And In Breaking News

Self replicating little parcels of carrots ready to be planted.

There is a case that has been heard by the US Supreme Court, Bowman vs. Monsanto and we are awaiting their decision. I, for one, am not hopeful that they will take the correct stance, which, of course would be to eviscerate the patent on seeds altogether. The patent on seeds is immoral and unethical and sets a horrid precedent: the forces in favor of patents on seeds have no idea of the line they have crossed in this matter.

In fact, neither do the Supreme Court Justices and most of the American public, but it is clear to those of us whose life's work is with seeds, this is a horrible transgression onto the patenting of life. In fact, Chief Justice John G. Roberts Jr. asked,"Why in the world, would anybody spend any money to try to improve the seed if as soon as they sold the first one anybody could grow more and have as many of those seeds as they want?" leaving me to hope he was just having a momentary loss of memory and doesn't really believe that people did exactly that since agriculture began!

I had the opportunity to be with Vandana Shiva this last week and hear her cogent answers, marveling at her ability to synthesize answers that not only answered the question, but enlightened the listener to points they had not yet considered in the question. She told us about the 200,000 varieties of rice in India – all bred by peasants, different rice varieties for different fields for example. But an observant rice farmer, peasant or not, sees a lot of rice and a keen observer will find different varieties – in fact, it was Luther Burbank's keen eye (not magical genius) that gave the world the Burbank Potato, still the most popular baking potato in the world today over 100 years later. He spotted one potato plant with some flowers that produced some seeds (not a common thing, potatoes are almost always propagated by cutting the tubers into chunks and planting them, rarely by seed). He harvested the seeds and a seedling from those seeds became the famous potato that keeps Idaho on the map.

Prior to the 1950's, almost all plant breeding in the US was done by farmers – with the expectation that they would profit very little from the improvement of seed except by better crops. The idea of patenting life was abhorrent to them, even if they wished to make more profit on their new line of seeds. The lack of patents did not slow down the process of finding new and better plants - and this is an important point the bio-tech corporations wish to ignore - we never needed patents before them and their derelict technology!

But business empires are not built on 'what we used to do,' so once the chemical company decided it wanted to control the food supply, they moved aggressively to get our government to protect their seed varieties with patents. This is the genesis of our current situation. It wasn't enough that chemical companies wanted to make money, they wanted guarantees that they could make money on a scale not seen in agriculture since the beginning of agriculture. The old saw, “How do you make a million dollars farming? Start with two million,” could be amended to, “How do you make a million dollars farming? Start as a chemical company and buy yourself a government.”

Even intelligent people argue for patent enforcement because if they let replication occur in seeds, then what happens to software, recording and so on. This is not a valid question and the questioner is not thinking the thing through. Rolling the law back on seed patenting would not in any way be applicable to these other patents – the difference is obvious. The question really should be, if we allow patents on seed, does this mean that a man should patent his own sperm and a woman her eggs before a bio-tech company does it? Sperm and eggs are more closely similar to a seed than a recording! A seed is LIFE. A recording is NOT. Software is NOT.

In fact, the Supreme Court is set to hear arguments in a case about patenting human genetic material April 5^th. Now I can see scenarios happening that just a few years ago would have been seen as crazy. What if I am given a genetically modified cure for Alzheimer’s. Is my body now a bio-tech company property? What if I have children and they, of course, inherit the cure? Are they owned by the bio-tech company? Do they have to buy a license? After all, like seeds, people are self-replicating!

Let us be clear: a life cannot be patented regardless if that has a deleterious effect on commerce. It does not matter.

Mind you, only those who do not see the difference between a baby and a recording or a seed and a software program imagine that one has anything to do with another.

Patenting life – any life – is a line we should NEVER have crossed. Now that we've done it, we need to undo it as quickly as possible. It is morally offensive and moves us towards re-establishing human slavery.

