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Come behind the fit as Seed Savers Exchange ’s saving team bear witness how they rectify seeds on Heritage farm . This is a vital step in worry for our assembling .
Planning
Each class our curator pick out hundreds of variety to grow for seed regeneration . Some salmagundi are selected due to miserable stock-taking – we require to keep an adequate supply of seed in our banking company and have have enough to share .
Others postulate to be regenerated because they have hapless germination , which has many causa , such as age or the seed may have come to us in pathetic condition . ( We do sprouting testing in our lab , which enables us to maintain the seed ’s germination ability without first imbed it . ) .
Still other seeds are selected base on their securities industry voltage ( significance , it ’s a variety that possess a certain quality that would be appealing to gardener and growers and may be a catalogue candidate ) .
Seeds are stored in a climate-controlled Seed Bank on our farm/headquarters in Northeast Iowa.
Once a variety is schedule for positive feedback , its seed package is retrieved from inhuman storage and the appropriate number of seeds are withdraw and set away . The seed then eagerly wait their big planting day .
Planting
In prevision of spring , we fire up our greenhouses in other February . Over the next few month , we start dozens of harvest types from cum in the greenhouses . By the outset of June , the nursery are a blinding video display of hundreds of assortment waiting for their day to be planted in the field .
In the lag , our farm director maps out garden around the farm and the placement of each assortment . To control varietal purity and a healthy seed craw , we take into business relationship closing off distances to avoid cross pollination , population sizes , craw rotations , and space needs when plan .
The final mapping is a checker board of isolation gardens spread out around the farm , separated by half a nautical mile or more of pasture , woodlands , limestone bluff , and wetland . ( Different varieties within a craw eccentric must be plant certain distances apart so that they do not hybridize pollinate with one another . )
Seeds are stored in a climate-controlled Seed Bank on our farm/headquarters in Northeast Iowa.
As soon as the transplants outgrow their pots , they are planted in the gardens by the field crew . May and June are a craze of ramp up cervid fence , tilling the soil , planting , trellis , fertilizing , lacrimation , and labeling – project all done with the care , attention , and esteem that these varieties deserve .
Harvesting & Processing
Even before planting season has finished , the harvest season commences . two-year crops in their 2nd year are the first to set seed . Then our one-year garlic harvest of over 200 diversity follows in mid - July . At this clock time pea , spinach , and lettuce are all maturing while tomato plant , noggin , and peppers are start to ripen .
The culmination of summertime brings an abundance of cucumber vine , melons , Solanum melongena , okra , squash and other variety with cum that need to be reap , processed , and dried in a precise timetable to check the highest lineament seed that will last in the deep deep-freeze . The process is a extremely coordinated and a well contemporize succession that repeats itself year after year .
Newly glean seed from the regeneration procedure refreshes and replenishes our bank . Through the process , we are also capable to observe and evaluate potpourri and decide which salmagundi could be introduced to our seed catalog and your garden .
Lettuce seedlings growing in the greenhouse.
Learn More
A Seed’s Journey
The Seed Savers Exchange preservation and educational activity team created a series of videos called “ A Seed ’s Journey . ” These videos detail the story of source preservation at Seed Savers Exchange , and how a seed gets selected for grow - outs and statistical distribution to home gardeners through our catalog and the Exchange .
in the beginning published September 11 , 2017 . Updated March 2 , 2025 .
Keep Exploring
Our team releasing pollinators into isolation cages in the fields.
When you make a leverage from Seed Savers Exchange , you help fulfill our nonprofit missionary station to protect our food and garden heritage . Do even more just by attain a donation to help us carry on and share even more heirloom varieties !
3094 North Winn RoadDecorah , Iowa 52101(563 ) 382 - 5990
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Removing seeds from tomatoes, preparing them for processing.
Seed Savers Exchange is a tax - exempt 501(c)3 non-profit-making organization dedicate to the preservation of heirloom seed .
