I do a lot of things to enhance my family’s food security and participate in many activities that I hope will support my communities resilience but the most important thing I do is save seed. Don’t get me wrong. I’m a total novice but I’m reading and experimenting and learning all I can so I can become more adept. I have joined a local seed saving guild and, as with most things agricultural, I find the more I know the more I learn I don’t know.
My goal this year is to grow out three varieties of squash. I’m choosing Oregon Sweet meat, Delicata and Bennings Green Tint. This gives me one of each squash family, Maximo, Mushata and Pepo. They won’t cross with each other. I will miss the many varieties I generally grow but the idea is that I’ll grow a lot and trade with friends to get some variety. The trick is going to be isolating my squash patch from my neighbors.
I’m going to use two techniques. The first is season extension. I’ll be starting my squash indoors, something I never bother with. I hope that if I get a one month head start, my plants will be flowering well before my neighbors. I’m also backing this up with a plan to tape the blossoms of the female squash closed and hand pollinating several vines. I’ll mark the hand pollinated fruits and save the seeds from just those plants. The downside to this method is that I want to save the best plants for seed and I won’t know that I have chosen the strongest vines until they mature.
I’ve been all over the internet, looking for some documentation forms that our group can use. It’s vital to have a consistent method for tracking process and results. After several fruitless hours I decided to make my own form. This is the information I think we will need.
Name of plant
Seed source
Year saved
Where planted
When planted
How isolated
How pollinated
When harvested
condition of plant and fruit
How many seed saved
How gathered
How dried
How saved
There is also a space for comments. If there has been drought or flood, insect damage or disease, this needs to be noted. It’s surprisingly hard to remember these details over time and the information could be vital.
I have joined a couple of internet forums this week. Idigmygarden and Seed Savers Alliance both look good. Primal Seeds, International Seed Savers Institute and Seed to Seed Exchange also have great resources. I love the feeling I’m getting from doing this. There is sense of belong to something much bigger than yourself. This makes me better nderstand my role in a global community. National boundaries are about politics. Food is about people. One is artificial and the other ordained by nature. Maintaining a secure seed bank, specific to your soil and climate, is the best way I know to ensure that you and your kids, their kids and their kids eat. It goes beyond voting with your pocketbook. It means voting with your sweat. It’s my act of rebellion in the face of a toxic food system.
March 16, 2012 at 6:46 am
‘I love the feeling I’m getting from doing this. There is sense of belong to something much bigger than yourself. This makes me better understand my role in a global community,’
I know exactly how you feel.
The day we harvested our first chicken, I was almost crazy with joy. When I tried to explain it, it sounded bloodthirsty, uncaring and disrespectful of the chicken’s life.
But the real truth was — I know that I can feed my family. Come what may, rich or poor, I can raise a chicken from a day old, figure out how to feed it on a 3/4 acre suburban lot with no inputs from the feed store, kill it, process it, and not endanger my family.
And THAT, in my opinion, is TRUE wealth.
March 16, 2012 at 9:06 am
“Vote with your sweat.” Them’s powerful fighting words, Kathy. You go, girl!
March 16, 2012 at 7:59 pm
I so enjoy reading your blog in large part due to your philosophy about how to get along if our society undergoes disasters/changes. I was watching one of those shows on Discovery yesterday and was struck by how violent the outlook is for so many of the “preppers” they profile. In addition to buying all sorts of guns they were setting up a bunker with booby traps- fatal booby traps. What is the sense in that? They’ll probably wind up killing someone in their own family before they kill an intruder, and if you don’t develop a community and work WITH your neighbors then what chance have you got anyway? If everyone is an enemy then there’s not going to be any way to rebuild a decent way of life, so when that supply of food they have stored up runs out they won’t survive anyway. Thank you for your perspective; it is appreciated and the one I would like to believe in should the worst happen.
March 16, 2012 at 10:05 pm
Kathy, I’m not finding a “Seed Savers Alliance” via Google. Did you mean Seed Savers Exchange? Or perhaps “Organic Seed Alliance”?
March 17, 2012 at 6:07 pm
Kathy,
Do you mind noting what squash varieties you are trying to save seeds from? I think this year we will most definitely save Sweet Meat Oregon Homestead. We have been very successful in saving corn seed from our Painted Mountain variety. The corn is listed as an ornamental but our chickens LOVE the stuff. Plus it does well here so I can count on at least a corn harvest for my animals. I’ve had limited success with tomatoes and great success with dried beans and (of course) potatoes. I’m definitely an amature at this seed saving but just the act of saving seed from year to year really helps me feel like I’ve got a little edge on pur family’s future food security.
Thanks for sharing all that you do. It helps the rest of us not feel so isolated in our own endeavors.
Elizabeth
March 19, 2012 at 5:18 am
I’m also doing a Bennings Green Tint which is a variety of PattyPan and I would love to do a Delicata but I believe Delicats a Pepo as well. I want to be sure to raise one each of Maximo, Pep and Mushata. I’ll look up the website for Seed Savers Alliance again.
March 19, 2012 at 10:01 am
Do be very careful saving squash seed. Contrary to popular belief, they do cross pollinate. I planted a field from hand-pollinated seed, which ended up being zucchernuts (butternut x zucchini)! I taped female flowers shut before and after pollination, but somehow there was a cross. For what it’s worth, I used to do controlled pollination for research, so I do know what I am doing. There is evidence that some bees may chew through the flower petals to get to the nectar, allowing for crossing. If you wanted to be 100% certain, I would bag the flowers pre- and post- pollination.