You'll never get that with software or a recording.

david

Don't Feed The Beast

They are just beginning to arrive:
the 2013 seed catalogs!

Let's face it:  the cards are stacked against anyone who does not want to grow genetically engineered foods. The Obama administration, the only administration to even throw a nod the non-GMO way (in a speech way back in the 2008 campaign), has turned it's back on everyone who is concerned about American agriculture and on the wishes of over 90% of the American people even to simply label products containing GMOs.

Prop 37 went down to defeat in the face of millions of dollars spent spewing lies - and where there wasn't a lie, creating lies (the 'research' that gave them their much-ballyhooed food price raise was bought by the 'No on 37' forces money) and almost monthly there is a new approval of a GMO - the freak du jour in January is GMO salmon, which poses risks to wild populations.  But salmon is out of my field. Really.  More than 'so to speak'.  I'm a gardener.

Many folks are excited about boycotts as a method to register their complaint against the companies that paid for the no on 37's lies.  I'm fine with that, but I find I often have never purchased the products I'm supposed to boycott in the first place.  I think that means my boycotting dollars won't really be missed.  

I don't even like the idea of a boycott because it implies when you get your way, you'll purchase their products in the future. I will not.  These companies are dead to me - I didn't need them before and I'll never need them again.  (I have one great confession to make:  the huge exception to this 'I never buy those products anyway' was my daily - yes, DAILY - chocolate bar fix on my way home from work. I had become aware years ago that my chocolate bars were using GMO soy lecithin but I pretended I didn't know because I wanted my chocolate/sugar fix.  I stopped somewhere in the beginning of October 2012 because I couldn't ignore the truth anymore and I've not had a chocolate bar since - Snickers was my favorite. I'm probably much healthier now as a side benefit.)  

However,I do buy seeds and I've made it a point to not buy from companies that carry GMO seeds and I'd very much like you to make the same commitment. Hybrids today are patented, a process that has given rise to the dubious practice of creating GMOs (if they couldn't patent them, they couldn't recoup their enormous research expenses).  Purchasing hybrid seed opens you up to helping GMO companies make a profit.  

Get on over to a seed library and learn to share in that process!  But when you must buy seeds that perhaps are not available in the seed library, don't buy hybrid seeds.  A quick check at the Seminis web site, a Monsanto company, netted me lists of the patented hybrids they own.  These are NOT GMO seeds.  They are only hybrids, but any profit from them does fee the GMO creator beast, Monsanto.  

I'll list a few I actually had purchased in the past, before i knew about GMOs: 
   Tomatoes - Beefmaster, Burpee's Big Boy,Celebrity Golden Boy and Viva Italia 
   Sweet Peppers - Big Bertha, Giant Marconi 
   Broccoli - Packman 
   Squash - Gold Rush, Greyzini, Lolita

To name but a few.  When I first saw these varieties, I was shocked.  I had purchased some of them even as little as five years ago!  All of these are listed on the Seminis web site; check it out if you want.

Another tab on that site, lists garden seed suppliers where you can purchase Seminis seeds - I suggest you avoid those companies.  It is sad to see Ball Horticultural Company there - they are the owners of Burpee Seeds, a catalog I grew up with and began my love affair with seeds.  So, no more Burpee for me.  

It is quicker and more portable to simply make sure the seed company you're about to buy from has signed the Safe Seed Pledge (found here for one of many places).  If they've signed it, they are OK to buy from - if they've not signed it, they are suspect; make sure you are not buying any hybrids (F1's).  The seeds that will not feed the beast are 'open pollinated' of which 'heirloom' is a sub-class - both are OK (it can be open pollinated and not heirloom, but it it's heirloom it is open pollinated - if this isn't clear, draw a big circle and label it 'Open Pollinated,' then draw a smaller circle inside the big circle; you can label that one 'Heirlooms' - now you can see the difference).  

