Seed choices, assisted

Like most gardeners, winter for me is a time of poring over seed catalogs and choosing what to grow next season -- mainly for edibles. With limited growing space, I need to choose carefully. Oh to have room for rows and rows of food someday!

One of the first places I look every year is Baker Creek Heirloom Seeds, a major player in the area of heirloom seeds, and also based right here in Missouri. Their catalog is huge and wonderful, and I've chosen a few things to order from them this year. Before placing the order though, I asked my neighbor if he was planning on ordering anything from them, thinking we could combine orders, save a little money, and conserve some resources.

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He said no, he wasn't going to order anything from them this year, because they had already sent a big assortment of free seeds to the school (my neighbor is principal and helped create the school garden and outdoor classroom). He asked if I wanted to take a look through them -- I could take some seeds if I was interested. (He knows I need so few of almost any variety, and they rarely use every seed in a packet.)

So the other day he brought over the school's seed storage bin:

There's so much in here, most of it coming from Baker Creek, but other seed companies have contributed too over the last few years.

Some things are tempting, but I won't be growing:

Other things that I really want to give a try:

Although I've seen African horned cucumber in the catalog, it probably wouldn't have made the final cut in my garden:

With some free seeds though, I'll be growing this for sure this year!

As mentioned, some of the seeds were older, and apparently it's difficult to keep every seed in its packet, especially when kids are involved:

The interesting thing was that those loose seeds did not come from any of the packets in that bag. I was tempted to grab some to plant, just to see what they ended up being! (Broccoli? Kale? Tatsoi? So many things it could be...)

I didn't take many seeds of course, and there are still a few things I want to order from Baker Creek, but it's nice to have some of the seed-choosing decisions made for me!


Are you planning on growing anything new this upcoming year?

(It turns out that seed-sowing time is here already -- it's possible to start lettuce seeds outdoors here in St. Louis, provided you give them a little bit of protection with a row cover. This is what Jack at Schlafly Gardenworks does. I'm going to give this a try this week!)

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