Saving 30,000 Varieties of Seeds - For Food & Stories

just two seeds passed down as a special gift launch this entire seed saving organization let's get that story today's farm featured feed savers we're in Iowa let's go see what they're about okay one more time and then we got to go go ahead mr. brown [Music] Diane's garden isn't that nice this is the co-founder of this place some things I want to find out how'd they get started why save seeds why is that important and then how to save seed I think we're at the right place to find all that out [Music] you [Music] Lily you want to take pictures while we talk to miss Diane okay you take pictures mom might have to open up for you I'm very excited to be here we have not gone to a place that is saving seeds yet on this tour we've been to 26 States I don't even know how many farms so we're very excited to be here and I think just supportive thing you do here so what is your name and what do you do here good morning my name is Diana Whaley and co-founder of seed savers exchange in Decorah Iowa and basically what we do here is we still sleep in the right place so how did it all get started one sees that started the whole organization one team the power of one seed all the seeds are important but this one has the history because it's kind of first one that started Seed Savers and the story about this is this is the grandpa Morning Glory and it's being one of the first ones I think I've seen but this was a started as a memory of mine when I was growing up in Northeast dialogue was I grew up on a small dairy farm and part of my summers were always driving down to my grandparents farm and looking at their gardens and they raised nine children during the Depression and their grocery list was flour sugar salt pepper coffee and vinegar and everything else that they produced to feed their family was produced by their hands and from their land so the gardens were really always important so that was part of our visit down there so we go down to my grandparents and one night and then we'd always end our garden visits on a porch and my grandfather would have the morning glories or whenever year he hadn't rained using twine strings which we sell you and he have an opening for there be a circle or square or a triangle so we could sit on the porch and he'd tell us stories about people driving by and so forth but we sat in this little cozy morning glory' room so when I had my first garden I of course I wanted the Morning Glory so I went my Kent Whaley and I drove over to the farm and asked him for the morning glory you know if we could have some the seeds and he went back into the back bedroom and came out this little white pillbox saw his little black seeds and he said yeah here are the Morning Glory seeds the general my parents brought these seeds over when they immigrated from Moria to Saint Lucas Iowa on the turn-of-the-century and I had never heard that story before and holding those seeds it was like I was connected to a family I never knew or thought about and also then he said you know those big German pink tomatoes that you love that grandma always serves with the sugar sprinkles on the top those also came from from the Varia with my parents so we were handed this this treasure and later that winter he passed away and Kent and I realized that if he hadn't given us the seed and told us the story that it would have been lost and how often that happened when immigrated when immigrants came into this country they brought with them their best feed and because they didn't know what they find here in this new country so my my family they wanted to be reminded of the beautiful morning glories and they loved those tomatoes but unless there was a systematic way of collecting he sees as as the elderly folks were passing on and moving off the farm they would be lost in all the genetic diversity and beauty that they treasured and brought over would be lost as well so we started seeing Savers Exchange it's a long story yeah beautiful story how we started so we're a nonprofit organization with the inspiration of those two seeds those varieties we were able to inspire other people to join us and also save feed and share and just and distribute their seeds so today we have a seed bank of over 25,000 different varieties of seeds so when we're talking about the power of a few seeds that that's it we stuck to what we were doing we had a great mission wonderful people joined us along the way and here we are today at this farm with our collection what we do at the farm is maintain the collection so we're talking about living heirlooms and the seeds are living so we have to continue that in the mode each year in replenishing our seed collection so that's what we do here at the farm because it's hard to sometimes describe why we should be saving genetic what genetic diversity is and why we should be saving it because it's the abstract idea but I think when people come to Heritage Farm and they walk in this garden and see all the work we're doing it makes it makes sense and when you think about all the seeds that we have growing around us from all over the world we have probably had the most diverse farm in the country here in Decorah Iowa photobomb you've been photobomb Dianne come on you get a good picture of the Morning Glory that's okay he can