Come to the Seed Library of Los Angeles meeting on January 19th at 2:30.  Membership is still only $10 for a life time and seeds are free to check out if you bring some back- don't worry, we'll teach you how!  And if you don't, we'll only charge you a nominal fee - much less than a packet of seed from a seed house.  Such a deal!  

Happy New Seed Saving Year everyone!

david

A Chance to Derail GMO Corn In Mexico!

(Reuters) - A top Mexican government official said Thursday that the long-awaited but highly controversial approval of genetically modified (GM) corn fields on a commercial scale will drag into next year.

Only one ear of corn showing considerable diversity!

El Presidente Felipe Calderon was scheduled to approve a commercial scale planting of Genetically Engineered corn in Mexico, but now it appears he will leave office without giving the project his blessing. Incoming President-elect Enrique Pena Nieto, will be inaugurated on December 1st and his aides have indicated the approval is not expected for up to five months after that date.

This presents us, the anti-GMO forces, with a small slice of time to derail this approval. Mind you, I don't know if anything of the kind is in the realm of possibility, but I do know this has got to be our goal. This task, whether or not it is possible, has got to be the focus of everyone who harbors doubts about the veracity of human meddling in the DNA of our food. Mexico is home to the birth of corn, which means it is also home to a diversity of corn that is not possible to fathom; we do not know what there is to loose.

The government of Mexico is undoubtedly being offered economic bonuses to make this happen. But they should be wary: It is the Devil's bargain. For a few pesos, the amount of money is not relevant, Nieto can sell the pride of his county into a new, and more deadly, colonialism that will bankrupt the economy and throw the pride and dignity of Mexico onto a dung heap from which it may take another hundreds of years from which to recover.

Look at the business plan of genetically modified food production. You buy the seeds (or, as a drug dealer might suggest, “the first one is free...”) and plant them. You have to also buy the inputs necessary to make that crop produce. Look who sells the inputs! Whether the farmer gets a crop or not, he (or she) must invest in new seed next year and all the attending inputs. Mexico is betting these seeds, with all the fertilizers and pesticides, will produce enough food to make the bargain profitable. It doesn't.

A fifteen year study done by the US Department of Agriculture, itself practically a branch office for Monsanto, showed that genetically engineered corn did NOT out-produce the GM corn to any real degree. So, all of those inputs and their expense, were for naught. And this is the scenario President-elect Nieto considers throwing his county's farmers into. We also know the number of Indian farmers that have committed suicide after making this Devil's deal with GM cotton. The first bad harvest, the wife takes off her jewelry to sell for fertilizers and pesticides. The second year, with no jewelry left, the families go into debt and it's a debt many cannot recover from. Is this not just a chemical process of subjugation that imitates the slavery of colonialism?

But the stakes are so much higher than that. If countries were assigned wealth according to their genetic resources, Mexico would be one of the wealthiest countries in the world. Corn, one of the most important food crops of our world, has it's origin in Mexico. Nikolai Vavilov identified Mexico as one of the most important centers of origin of food because of the tremendous diversity of corn. This diversity is threatened by the introduction of genetically engineered corn.

When Monsanto was asking for FDA approval for their unproven product, the genetically altered corn, they stated in their application that corn pollen was viable for five miles. This figure is important because it lets one know how far away from the genetically engineered product a farmer must be if that farmer wishes to have none of the altered genes in his corn.

The figure, like so much of what Monsanto claims, was a lie. Research since then has demonstrated that corn pollen can be viable up to twenty miles from the source, or, four times as far as Monsanto had reported. Mind you, this figure represents ideal conditions, but until we can predict conditions in the future with pinpoint accuracy, this is the figure we have to have and use.

With the diversity of corn throughout Mexico, we cannot allow genetically modified pollen to spread through those fields! The DNA of every cell of the Monsanto (and allied corporations) corn plant, is modified, or engineered and therefore the pollen's DNA is also altered and whatever qualities has been engineered into the altered corn, will become manifest in the corn of Mexico. Imagine the so-called terminator gene being let loose in Mexico! Thousands of years of corn breeding could be terminated if that pollen was let loose.

