Salt Spring Seeds

🎉🎈🙌 Salt Spring Seeds Turns 40 Years Old! 🎉🎈🙌

Here at Seed Spirit Farm, this summer marks more than the usual seasonal delights: it is the 40th birthday of Salt Spring Seeds! 40 years ago, our seed man, Dan Jason, founded Salt Spring Seeds on our beautiful island. Inspired by the generosity of the plants he worked with, he took on the responsibility of stewarding hundreds of seed varieties. He has since come to know their stories and shared them far and wide. He's learned their ways - how each plant prefers to grow, express itself, and give its seed. How to cook each type of bean to perfection and find exactly the right screen for every seed. He has dutifully given his love to the seeds for many years, and they in turn have gifted him a life path full of meaning and beauty - the magic of which he shares willingly with everyone he meets.

We're certain that we speak for everyone when we say we're all profoundly grateful for the important work Dan has done over the last 40 years (and continues to do each day, as he has surely not stopped farming!). Through Salt Spring Seeds, Dan has inspired countless gardeners, farmers and many other folks to take up the empowering and sacred art of saving their own seeds, therefore preserving their own stories and gaining an understanding of this intricate and subtle yet powerful practice. He has donated seeds to countless projects and enabled many seed initiatives to take off.

Following the very nature of seeds themselves, he has spread a sense of abundance far and wide and sown ideas of a gentler and more generous paradigm in the hearts of many.

In honour of his work and philosophy, and to celebrate Salt Spring Seeds turning 40, we'd love to offer a 40% off sale on some of our favourite seed varieties! Check out our 40th Anniversary Sale on our website:

https://www.saltspringseeds.com/collections/40th-anniversary-sale

Enjoy! 🌱🌻

🧄🧄 Garlic time is here 🧄🧄

We're kicking off the garlic season with some big and beautiful Early Portuguese grown right here on Salt Spring Island.

The bulbs have been harvested and are currently curing. We'll be cleaning them up and getting them ready to send out to you over the next few weeks. Feel free to place your orders in advance through our website: https://www.saltspringseeds.com/.../early-portuguese...

There will be more garlic varieties to come, and as we harvest, we'll keep you updated. 🧄

Parsnips!

Hey there seed friends. It’s been a while since we’ve posted, and that is because we’ve been all hands and feet and knees on the land for the last couple of months. As many garden and farm folk know, May and June are the months to get everything planted and established – which is exactly what we’ve been up to.

Amidst all that, we have also had the delight of witnessing one of the season’s first seed crops budding, blooming and readying themselves for harvest. Many of the early seeds that we collect are from varieties that we’ve overwintered – such as these impressive parsnips!

Have you ever seen these towering beauties before? For us, it is a first to see them reach so high, at about 8 feet tall. They have been a giant in the garden next to all our baby bean plants, and they have brought us an early sense of vibrancy and abundance. The flowers are absolutely loaded with various bees. We’ve also noticed a huge number of ladybugs have taken up residency in the parsnip patch. It’s been a joy to walk by and see all the pollinators and beneficial bugs thriving.

It is always inspiring to watch a crop go through a winter in the ground and come back in the spring with such vigour. Root crops especially amaze us, the way that they draw all the sugars from the root to burst forth with seeds and continue their cycle. Which crops have you had fun overwintering?

🌼🐝🦋 Hello seedy folks 🦋🐝🌼

Though it was a slower unfolding of spring this season, it now feels in full bloom here at Seed Spirit Farm. To celebrate this long-awaited blossoming, we put together a collection of discounted seed packets to peruse and see if there are any gaps to fill or last-minute additions for your garden plans this year.

All of these varieties can still be started - it's not too late by any means! We ourselves
are only now just potting up our tomatoes and starting some late herbs and brassicas. Every season has a different pace, and it's incredible how patient the garden can be. As farmers, we learn how to pivot and accept the variations in the growing season - in fact, we are given no choice but to surrender to it all (it sounds romantic on paper, but its a lot messier in reality!).

We hope that this sale invites you to dance with the slow spring that we've experienced. Please use the link provided or visit our website to browse our collection of discounted seed packets. Those in this collection are 25% off, with the discount automatically applied. This sale will run from Friday, May 8th - Friday, May 15th.

🌼🐝🦋 Happy planting and wishes of abundance this growing season! 🦋🐝🌼

https://www.saltspringseeds.com/collections/spring-sale-202

Hey seedy folks

Salt Spring Seeds is stoked to collaborate with our friends at Art Ecosystem and the Russian Hall next weekend.