be he can be there to say it's good you can get get some pictures buddy get some pictures this is important this is diversity in action really I mean you can now people understand they walk into this garden and they see I have about 300 different plant types in my garden so definitely there's a lot of diversity going on I plant flowers and herbs and vegetables together with Prairie plants and wildflowers and I like the idea that my garden looks like looks like it's part of nature and nature actually creates most of it a lot of people think oh I can't save seed and I wonder if that's complicated first of all I always say start with with easier seeds like tomatoes beans lettuce and peas because they are self pollinating and you can just grow an open pollinated heirloom variety of those types and you can save the seed without any you know a lot of without a lot of education or background you can definitely save tomato seeds and when you think about all the seeds that we have in our collection was brought into this country and maintained by people they didn't have fancy equipment or degrees they were just backyard gardeners like we were in savings Fiedler's was an it was a part of everyone's garden back in the day because you didn't rely on on store-bought seeds because that was a luxury like store-bought anything so she's saving this part of everyone's garden I would ask you something about the Morning Glory what is the purpose of the more glory purposes of the morning glory okay sometimes if we were out here you'll see bees coming into the character of it so definitely it attracts a bees which are pollinators which we need to pollinate our food crops for me there's a sentimental value of it I come out here and I see those morning glories and who do I think about but my grandmother he still lives he's right there and where do I go but back on my grandparents porch yeah morning boys so me it's a living really is literally a living connection to my family that I knew which all heirloom seeds are because they all are connected they all have histories the odd stories all of our seeds have stories so the importance but you know when I have when my grandparents garden and my mother their garden had to be serious because they were producing food and they couldn't afford the luxury of having a flower in their garden because it wasn't as you say what is the purpose of that outside of adding in a joy and beauty to heart but my grandmother always had you know we had the Morning Glory so that she travels because that was her flower but also now I'm finding it's not only a luxury to have flowers it's a necessity because my garden attracts you know butterflies hummingbirds hummingbird moth bats bats or pollinators and they're all crucial these days for now to maintain our our food supply because I think I don't know I shouldn't quote things that I don't know but a great percent of our food is relying on pollinators to do the pollinating of that particular plant so we need you know it's this common sense we need to keep preserve at all and in terms of heirloom seeds and what why we're saving it we just believe in saving all the pieces because we don't know with climate you know maybe changing or what scientists are going to need in the future we want to make sure that they have the tools to work with to create a better food crop if needed or whatever but we just believe in saving all the pieces today Diane I learn how to save it tomato soup I do not know I know everything is different like you save a corn seed different than you would have to meditate so let's start with one tomato seed and this is a perfect one to start with because this is a grandpa or this is a German pink this is the one that came from Bavaria along with my great-grandparents and that morning-glory see that's growing on the barn you keep saving seeds from this one right there grandpa lives on this plant has been grown in Northeast Iowa for over a hundred years Wow when you think about the value of that seed it has been a lot of climate changes seeing a lot of pests and it survived so it is a strong seed that has been naturally strengthened by Nature going on for a hundred years but now you're going to have to use your imagination on how to exactly sing yeah I'm a Tosi so we're in Iowa and we don't have summer like in North Carolina so we have one tomato and on here yes okay coming along it's green but basil you know we want it to be you know about it can be half a pound size and be red okay so then when it is ripen what we will do is rotate the tomato off ticket and as hard as it is we squeeze it you can only just want to slice it and have it on a BLT or something but we squeeze the seed into a container and then we let that seed and the juice ferment for about two or three days depending upon the temperature and when we will come back in on the container there'll be a little layer of mold and that is containing all the bacterial that's been in carried in the seed it's going on the top in that liquid so we take that off wash the seeds put it on a coffee filter or a paper towel and just let the seeds dry cool it's as easy as that but you have to start with a non hybrid seed - seed you would not get the same plant back you took one of the other parents how do you keep this one from not going covered this