It would be far worse than all the Spanish conquistadoras combined.

It would be a scar on Mexico's soul that nothing could ever heal.

It would be the Rape Of Mexico.

We cannot sit idly by and allow this to happen.

david

Honest Food

Ms. Honeybee pollinating a broccoli plant.
We need MORE nature, not less, in
our gardens and our farms!

Over the past decade, I've taken to calling organic and non-GMO food, 'clean food.' I've used 'clean' as my adjective of choice for seeds, plants, varieties and food, using it to meanthis food that is not the product of industrial agriculture and the multi-national corporations that support chemicals and laboratory experiments on the DNA of plants destined to become food.

Having lost a fight to industrial agriculture with Proposition 37 going down to a narrow defeat, and having seen BIG AG at work, I am now calling organic and non-GMO food, 'honest' in addition to clean.

I've not been a part of a proposition campaign before, but I do keep up on politics. I can say without reservation, I was totally blown away by the amount of lying and the dirty tricks played by the 'No' campaign! It was disgusting and the lack of enforcement against them was appalling. The final straw for me was the other day hearing a 'No' operative explain on NPR that 'people just used their good sense to defeat a poorly written law...' I could have driven off the road in disgust, because, of course, that is the truth stood firmly on its head.

There was not one whit of truth in anything they said in their $43 million campaign – and the remarkable thing, in the end, was that they lied so much and it was still so close! I do not have to reiterate each one of their lies, that has been done amply elsewhere, but there was nothing in their entire arsenal that was honest: from the Stanford professor (he wasn't) to the study that said it would increase our food bill (they paid for the study to be done to show that and the history of other countries requiring labeling disproved that by historical fact vs the so-called study's 'findings'); nothing they said was true. Which brings us to wonder why they didn't lie to us about how wonderful GMO crops are? You will note, they did not say a single word about why we even needed GMOs.... like that was a foregone conclusion.

Now, after absorbing the sting of defeat (I do not like to lose!), I have been reflecting on the history of GMOs in the US food supply and, guess what? I can't find an honest representation in anything Big Ag says and wants us to believe as far as GMO's are concerned. Nothing they are doing can be backed up by science or common sense.

