When the weather doesn't allow you to get out in the garden, a great winter garden pastime is the perusing of seed and plant catalogues. The promise of all the beautiful things you can grow and eat is so tempting and it is a great way to keep up your plant identification skills and check out new varieties.
Thirty years ago, hybrid or hybridized seeds were all the rage, but the buzzword in seed catalogues these days is heirloom or open-pollinated varieties of seed. Those of you who frequent farmers' markets are probably already familiar with heirloom grown vegetables and enjoy their bounty.
People often ask which variety of seeds they should grow and why. It helps to understand the difference between the types of seeds, so here goes.
An heirloom seed is by definition open-pollinated. This means that heirloom seeds will produce plants that are identical to the parent plants. Traditionally, an heirloom is a cultivar whose seed has been saved and handed down through generations. The jury is out as to how long a seed must be grown to be considered an heirloom, but it is somewhere between a minimum of 25 and 50 years.
Heirloom seeds were originally handed down between generations and within a relatively small geographic area. If my great grandmother grew an open-pollinated variety of tomato, saved the seed year after year and chose seeds from the most prolific and hardy plants, it resulted in a seed that grows well in that region.
Fans of heirloom seeds think they have better taste, are easy to grow, and preserve a part of our history. Gardening purists and environmentalists believe that 97 per cent of cultivated varieties of plants that grew 100 years ago are now gone forever.
There are a lot of reasons for growing heirloom/open-pollinated seeds and plants, but most importantly, growing heirlooms promotes the preservation of our agricultural gene pool.
A hybrid grown seed is created by cross-pollinating two different plants together to combine the best attributes of both plants. If type 1 tomato ripens early, you could combine that with type 2 that resists cracking and the new hybrid would have both of these qualities.
If you like to save money and save your seeds from year to year, then hybrid seeds are not for you, as the seed from hybrids rarely grows true to the parent plant.
Hybrids generally produce a larger and more uniform harvest. Often these varieties are hardier and are bred to be more resistant to pests and diseases. Large-scale farms like to use hybridized seeds because they produce a very uniform harvest time and yield.
I have to admit I am a sucker for heirloom varieties and do believe that the taste is much superior. The natural cycle of heirloom/open-pollinated seeds is appealing on many levels. From the beginning of time, people all over the world have grown and saved their own seeds. These seeds are as diverse as the many different places they are grown. It is regional growing at its best.
If you are interested in a local source for heirloom/open-pollinated seeds, check out Dan Jason's www.saltspringseeds.com