one is self pollinating as I mentioned so it will it will pollinate before the blossom is open so it doesn't cost us anything so like over here Li I don't want to complicate things but this is a squat yeah so you see that blossom that would cross bees will go from one blossom to another so you could have a cucumber over here which I have or another squash variety and network so to say that seed you have to grow those further away isolate or hand Halloween episode how did your grandparents isolate the squash well they probably only had one varieties and so you can grow a variety of watermelon a variety of squash they just took me to know a family okay okay you get one of the better isn't in the same family some save the seed so yeah they didn't they probably have their favorite pumpkin that's how this happens you have your favorite tomato your favorite pumpkin and you probably don't think you need anything else okay [Music] what are you doing I bet you better not playing that bird back come on come on we don't want you to get wet we don't want you to get way oh don't forget your water bottle miss around here's your water bottle buddy all right go 50 mama go [Music] Diane thank you so much for the tour of your beautiful garden thank you for what you're doing what you're doing is really important keep up the good work well thank you for sharing it people if people want to find out more about what you do where do they go our Seed Savers org okay [Music] next up got a seed drying room and we're we're Cindy what's your role here Cindy my role is Development Coordinator at Seed Savers Exchange okay just as I've talked to Elena this to make this possible so thank you for that you're welcome we're excited that you're here now here with Phil what's your job here Phil I'm the seed bank manager at a pers exchange cool yeah supposedly those drying room here that you can tell us a little bit about yeah well maybe the seed banks you are room three inventory oh here we go the good stuff so this is one of the rooms that we house our inventory it's a little cool with about 38 degrees so you might you might be a little cold for a while but in here are just thousands of thousands of varieties so you want to take them beans Wow like I said everything in here is from previous year grow out okay the things that we we're going to regenerate in the future you'll grow them out again proceed yep absolutely yeah we're we're a little different than than a typical farmer or we call ourselves Eve formers okay and so we house anywhere from 25,000 to 30,000 different varieties in our in our seed bulb and this is just one of the the rooms that we we have something so far cuz you want to see some more examples of some beans here black beans white beans we have beans you've never seen be yeah so we have approximately a thousand corn varieties in the collection we have five thousand beans in the collection we have six thousand Tomatoes we have about four to five thousand peppers in the collection and you know typically when you go to the store the farmers market you're only seeing a couple varieties here and there so we have really interesting variety than the collection that we can trace back the old varieties and the 800th that were very popular back then we have cherished family heirlooms that have been passed down from generation to generation and people have given them to us as gifts so we can maintain them here and keep them in our seed vault for safekeeping and once we get those we share them with our members and other people as well so our goal is to not only preserve the seeds but preserve the family heritage behind these and share them and get them out with people all around the country and all around the world nice these are not going to be for sale these are for planting again and raising up for more seeds that's correct okay yeah but we will also offer them to members okay they've exchanged through what we call the yearbook okay sure Road yellow popcorn you got it Wow I've got our Ramona yeah write our name on who knows maybe if they can come pretty it could have come from a distant member of Durham we try yeah is this the yearly insist a year book that you're requiring there so if somebody how does somebody get this yearbook once you become members okay a weapon to that yearbook and we have what happens once you become a member once you become a member of Seed Savers Exchange and not only support what we do here in preserving you know biodiversity and the stories and the season everything like that you get access to this book and this has over 12,000 varieties offered by not only heritage farm which is a seat savers exchange but also members of Seed Savers Exchange offer what they have to offer all three book so we have over here we have everything from asparagus to apples to the 200 pages of tomatoes to film through these apple seed no the grass they are apple grass the apple blood stock yep because apples nice if you get apple seeds they don't breach right and so you don't know what you're going to get with an apple so you have to you have to grab them you're interested in that honey yes very much this stuff yeah okay you'll have to catch it we're going to go to the bolt Oh pulling her away bullying her way out to the bolt right now there we go here's the vault which is our Spiegel