• Feed the world.... Not by lowering the number of species we depend on for food! That is the way of starvation!
• Help farmers.... Not by lowering the number of varieties available to plant. This is another starvation trap waiting to be sprung on us... This is run up to the Irish Potato Famine game being played out in America today.
• Feed the world, Part II... Not by ridding the world of its seed heritage and attempting to replace it with patented seeds owned by multi-national corporations that don't have allegiance to even one country; only to profit.
• Help farmers Part II.... Not by making farmers totally dependent on seeds from a company that has no skin in the game, see above.
• Save the ecosphere... Not by polluting the ecosphere with all kinds of poisons! What does all this herbicide do to the critters in the soil (which are the real source of fertility, not chemicals)? No one knows because no one's bothered to study it.
• Save the ecosphere Part II... Not by killing off so many insects that pollination is imperiled by a lack of insects.
• Feed the world Part III... The world already produces enough food for 12 billion humans, with only 7 billion on the planet. Most of the starvation in the world comes from a lack of political will to change it.
• Our products are harmless.... Are they? We don't know that. Only now are tests being performed that will determine the veracity of this statement. And when the tests are performed, they will face scrutiny from professional scientists that are getting Big Ag grant money. Like the NPR program I heard recently about the French researcher whose work showed 80% death rate of rats fed GMOs after two years. They cut over to an American researcher who stated the study was 'flawed science' because the Frenchman used a rat that was susceptible to tumors and cancer. If the story had ended there, all listening would have come away thinking 'silly Frenchman...' but NPR went back to the French scientist and asked him, “Why those rats?” He said, “I was replicating the Monsanto study used to get FDA approval. I used the same rats they used, but I ran my study two years while Monsanto's study ran 60 days.” (Emphasis mine)  Remember, Monsanto called Agent Orange safe too.
• They increase yields.... Ah. Except, even the US Department of Agriculture, which is practically just a different address for Monsanto, did a 15 year study that stated, “there is no appreciable increase in yield” over the length of the study. In other words, all this hype about GMO plants is all for naught.
• No till agriculture is good for the environment.... Not if you count a loss of top soil as bad for the environment! Current agriculture practices of spraying the very life out of the soil has not produced a viable method of controlling weeds and retaining top soil.
• We will control the weeds without labor costs.... Not for very long you won't. And this is one of the things that really toasts my bagel: No one in agriculture, big or little, chemical or organic should have believed this one at all. If you spray One Thing for a bug or a weed, in a few years, the bug or weed becomes resistant to your One Thing, I don't care what it is. Invariably, it was only a matter of time before the weeds would be impervious to Round Up. I am shocked that Round Up Version 8 wasn't waiting in the wings. Apparently, it wasn't, which makes me think that Monsanto really didn't have a clue about what they were doing. Nature evolves. Maybe they were believing the anti-Darwin factions in the mid-west. But even if you believe in Creationism for the past, you have to admit that evolution is alive and well in the garden and the farm. Nature abhors monoculture and repetitiveness. Do the same thing long enough and nature finds a way to disrupt it. American agriculture is on the verge of a horrendous collapse because of it's disregard for the laws of Nature. You can lie to us, but you can't lie to Nature.

Companies pushing GMO agriculture have nothing to show for an almost 20 year run at this. They have no outside documentation to prove ANY of their claims. None. To the contrary, multiple sources are beginning to take issue with almost everything said about GMOs.

Here's the problem: if GMOs are allowed to proliferate, their pollen spreads to non-GMO plants, inserting itself into the environment in ways that are not understood (because no one bothered to research them) and may wreck considerable havoc with our world in the future. They may not, but from the track record of Monsanto and Big Ag, I am not reassured.

Honest food, our real food, can be corrupted. We, as consumers, as eaters, as bearers of children and as custodians of the earth and the future (comes with the territory, you don't get to opt in or opt out), have got to stand up for good, clean and honest food. Our next fight with Big Ag looms and we know now that they will lie to anyone and everyone from the start to the end.

Our next round is to get Los Angeles City and Los Angeles County declared GMO-free zones: no GMO organisms can be grown in the county or the city. This will help us ensure that the plants grown here are not contaminated with the genetically altered genes and will allow us to save seeds from the past that are the key to survival in the future. They are not GMO, they are not controlled by some malevolent corporation, nor can they be.  And it will send a message to those companies that they have just begun to dig into their profits to defend against an informed populace that is mad as hell and getting madder.

More on that ahead.

I wish you and yours a joyous and resplendent Thanksgiving and hope you will enjoy the whole day with loved ones and not be seduced into the madness of Black Friday or even Gray Thursday. The tradition of Thanksgiving is to look at what we have with gratitude and humility that we should be so blessed. I wish you the peace of that gratitude and humility.

david

Seed Saving 101 Syllabus

In this seminar, participants will learn the reasons for saving seeds, the botany necessary to saving seeds and the mechanisms of seed saving. Students will know which plants have easily saved seeds, which are more difficult, and how to deal with both. Through use of actual plants and flowers, students will learn the process of hand pollination on different plants and the devices and supplies used in pollinating different seeds. Students will be shown how to breed their own vegetable varieties and learn why that is an important contribution to modern agriculture.

Class will meet from 6:30 to 8:00 PM for three Thursdays in a row, October 26, and November 1 and 8. Dress warmly as our room is not well heated and close to the ocean: we can get chilly.

