Seedy Thoughts

I've been thinking a lot about seeds lately...it's a personal thing for most of us...the saving, the planting, the eating, the storing and the sharing. Saving seeds has become a passion for Owen Bridge of Annapolis Seeds in Nova Scotia. He, along with Dan Jason from my beloved Salt Spring Island, are holding three workshops locally and if you check out his blog on the sidebar, you can find out how you can attend.

What I know about seeds is probably about average for most folks. Tomato seeds have been saved in this house, by smearing them on the kitchen window sill, waiting for them to dry and storing them. I don't think Owen and Dan would approve))))!

As for planting, all gardeners can relate to the shock and awe of seeing seeds they planted, germinate and grow to be fruiting and magnificent plants in their own right...starting life from "your own heart and hands".

Then for the best part, eating! Corn, with their precious seed kernels, each connected to a fine filament that forms the tassel, is now available here, fresh picked from the fields, mostly grown in the Annapolis Valley where Owen lives. The Captain and I grew corn as a cash crop when we lived on Salt Spring, getting up before dawn, dressing in rain gear to protect us from the heavy dew, rousing the little one out of bed and handing him a just picked cob to chew on....and after three hours picking, or when the truck was full, whichever came first, off we went to the Salt Spring market. Oh memories...

Memories bring me to the value of all seeds, but applicable to our early life, grain, and the sharing of it. Years before living on Salt Spring, our ship arrived in Bangladesh, with five holds full of United Nations mixed oats, wheat, barley and corn, ....and no automated way to offload. It was early days for the new Bangladesh. For one full month, a legion of men descended to the depths, in heat you cannot imagine, shoveled that grain, those seeds, into sacks, which would then be sewed shut and lifted out of the holds by rope and pulley.

The value of grains...the value of all seed, and knowing how to save it, plant it, store it, and share it... benefit all humankind.

See you at the Seed Saving Workshop!