat.

Sow True Seed also has a fun selection of Seed Collections for those just starting out or wanting some inspiration. Their catalog provides useful information on throughout, including companion planting information, making the catalog a valuable resource.

Please support these folks, as they are a wow of doing the future right. Plus how awesome is there name?

Seeds Matter – 2017 Seed Catalog Reviews – Seed Saver’s Exchange

Debby WardLeave a comment

Each year we review seed catalogs and pick our favorites who meet our criteria for supporting biodiversity, organic gardening, local communities and provide safe, non-gmo seed.

What’s not to love here? Seed Saver’s Exchange is an easy place to start every year because they not only house the largest privately held seed back of open pollinated seed in the US, but also manage the largest seed exchange. They carry heirloom, untreated, non-hybrid, non-GMO seeds. They also have hundreds of certified organic varieties.

Reading their catalog is a walk through history. Each varietal description is the short story of its history..

Chioggia Beet: “Pre-1840 Italian historic variety, introduced to the U.S. before 1865. Uniquely beautiful flesh has alternating red and white concentric rings …”

Grandpa Admire’s butterhead lettuce: “From the family of George Admire (1822-1911) a Civil War veteran who migrated west to Putnam County, Missouri during the 1850s. Bronze-tinged leaves form loose heads….”

Not hooked yet, check out Trophy tomato: “Introduced in 1870 by Colonel George E Waring, Jr, of Rhode Island. Sold for five dollars a packet (equivalent to eighty dollars today). Gardeners paid the exorbitant price hoping to win the $00 grand prize at the local fair.” …

In addition to these great stories come an amazing diversity of high quality seed. Become a member and you have access to literally thousands of variety, all open pollinated, so if you save seed from the plants you grow, you know you will be the same variety from the seeds you saved.

Some of our favorite must have varieties are: True Lemon cucumber, Emerald Gem melon, Listada de Gandia eggplant, Christmas Limas, CiCicco Broccoli, St Valery carrot, Cherokee Purple, Moonglow, and Tommy Toe tomatoes to name a few.

Supporting See d Savers’ Exchange is one way to vote with your dollar in favor of preserving our seed heritage and biodiversity. As we said, what’s not to love.

Do You Know Quality Seed and Where to Get It?

Debby WardLeave a comment

The easy answer is to purchase your seed from one of the companies on our Recommended Seed Company List. This works great if you have come to trust our process of evaluating companies.

I am not an “activist”, it is has never been my interest or my bent, yet I do “vote with my dollar” and so choose to support companies who have the values I consider important. To that end, each year I research companies, read a pile of seed catalogs and compare varieties and plant lists of those folks I know and trust and those I don’t.

It has become clear that in addition to the current 13 criteria we use to evaluate a company, two more need to be added. Here are our additional criteria and why we added them. See the first 13 criteria.

Does the company sell varieties that are owned by companies who engage in genetic modification of seeds?

One company in particular, who was on our list for years, has staunchly continued to offer a small percentage of varieties owned by Monsanto. Granted, most of these varieties were not bred by Monsanto, but were bred and owned by companies who Monsanto bought a few years ago. For those like us, who do not want to support companies who engage in genetic modification of seed, the act of buying from a company who buys from a company who engages in genetic modification of seed, is indirectly supporting companies who engage genetic seed modification. Prior Unity Garden does not support this activity. Therefore any company who buys seed from companies who create GMO seed will not make our list, even if they have signed the Safe Seed Pledge.

You may be thinking, but if they signed the Safe Seed Pledge, then they are not selling GMOs, right ? Generally speaking, you are correct, they are not selling genetically modified seed, but they can still sign the Pledge and sell seed that is not genetically modified from companies who make GMO seed. Doing this practice now excludes a company from being on our recommended seed company list.

Does the company actually grow the varieties they sell?

There are ‘seed houses’ who are resellers of seed only, buying seed wholesale and reselling it. They may grow some of it, but do not really have field trials, so are not really in touch with the varieties they are offering.

We have found the seed quality and reliability from these companies to swing wildly and these companies do not have people you can talk with about growing specific varieties they offer. While this may be fine for some folks, we find it frustrating when evaluating specific varieties for growing traits our clients have requested. In effect, you become the testers. Because we want to recommend the highest quality seed companies how offer the highest quality seed, we will not be putting companies on our list who do grow all or most of the varieties whey offer. These companies simply cannot support what they sell to the high degree other companies can.

In some cases, a company will offer seed from a variety of local farms and this is a practice we love seeing as it supports small local farms and seed. In this case, the seed house may not trial every variety, but their partner farms are growing seed and this practice has proven to be an excellent marker of quality seed, in part because the farm’s name is on the seed. These companies do make our list. Granted, most of them also test all or most of the varieties they offer.

Who owned the company?

As large Agribusinesses buy out smaller companies, this question is becoming more important. It used to be seed companies be handed down through generations of a family. Now, it is good to know and sometimes difficult to find out. Often the Agribusiness does not want their ownership known.

Call the company, see what is written in the catalog and website. The point here is avoiding supporting agribusinesses who engage in generic modification of seed.

Companies who are owned by large agriculture businesses will usually sell varieties they own, so knowing what those varieties are, helps you discern if you want to support that business or not.

You can make the process easier and let us do the research for you. See our list of Recommended Seed Companies and/or the rest of our Seed Company Criteria.

3 Reasons to Start Your Veggies from Seed – Foundations of Organic Gardening Info Series

Debby WardLeave a comment

Ok, I have been getting such a great response to this series of posts, I’ll keep going into August ….

Are you someone who has hesitated to start your own plants ? Here are three really good reasons to try it.

1. Save money. Really, you do save money by starting your own plants. A seed packet that can last you for years can cost the same amount as one plant.

2. Variety diversity. Think about how many varieties of tomatoes you see in the store. How many from your local farmer’s market. Consider this, the Seed Saver’s Exchange Member catalog has about 4000 tomato varieties– that is variety diversity. You won’t get bored, you get to try loads of cool stuff and eat a much more diverse yummy diet – what is not to love about that ?

3. You control what happens to your garden plants. Most people I work with want to know their plants are not grown with GMO seed, are not given chemicals as infants and given proper organic nutrition as they grow up. Unless the plants you buy are certified organic, or you know your local plant grower well, you are taking your chances.

Growing from seed is not hard, especially the crops most people love like tomatoes and cucumbers. Some plants grow really easy from seed right into the garden, like lettuce.

Want more Foundation ? Consider the Foundations Course. We start in August, so sign up soon so you don’t have to wait anther year for garden success !