Upon completion of the course, students should confidently be able to save seeds from a wide variety of vegetable species and understand the importance of doing so and be able to commence breeding new vegetable varieties.

Instructor: David King 310.722.3656 (my cell phone)

greenman@slola.org – or – greenteach@gmail.com

Office hours are by appointment, I will meet with you at any reasonable hour of the day to help you understand the material. If you are confused by ANYTHING, contact me. I expect every student that completes this seminar to achieve the goals outlined above. If you are not comfortable with anything, call, email or come see me (by appointment) and we will clarify as needed. I want every one who completes this course to feel they have met the goals above.

Week 1	Introduction Why Save Seeds Heirlooms Botany of Seed Saving /Seed Morphology Open Pollinated vs Hybrid
Week 2	Inbred and Outbred Plants Genetics Practical Process of Seed Saving Recording Your Work
Week 3	Seed Storage Practical Lab – flower dissection Sources Course Applicability and Review

I will provide tea from the garden – students should bring their own cups. We need to leave the classroom as clean as we found it. In most cases, it won't be hard.

Students are urged to become active members of the Seed Library of Los Angeles and even to participate in the Best Practices committee which is the standard setting committee of the Library – it needs people with your knowledge of seed saving and the skills you have learned here.

Handouts will be available at the SLOLA blog site; slola.blogspot.com

The class is not full. If you have friends you know would like to be a part of this class, please let them know. We are holding the class outside as much as we can. Please have layers handy to keep warm as we get an onshore flow during class time that can be downright nippy some nights. If it is too cold, we do have indoor spaces to use. Coffee/warm herb tea will be available. Bring your own mug. We have LA tap water from a hose – if that's not your kind of thing, you'll need to bring your own.

Please go to http://www.seedalliance.org/Publications/ and download A Seed Saving Guide for Gardeners and Farmers. That will be our textbook. It is free.  I've given the OSA a donation every year I've been involved in seed saving – the work they do is so germane to the mission of the Seed Library Of Los Angeles and my personal goals for our society; They deserve our support.

By the third class, I would like each student to have a 10x or more jewelers' loupe. If you have questions about this, wait until the first class, I will show you some that I have and your can decide what you want will serve you best.

Fall 2012's Seed Saving 101 Announced

Essentials of Seed Saving

Generations before we arrived on scene, understood the importance of saving seeds. It was an essential part of the lives of all our ancestors. This vital connection was lost as we began to purchase our seeds from seed sellers. In recent times, the specter of GMOs and monster corporations controlling the seeds they created and the very real prospect of seed corporations having control over our food supply.

Saving our own vegetable biodiversity today provides us

• those old open pollinated varieties that taste good.

• a wider range of vegetable varieties and more control over what we can have.

• a closer participation in the cycle of life. In our gardens. 

• a hedge against personal financial misfortune.

• a safeguard against food shortages. 

• our own way to mitigate against climate change and it's impact on agriculture.

• the means to fight our shrinking biodiversity.

The final class is a hands on lab, people who have had this series before are invited back for the last class because the lab is always different depending on what is going to seed in the garden.

Upon completing this short course, participants will know why we urgently need to learn how to save seeds, the basics of saving most vegetable seeds, optimum conditions for seed preservation, how to preserve the genetic lines of differe
nt types of seed and short-cuts and tips from someone steeped in the seed saving ethic. New in 2012:  the course will have an added workshop component!

David King began his time in the garden at his Grandfather's knee in northeast Kansas.  He has been an avid gardener for most of his life and has taught gardening and horticulture at UCLA Extension and UC Cooperative Extension.  He has been with The Learning Garden at Venice High School for over ten years and is the Chair of the Seed Library of Los Angeles. He has written the LA Garden Blog for over three years as well as several columns for periodical publications.  A course of information, delivered with passion and humor is guaranteed
.

We have limited seating, reserve your space now!