Join us for ‘Seeding the Commons’, an event organized to invite everyone to step onto the common ground of sharing knowledge, resources, stories and snacks; all in the name of our shared respect for the plant world.

Come by at 1 pm for a presentation on Palestinian Political Ecologies & the Role of Seeds in Cultural Memory by Haneen G and Alia Hijaab. Afterwards, there will be a Host Nation’s welcome to begin our food and resource share and seed swap.

Feel free to bring along some spare seeds or plant starts to redistribute, or if those aren’t at hand, just bring an open heart and ear to share and listen!

Sunday, April 12th at the Russian Hall
600 Campbell street, Vancouver

All other details can be found in the post below!

https://www.instagram.com/p/DWPcRXlkvTu/?utm_source=ig_web_button_share_sheet&igsh=MzRlODBiNWFlZA==

🌱Seeding the Commons brings together friends, neighbours and organizers, to center around a shared adoration of seeds, food, land-based knowledge and community care. From 1-1:45pm, we welcome the public to join us for a presentation on Political Ecologies & the Role of Seeds in Cultural Memory by Haneen and Alia, followed by a land & food resource fair and seed swap from 2-4pm. 🍉 🦋Come by right at 2pm for a host nation’s welcoming and opening words from some community members, and enter your name in the raffle ~ winner will be announced at 4pm. Bring your seeds and starters to trade or share (but it’s not required!), and join us for a cup of tea & cookies. Email [email protected] for accessibility information and accommodations. Kid & family friendly event (with hands on activities)🐝 ♡ *masks will be available at the event* ♡ PRESENTATION INFO: Palestinian Political Ecologies & the Role of Seeds in Cultural Memory 45 mins Description: Join us for an informative talk on Palestinian political ecologies and the role that seed saving has in preserving memory of the land and its stewards. Topics will include Palestinian sovereignty and land-based resistance, zionist tools of Indigenous dispossession, seeds as objects that hold memory and keep history, and Palestinian seed-saving in diaspora and in the homelands. Funded & organized by the Russian Hall, art ecosystem, & Salt Spring Seeds

🌾🌱🌼 Come say hi at our final Seedy Saturday of the year! (But remember, this one is on a Sunday) 🌼🌱🌾

Duncan Seedy Sunday on March 29th marks the finale of the Seedy Saturday season for Salt Spring Seeds.

After this weekend, we will have attended a total of 11 Seedy Saturdays, and we want to express our huge gratitude to all the folks who put them together.

Thank you to all the communities who organized these seedy events, who came out and took part and of course, all the amazing seed growers and growers/crafters of other kinds who were vendors! Everyone coming together to welcome in the season is always such an invigorating way to transition from winter to spring.

We wish everyone the most abundant gardens this year, with plenty of beauty and nourishment to enjoy and share. 🌾🌱🌼

🌾 Hey again seedy people. 🌾

We have yet another upcoming Seedy Saturday! This weekend, we’ll be in Ladysmith at the Saltair Seedy Saturday.

It’s from 10am - 2pm at the Saltair Community Centre.

See you there for some pre-spring preparations and fun. 🌾

🧅 Onions are back! 🧅

Thanks to the hands of our friend and grower, Sal Dominelli at Sweet Rock Farm on Gabriola, we’ve got onion seeds back in stock. One variety, Newberg, has already flown off the shelves and into many patiently waiting seed trays. This photo is of the Ailsa Craig, a large, sweet and mild onion that can reach up to 2 pounds! It’s great to eat in the fall and early winter, and it is a low-maintenance onion to grow. 🧅

Check out Sweet Rock Farm here:
https://www.sweetrockfarm.ca

🌱 Hello again seedy folks! 🌱

This coming weekend, we will be doing a double Seedy Saturday. We’re splitting up the team to cover more ground with Dan and Fern attending the Comox Valley Seedy Saturday, and I, Caitlyn, will be joining the fun in Squamish. Sol the cat will be staying at Seed Spirit Farm to supervise the leek seedlings.

We have certainly indulged this season, taking on 11 Seedy Saturdays/Sundays! We’ve got 5 more to go, so hopefully we get to see some of you along the way to exchange seeds and stories. 🌱

🌱 We are thrilled to announce that this year we will be at Nanaimo's Seedy Sunday! 🌱
It's been a while since our last visit, so we are genuinely excited. We will bring loads of seeds - looking forward to seeing you there!