There is a buzz among organic farmers all over the country about growing vegetable, flower and herb seed. Some growers are discovering the virtues of growing seed for their own use and some are finding out that growing seed can be a great alternative cash crop. In many cases it allows them to diversify and produce something with good market potential that doesn't have the same level of constant care that most vegetables or flowers demand during the growing season.

Many farmers take the seed that they purchase each year for granted, never really considering where it comes from, who produces it and how it's produced. The mail order seed companies that we buy our seed from are usually not producing most of the seed they sell. In general, they are buying it from a few corporate seed companies that perform research, breeding, and large scale production. Most mail order companies only produce a fraction of their varieties through contracts with independent growers. But, as we'll see, this is changing!

In fact, the growing of vegetable seed is becoming more common across the American landscape than it has been in many years. The vegetable seed industry is going through a grassroots transformation that is leading to a healthy diversification and blossoming in the number of vegetable varieties available to gardeners and farmers. This is due to an interesting confluence of circumstances that includes consolidations in the seed industry, the burgeoning demand for organically grown seed, independent companies specializing in older regional niche varieties, and some new offerings from independent plant breeders who are selecting varieties for new markets. All of these factors have sparked an increased demand for farmer-grown seed.

The consolidations among the largest players in the seed mdustry are havmg a far-reaching impact on the vegetable and flower seed that is available to the diversified small-scale grower. First of all, as these trans-national companies get bigger they tend to concentrate their energies on their newest, highest profile varieties that also have the highest profit margi n. Their older varieties, many of them tried and true "workhorse" varieties that have stood the test of time. are either dropped or if they are kept on the price list they are relegated to a second-class status whereby they get little or noi upkeep or concern for their genetic purity.

Many growers have found that these older workhorse varieties are in fact resilient and well adapted to the rigors of organic cultural practices. As many of these hearty varieties are abandoned by the new mega seed businesses there are more and more farmers who are seeking out new sources for the seed of these varieties. In a number of cases they are producing their own seed of important "dropped" varieties that they can't get otherwise. In other instances they are contacting the regional seed companies and requesting the reintroduction of these important open-pollinated varieties. In turn, these companies, which traditionally don't do their own seed production, have been scurrying around in the past few years, trying to find small-scale seed growers to produce these varieties that still have a loyal following.

In the eye of the Grower

One of the most important benefits of involving growers from different geographical regions in the seed growing process is that it can increase the genetic elasticity of the crops through the farmers' selection for resistance under environmental pressures like cold and drought stress or disease and insect attack.

While the growers' selection of the plants that are less affected by environmental stresses may seem incremental and slow, many budding plant breeders have been amazed at just how much progress they've made in only a few generations of this type of selection when they subsequently do a side-by-side comparison of their selected variety next to the original stock in a trial.

Fedco Grows

Fedco Seeds of Waterville, Maine has had an exponential rise in the number of seed varieties that they buy from independent seed growers in the past 10 years. In the 2002 seed catalog they have a very telling diagram concerning what they call "Our Own Seed Crops." This diagram shows Fedco buying seed of only four varieties from "small-farm grown" sources in 1991, contrasted with 2002 where they are buying seed of 125 varieties from farmers! And this number has more than doubled from 66 varieties in just the last four years. In talking to C.R. Lawn, Fedco's president, I learned that they are interested in having seed produced by independent seed growers for several reasons.

Fedco started contracting with small seed growers to produce what C.R. calls "niche varieties," which in many cases are older regional favorites (sometimes heirlooms) that are no longer commercially available. Many of these varieties don't always have the wide adaptation and disease resistance of the workhorse varieties, but they can have splendid regional adaptation with loyal followings in certain regions of the country. These niche varieties, like 'Golden Gopher' muskmelon or 'Boothby's Blond' cucumber, were the main avenue for Fedco to begin relationships with independent seed growers.

Fedco is also having the seed of a number of their most popular "workhorse" varieties produced organically as the demand for organic seed is rising. C.R. sees the need for more and more of the workhorse varieties to be produced by small independent companies like his as the larger seed houses drop them. "We have to have them, these are the best varieties because they're so versatile ! " he said. "The wave of the future is that many of these workhorses from the golden age of plant breeding ( 1940s- 1970s) are going to be dropped."

Yankee Independence

In northern Vermont there is a company that is taking on a number of aspects of the new seed growing movement. High Mowing Farm in Wolcott, Vermont, was started by Tom Sterns to supply certified organically grown seed of many of the good standard workhorse varieties and older regional favorites that perform well in northern New England. Their vegetable, flower, and herb seed is sold via mail order, both for home gardeners and as bulk sales, and their seed racks are doing a booming business in many natural food stores across Vermont and throughout New England.

In sharp contrast to most of the new breed of seed growers Tom didn't start his journey into seeds via marketing fresh vegetables or flowers. He freely admits. "No, I don't like the vegetable side of it at all," he says in reference to growing produce as a vocation. Tom loves the art and practice of growing, harvesting, and cleaning seed. He says that the seed business suits him because he can "spread my work out throughout the season." He says he enjoys the office and the people part of his work as much as he enjoys growing the seed.

