Expats: save those seeds!
November 28th, 2007
In an interesting article. the New York Times has proposed that the traditional seeds that once made up the vast variety of food plants grown in Italy has started to disappear.
My neighbors save seeds and use them year after year, if you live in the country, I’ll bet some of yours do, too.
I’d like to propose that we who live in the country talk to our neighbors with ortos and ask about the seeds they use, ask further who else there is they can introduce us to who uses old seeds. Now is the time to do it, because now is when the seeds are in and are also in their minds.
We can contact the study group in Perugia and point them right at the seeds that we find. Some will be winners, some not, but nothing will happen if everyone doesn’t try.
Calabria? Puglia? Emilia-Romana? Le Marche? All of italy … rise up and save those seeds!
12 Comments Add your own
1. Maryann | November 28th, 2007 at 3:38 am
I’m glad you wrote about this. Even here we are losing our heirloom seeds.
I know this is off your topic a bit but did you hear that the govt has produced vegetables who’s seed will not produce? I thought it was interesting that maybe, years from now, the only food we will have will be supplied by the govt and not home grown.A bit scary.
2. Mary | November 28th, 2007 at 8:46 am
An interesting article and sad that so many species are being lost. Many people here save their seeds and replant year after year. But, to be honest, none of the varieties seem different than what I’ve seen elsewhere. It’s sad to think, but maybe our older ones have already been lost.
3. admin | November 28th, 2007 at 11:13 am
We can’t know unless we get out and ask, yes?
We’ve lots of anziani with orti here. I want to meet them anyway.
4. Dermott | November 28th, 2007 at 11:31 am
My two-legged dog saves his heirloom tomato seeds.
It got to a point in Australia where a company based in Sydney was producing and selling a couple of vegies from seeds under licence from an American company. The American company had bred miniature capsicum that were, effectively, patented. The seeds were obviously sterile to prevent saving them. If you somehow managed to find fertile seeds somewhere, you would be sued.
They also grew and marketed an interesting green called broccolini which was developed, originally, in Japan and licensed in the same way.
5. Meg | November 28th, 2007 at 7:10 pm
Wasn\’t that an interesting article? It makes me wonder, though, because kitchen gardens are a strong tradition in France, and Spain (and presumably other countries as well, but not, clearly, the US so much, although it appears to be something of an issue here, as well); are they having the same problems? It\’s been a good series of articles on heirloom species, from turkeys to apples to garden seeds.
On a different note, I remember the nonna in the village I worked in would go out and forage wild crops (for lack of a better word for it), and wonder if knowledge of edible wild species and where to find them is something that will be lost with the passing of a generation, too.
6. admin | November 28th, 2007 at 8:26 pm
Yes, there’s a long term effort to save heirloom seeds in the US. Thing is, many hybrids are either sterile or you can’t tell what you might get if they’re fertile, but the newer effort is not the government, but agribusiness making sure they get a return for their research. Perhaps what they are protecting isn’t something we’ll always want, anyway. We’ll have nothing to fall back on if we don’t save the older seeds.
The one that IS sterile and IS dependent on the government, is tobacco in Italy. Don’t even try if you haven’t the license and the government plants. That dates back to the days of Papal control over large swathes of Italy. Umbria was a permitted tobacco growing area, and it still is, although it’s such picky work the crop is disappearing.
I knew tons of people in the US with veg gardens, but they bought seeds or plants for the most part.
At least with weed gathering there are books showing what to gather and how to use it. (I have one and it’s terrific.) If we lose these special breeds of ancient plants, we’ll have no recourse for genetic material when something goes wrong with the hybrid system.
7. Dermott | November 29th, 2007 at 12:38 pm
The US is the home of heirloom tomatoes, that’s for sure. There are heaps of dedicated growers and some real specialists. And they’re incredibly generous with both seeds and knowledge. I acquired most of my seeds, originally, from US growers.
8. admin | November 29th, 2007 at 1:13 pm
Tell us how good they were! :(
9. Dermott | November 29th, 2007 at 2:50 pm
Scrumptious … scrumptious … and scrumptious … not to forget scrumptious …
The best thing about the US tomato contacts was access to the (as it were) new heirloom varieties. A guy called Craig LeHoulier, one of THE specialists, I think in one of the Carolinas, found a mahogany-coloured fruit on one of his heirloom Cherokee Purple plants. It was the result of a spontaneous mutation of a colour gene. He saved seeds, grew it out over about five years, stabilised it, and Cherokee Chocolate came into being as a variety. Grew some this year. Gorgeous.
10. admin | November 29th, 2007 at 4:01 pm
<----- paint green
11. Dermott | December 1st, 2007 at 5:22 pm
Speaking of green, there’s also now a Cherokee Green, the result of yet another spontaneous colour gene mutation. Never grown it, but.
You can have heirloom seeds galore next year. Heirloom seedlings even, if you couldn’t be ducked starting the seeds yourself.
12. admin | December 1st, 2007 at 7:23 pm
It’s always nice to make friends with a dog. All positives and no negatives…. so far.
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