Dates for the
 Fall series are : October 25th, November 1st and 8th.  All three classes comprise one offering, each class builds on the previous lecture.  The classes are 6:3 to 8:00 PM.  We will meet at The Learning Garden and move to an indoor lighted space.  
Prices:  $35 from now until October 18th, $45 until the 25th and $55 at the door.  Deduct $10 if you are a SLOLA member.  If you are not a SLOLA member before, you are one once you register.

Date Enrolled

Before 10/28/2012 $35.00 USD  After 10/18/2012 $45.00 USD  At The Door $55.00 USD

  

david

The Organic Seed Problem

Some seeds on display at the Seed Matters booth,
Heritage Seed Festival

I have been a proud supporter of the Organic Seed Alliance for several years. While there are many good reasons, including their blog, and their numerous publications, one of the most pressing concerns they have a clear focus on, his the lack of organic seed available to growers everywhere. It is an acknowledged problem to the extent that organic certification allows a farmer to remain certified even if she doesn't use organic seed, if she cannot find organic seed for her crop.

Few home gardeners face this problem because organic seed is usually available in the small quantities we use. Farmers though, think in terms of "pounds of seed" vs. "grams of seed" that most of us are familiar with.  This is where the hoeing gets tough because those large quantities of seed are available, if at all, at a premium price. But the problem is much more systemic than meets the eye.

Not only is there a dearth of organic seed, there is a dearth of new varietals being developed by and for organic growing. You can buy organic Big Boy Tomato Seed (don't, by the way, its patent is owned by Monsanto), but it was bred to be grown in a chemical environment. Big Boy will most likely only reach its full potential if coddled with chemical fertilizer and protection from insects because that is the environment where it was created and it was 'designed' to co-exist with all that petroleum-based help. Big Boy and most of the modern hybrids assume you will spray insecticides and add copious amounts of nitrogen to your garden. Like buying a car that only runs on premium fuel and filling it with regular, you are asking for trouble to ask a modern hybrid  to perform in an organic garden.

We need more organic seed producers. Many, many more. OSA has seminars (including one near Ojai in November) teaching organic farmers how to become seed producers. And they have seminars on breeding plants predisposed to growing in an organic environment. 

It is not necessary to sit on the side line and contemplate this problem. Remember, all the great varietals that fed mankind through the 1950's, including some of the most prized varieties of the modern age, were bred by people not unlike you and me. I could tick of a list of twenty or thirty varieties that were bred by folks who had no degree in agriculture – and a couple that didn't even finish high school.

 In this vein, already, the Seed Library of Los Angeles has begun to find ways to contribute some plant breeding as well as seed saving to the community. Several projects are currently growing  in members' gardens to improve a few breeds and, in one of special note, taking a hybrid and patiently growing it out over several seasons to find similar eating qualities in a non-nybrid form. So far from that, we have the original and two other very promising varieties coming from the same planting. It's very exciting.  More will be revealed in the coming years - it will take some patience!  

You know, oftentimes the focus of SLOLA members and this blog is very often only on the how and why of seed saving and saving these wonderful varieties for future generations. It dawns on me, that this is not our real purpose. Our real purpose is growing a new kind of gardener who will take responsibility to steward our precious seeds for the future. While we do this and we talk around it, I think we fail to acknowledge that this is what we are really growing. I would like to appoint someone “Goddess of Direction” (could be a God too, I'm not going to discriminate!) to tap board members on the shoulder from time to time and say: “Your real job is to educate and grow gardeners.”  

Like all our positions, it is unfunded. I'll be accepting applications until the next SLOLA meeting...

david

OSA just announced the launch of a new Organic Seed Database a free online tool for anyone hoping to find organic seeds.  Going online October 01, 2012 at www.organicseedfinder.org  the seed finder will facilitate connecting growers with seed suppliers - as noted above, finding organic seed can be an obstacle for organic growers.  One more time Organic Seed Alliance has shown leadership in solving these problems.  I am proud to be one of OSA's supporters.