Seed Libraries Newsletter
Cool Beans!
July 2021| Issue #26
Upcoming Events

Grain School Online
Sep 30, 2021 - Nov 18, 2021
Thursdays from 2-4 pm MT
Online
$229 - Fill out the Scholarship Form to receive financial support
Rocky Mountain Seed Alliance

Seed School 101
Online, Self-Paced Seed Saving Course
$40 - Fill out the Scholarship Form to receive financial support
Rocky Mountain Seed Alliance

Grain-School-In-A-Day (GSIAD)
Thursday, August 12, 2021
Mancos, CO, USA
$90 or $150 if purchased with Seed-School-In-A-Day - Fill out the Scholarship Form to receive financial support
Rocky Mountain Seed Alliance

Seed-School-In-A-Day
Friday, August 13, 2021
Mancos, CO, USA
$90 or $150 if purchased with Grain-School-In-A-Day - Fill out the Scholarship Form to receive financial support
Rocky Mountain Seed Alliance

Virtual Seed School
Sept 13-Oct 25, Mondays at 6 PM CDT
A 7-week online education course
Register at https://www.seedsavers.org/events (registration will open July 19)
$35 for students and seniors, $50 for farmers, $100 full price
Seed Savers Exchange
Virtual Seed Swaps
Presentation from the Queen City Seed Library, Marquette, Michigan from the 10th Annual Seed Library Summit
Seed swaps help us share seeds that have cultural significance to our community and that do well in our area. Sebastopol, California
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Seed Swaps
By Elizabeth Johnson
San Luis Obispo, CA, USA

Seed Swaps have traditionally been one of the most important ways that human beings around the globe have maintained healthy food crops by growing them in new or different soils that encourages variety of expression, promotes genetic resilience and helps prevent accumulation of potential pathogens. Some traditional practices exchange seeds at the same time every year, accompanied by rituals and ceremonies that celebrate the biodiversity of their cultures. In some places, seeds were part of a bride’s dowry and traveled with her to her new home.  
Social elements of seed swaps are profound, and based in a community’s commitment to support each other’s creative pursuit of food security. Seed swaps in every form offer friendship, shared information/self-education, shared meals, and the joy of success in growing plants from seed to seed. Every seed has a story so storytelling is always present during every swap. New varieties are discovered, grown, and shared. Soil improvement and garden problem solving are also storytelling opportunities. Recipes on the hospitality table using seeds available at the exchange are popular. 
Anyone who has attended a seed swap can attest to the feeding frenzy that rises from the hunger for connection to our seeds and soil – our human heritage! SLO Seed Exchange in San Luis Obispo County, California has hosted many almost-annual exchanges over the past 15 years plus during talks that we and our library branches host, and
at lots of events hosted by other groups. We also participate in the annual Santa Barbara Seed Exchanges hosted by the SB Permaculture Guild as both educator and seed exchange. The venue for both annual events is usually the central public library in each county. SLO lines up a speaker on one specific topic and SB lines up an afternoon of short talks by many presenters on different subjects. Both of these events are great opportunities to network with other regional seed folks. 
Over the years, our speaker topics have ranged from ‘heirloom tomatoes’ to ‘seed stories’ to ‘native plants for pollinators’ to ‘local businesses based on organic seeds’ to ‘seed libraries.’ Just as our recent Seed Library Summit presentation list showed, the list of topics related to seed saving and exchange is extensive and evolving each year. Those of us who attend national or international organic seed conferences experience the same things on a larger and more professional scale - like talks, tours, and the ever-present seed exchange that is always the heart of the event. 
In addition to the “big” swaps, we use every event opportunity to share seeds: farm festivals, Rare Fruit Growers conference, annual California Native Plant Society chapter seed exchange, library branch seed talks, garden visits, mobile seed library at Farmers’ Markets, and more. Our county library Seed Librarians also show up at events with seeds to give away. In 2019 and 2020, our region participated in a One Seed One Community project where we all grew one variety of pole bean and shared the harvest at our 2019 Community Seed Exchange. All of these activities link our efforts to self-educate, become seed stewards, and enjoy everyone’s garden choices. Everyone is always welcome at every event, whether you garden and save seeds or not. If you are interested, you are welcome.
Lettuce Talks!
How Do You Prepare for Seed Swaps?
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This month we are focusing on seed swaps. Here are some questions to consider, but feel free to pose questions to the other seed librarians. Post your responses on UpBeet! and use #seedswap.

- How do you promote your seed swap?
- What type of venue do you host your swap in?
- How has COVID changed your exchange? Any recommendations?
- Would you continue with those changes after COVID restrictions are lifted? Why or why not?
- How do you organize your seed swap?
- How do you increase locally saved seeds through your seed swap?
- Do you partner with other organizations when doing the seed swap? If so, what type of organizations?
- Do you have any other programming (ex. lectures, hands-on, literature) associated with the seed swap?


Response from Pat Sobrero
The Seed Library at the Round Valley Public Library, Covelo (Mendocino County), CA, USA

-How do you promote your seed swap?
We are located in a small, remote community. We promote our events through flyers, both around town on bulletin boards and at the library, on our Facebook page, and on the community radio station.

- What type of venue do you host your swap in?
We generally hold our seed swaps in our library's community room, or in the case of our seed and seedling swap, on the patio behind the library. We also hold events where we make seed available in the walnut grove behind the library during Farmers Market.

- How has COVID changed your exchange? Any recommendations?
We have not done a community seed e"swap" during Covid, what we have done is purchase seed for seed giveaways: we have a grab and go table weekly out at the Farmers Market. We make seed available during our planting parties, held monthly. As soon as WIC comes back, we would like to have a box of seeds there as providing seed to the seed bank was very popular. And of course, now we have the seed catalog available during library hours. But our county has not opened up indoor programming as of yet.

- Would you continue with those changes after COVID restrictions are lifted? Why or why not?
Undecided. We have packaged up several thousand packets of seed and distributed almost 6,000 since Covid began. We got the bulk of the prep work done before our library reopened to the public. Now that we're open we have far fewer hours to devote to seed packing as we have not welcomed back volunteers yet.
- How do you organize your seed swap?
Pre-Covid, we had different tables for different types of seed: Veggies, Flowers, Herbs, Misc. Some bulk seed from local folks in jars and baggies, but mostly commercial type packets with our little envelopes (each with a label so people could record type of seed, variety, where the seed was sourced from, year of harvest, name of gardener or seed company, and "notes"). People would drop off seed to share if they had any and wander around the room helping themselves. People were able to attend the event and take seed even if they had none to share.

- How do you increase locally saved seeds through your seed swap?
We personally contact folks we know who are seed savers and ask them to attend the event.

- Do you partner with other organizations when doing the seed swap? If so, what type of organizations?
We have shared seed with the entity that oversees the community garden and the food bank. Originally with baggies of about 15 types of seed. We came to the conclusion that these "Victory Garden Starter Kits" were wasteful and started putting out varieties of seed and allowing the gardener to take just what they needed.

- Do you have any other programming (ex. lectures, hands-on, literature) associated with the seed swap?
Yes, we have held swaps following lectures on gardening and seed saving. This has been very successful. We try to have folks from local seed companies come to lecture at least once a year. We also have seeds available at our seedling swap in the spring and our monthly "planting parties."

We ALWAYS have literature available: a planting calendar for our area, info on "easy to save" seed (beans, peas, tomatoes, lettuce), a more in-depth handout on how to save seed that crosses, a handout on how and why to save seed to donate to the library.
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