Seeds, seeds, seeds

I'm very excited, my first order of seed for the allotment has arrived. I have been late ordering seeds this year but then again the weather hasn't been that great for planting them.

My allotment is organic, ever year I buy my seeds from The Real Seed Company. It is run by a husband and wife team they are also gardeners and write their own catalogue and run their own website. As their website states they do not sell F1 hybrid or genetically modified seed. A lot of the seeds they sell are also rare heirloom varieties.

As I am sure a lot of you are aware the EU have an official list of vegetable varieties and as such this means that if the vegetable is not on their official list then seed companies are not allowed to sell it to the general public. I think this is ridiculous, apparently there is no law that stops the general public from actually buying or growing the seed, just that companies are not allowed to sell it if it's not on the 'list'! This also mean that thousands of heirloom varieties will be lost forever because of this EU law.

However, The Real Seed Company have found an ingenious way around this, they operate as a Club, 1p of your order pays for a years membership, this means they are not directly selling to the general public but to a club member, so lucky us we are able to grow the heirloom varieties which would otherwise become extinct.

When I received my order the company also including instructions on how to harvest and store the plant together with useful cooking instructions. They also ask all their customers to try saving their own seed and you can download information on how to do this on their website, here.

 

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