Becoming more philosophical, he says: "Being able to encourage people to grow their own food is a big step in the right direction. It's very different selling someone a packet of lettuce seed than selling them a head of lettuce."

In fact, High Mowing Farm is one of very few independent seed companies in America that either grows or contracts directly with small farmers for al I of their seed needs. This has thrust Tom into an active role as a teacher, training many of the seed growers that he works with to get them up to speed. He explains, '6As much as I like training growers I wish I didn't have to do as much of it as I do, because that would mean we'd have more of the high caliber professional seed growers that we're all looking for!"

Wild Garden Creations

Some growers like to create new variation in the crops they grow. Frank and Karen Morton of Shoulder to Shoulder Farm are creating new varieties of vegetables that are now being carried by a number of the smaller independent seed companies. Many of the ideas for the new varieties of salad green crops that their company has come to specialize in were originally conceived because of their own salad mix production for restaurants.

In the beginning of Frank and Karen's odyssey with seed they viewed the serendipity of the lettuce crosses that occasionally happened in their seed production plots as a way to get new texture and color combinations in lettuce, giving them something unique for their salad r..ix. As anyone who's ever made crosses between different varieties of the same crop knows, there is a lot of variation in the subsequent generations after the cross. Frank was delighted with the combinations he was getting and soon he was also experimenting with crosses between his favorite kales and among various mustards varieties.

Frank commented on this process, "I realized right away that I would be able to derive unique new varieties, but in the meantime the leaves of the segregating generations would be perfectly good for salad mix."

While many of the numerous vegetables Frank has developed are uniform and "true to type" varieties, his seed company, Wild Garden Seeds, does sell population mixes of particular salad crops that are known for their wild variations of colors and leaf shapes. Several of these mixes, like the 'Wild Garden Kale Mix', 'Wild Garden Mild Mustard Mix' and the 'Wild Garden Lettuce Mix' have been successful with discerning salad mix growers who are striving for a unique look.

"The original idea of our salad and seed business was ¢3 to utilize diversity as an asset and along the way we've created these populations of useful genetic mixes that are the modern equivalent of the kind of diverse varieties that our ancestors grew," Frank says.

Flower Seed

Most of the commercial seed growers I talked to are 37 either selling the seed they grow through mail order or ¢.~in bulk to seed companies under contract. Susan Belding has a different twist for selling much of the wide array of flower seed that she produces at Old Stage Farm in Lovell, Maine. While she does offer her flower seed through a wonderfully descriptive mail-order catalog, Susan has also developed a very creative way of direct marketing her seed.

Each year Susan travels to two of the biggest agricultural fairs in Maine. In the winter she has a display at the Portland Flower Show and in the fall she attends the Common Ground Fair in Unity. Her display at these fairs includes a set of bins filled with seed packets that are 8 bins across and 3 bins tall in a stair step arrangement. On top of the bins are laminated photos of the flower varieties that really highlight the uniqueness of her unusual selection. The flowers that Susan concentrates on growing for seed are hard-tofind varieties. This is an asset to her business as it attracts many true flower aficionados seeking the unusual to both her workshops and her booth. Also because these two fairs are in different seasons and are attended by an almost completely different clientele, she can increase her exposure to a cross section of customers and maxi,mize her cash flow throughout the year.

Susan echoes something quite commonly heard from many of the "good" seed stewards I've spoken with. "The roguing, harvesting, and cleaning of the seed crop really determines the integrity of the seed."

A Seed Revolution

As this progressive seed movement evolves there will definitely be room for many seed growers to take part as well as a need for farmers to become more savvy in the techniques of growing, roguing, and selecting seed crops so they can effectively improve them for their adaptation to organic practices and regional climates. As Ned Herbert, the farm manager at the Abundant Life Seed Foundation in Port Townsend, Washington said: "We need to develop a new system of seed production that has the scope and is on the scale of the sustainable market farmers around the country. It needs to be diversified. Just as the market farmers have diversified our diets, then seed growing by an increasing number of farmers is going to increase our seed choices for our different needs."

Keep your eyes open for new seed choices. This revolution will not be televised.

Resources

- Fedco Seeds, P O Box 520 A Waterville, ME 04903 (207) 873-7333

- Wild Garden Seed, PO Box 1509 Philomath, OR 97370 (541) 929-4068

- High Mowing Farm, 813 Brook Rd Walcott' VT 05680 (802) 888-1800

- Old Stage Farm, RR2, Box 377 Lovell, ME 04051 (207) 925-1006

John Navazio worked as an organic vegetable farmer for eight years before earning a doctorate in plant breeding from the University of Wisconsin. He has worked as a plant breeder at Garden City Seeds and Alf Christenson Seed Company, and recently started his own company, Seed Movement, where he is devoted to establishing a farmer/breeder cooperation for organic agriculture.

Reprinted with the kind permission of the author and Growing for Market (Vol. 11, N. 9).