it's cold in there it's about zero degrees Fahrenheit and this house is pretty much everything in our collection so you saw room three all the new grow outs and everything in there is housed in here we have thousands of thousands of seed packets in here so this is what's for so that's packed this is what we will we will make available to member of member yoga yes everything in there so what is for sale just stuff in the visitor center that's right so we're a little little interesting organization so we have a seed catalog that's produced by it we call this seed house okay and then we have what we call preservation it's two different two different departments and some different ideas behind what we do so preservation is in charge of manage this vast collection of 25 to 30 thousand different varieties the seed house is there to kind of peruse the collection and make it available to everybody okay and and once you become a member we kind of you know who want them to feel special okay so that's where you get access to you know pretty much almost everything into question Wow every about 5000 varieties to our members every year how much is a membership I know is $25 right here okay cool yeah yeah we're definitely gonna have to become members I don't see why not I know I know I was not aware of Thank You Phil Thank You Sydney this place is amazing great stop on the tour thanks for all you do thanks for coming Justin appreciated [Music] guys let's get us something that we can grow in the bus bill your show what else it in what should we get it we can grown about enough I kind of like an apartment situation doesn't need a lot of maintenance not going to grow big it will be in a tiny pot but you some lettuce with you okay what kind of lettuce do you like where's our lettuce what about a mint or something for a tea or Oh ever what is your like basil we have a tank basil okay my name is basil Rebecca you cool with basil any time I walk by this the basil smells good like we're gonna have Italian okay let's grow basil plant in the bus you want to that will be a good one okay you don't so pops here do you oh you do okay thanks I like that book cool store here thank you look at that nice like I want to hold that till you don't sell potting soil here do you happy for all that is there not good you know what I'll do I'm gonna go out into the garden I was okay with them in the show we're here cool we're gonna be growing a basil plant we'd bottom I'm gonna go I'm gonna go he talked to me about here look right back okay soil from this place they can't get any better than that right you got your pet junk you gotta head back with the ground you getting that book they gifted it oh one other gathering a memoir of a seed saver by Diane oh that was very cool I'm excited well thank you guys yes and Rebecca Rebecca yes he's going to get some hot oil for us from garden lettuce from the medieval garden for you to try our tech thank you okay a little bit for you okay look at him look at him excellent there it is great head of lettuce you gave me there you gave it to me from the garden you want some yeah they should just take knocks oh yeah oh just I would love this the best head of lettuce whatever takes it is difficult they call it iceberg lettuce but it's the iceberg lettuce like you know AB I know right like that actually has noted yeah you go to the store you buy iceberg lettuce tastes like nothing yes this is that this is actually a little mid nineteen eight twentieth century you variety in Kalmar Wow amazing just tell you what Johnny you want to try this big fight just take a bite and we're going to give the rest to Josiah cause he loves love it peanut lettuce like real crunchy juicy exact mirror I got a treat for you what special head of lettuce this is our lettuce kind jump away my friend [Music] what do you think no place kids always do objective trick I liked it I'm not lying you liked it okay he's starting to warm up he's kind of warm up that actually has a little bit of taste to it doesn't it well he's not talking for less time they must be that good that it's quiet [Music] how many roads people can we fit into the mudroom everybody I guess you know our motto just plans even if in Europe even if you're in a bus yeah there's no excuse it may not work but we're going to put a few seeds in there hold on one second D which one makes it spin them out look we got our little green room here light from both directions I mean you're going to drop in there ah three four well I'm just putting a couple here just throw some in nice we'll just see what happened yep here's with luck yeah you got to keep them watered okay and maybe we will eventually get some sort of suction cup thingy hold that into place yeah you know only too terribly hopeful I am just nervous somebody gets in me a very nice plan I feel like it's not going to make it the whole trip and I really want it to so wait this is not a glass pot no this guy okay and that makes me have some more water yeah no it's plot it's a recycled plastic great awesome a recycled Plus okay I have no hope oh my gosh okay well see what happens [Music]

Channel: Justin Rhodes

Views: 68,768

Rating: 4.9506173 out of 5

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Id: 8X01H6lH7VQ

Length: 26min 19sec (1579 seconds)

Published: Sat Jul 15 2017