Collect seeds to preserve plant, food heritage
Hybrid seeds do not provide same traits in next generation.
Today, we are blessed with a wide variety of food plants thanks to the seed-saving efforts of our ancestors, from American Indians who cultivated corn, beans, and squash to immigrants who brought seeds on their voyages across the ocean.
The domestication of crops began around 11,500 years ago when humans began sowing, tending and harvesting plants that had previously been gathered in the wild. While assisted by agricultural techniques such as irrigation, crop rotation and the application of fertilizers, the domestication of crops was made possible by two related insights: plants grew from seeds, and seeds could be saved.
Since acquiring this knowledge, humans have practiced selective seed saving, harvesting and sowing seeds from the hardiest, tastiest crops and passing these crops down to each new generation of food growers.
Until recently, seed saving rituals were a fundamental part of food growing because there were no companies from which farmers and gardeners could order seeds for next season’s plantings. Instead, individuals, families and neighbors saved and traded seeds, using astute observation skills to choose plants that were adapted to their region’s soil
and climate and resistant to local insects and diseases. Cultivated and saved over generations, these plants became heirloom varieties, prized for genetic traits that allow these crops to thrive in their local ecosystems.
Unfortunately, we are losing many of these vegetable varieties. As populations have become more mobile and urbanized, the number of farmers and gardeners has decreased. Elderly seed savers can no longer find other gardeners willing to grow or maintain heirloom varieties, and the plant’s outstanding traits often become extinct.
Plant diversity is also threatened by conglomerates that buy out family-owned seed companies and replace regionally adapted collections with hybrid seeds. More generalized varieties that grow reasonably well in areas nationwide, hybrids assure greater sales in a large, nationwide market; however, because seeds of the next generation of hybrids do not consistently have the same characteristics as the parent generation, they cannot be saved. This deters food growers from continuing the time-honored practice of seed saving, cutting us off from our agricultural inheritance.
During the last few decades, several grassroots preservation projects have started working to reverse these losses by collecting and distributing heirloom varieties. The Seed Savers Exchange, for example, runs a farm in Iowa where growers maintain thousands of heirloom garden varieties that were brought to North America by members’ ancestors who emigrated from Europe, the Middle East, Asia and other parts of the world.
Another organization, Native Seeds/SEARCH is a Tucson-based nonprofit agency dedicated to conserving the rich agro-biodiversity of America’s arid Southwest through seed banks, distribution and education.
You can be a part of these efforts to preserve plant diversity by saving and sharing seeds from your garden. On Dec. 8, Sustainable Food Center is hosting a seed-saving class to teach just how to do this.
So what happens to the seeds that we don’t save? Many of them end up in our bowls — like lentils, which are actually seeds.
LENTIL SOUP
2 cups lentils 8 cups water, or lowsodium chicken or vegetable broth ½ onion, finely chopped 1 carrot, finely chopped 1 stalk celery, finely
chopped ½ cup spinach, finely
chopped 1 potato or 1 sweet potato,
cut into small cubes 2 Tbsp. canola or olive oil 2 bay leaves 1 Tbsp. tomato paste 2 whole cloves ½ cup parsley, finely
chopped and divided 2 tsp. apple cider vinegar 1 tsp. salt Plain low-fat yogurt
(optional)
Place all ingredients except the parsley, salt, vinegar and yogurt in a large soup pot.
Bring the soup to a boil and reduce the temperature to a simmer.
Cover the pot and cook the soup for about one hour, or until lentils are soft.
Ten minutes before the soup is done, remove the lid and add the salt and vinegar.
Serve the soup hot, and add a generous spoonful of yogurt to each serving. Sprinkle with the remaining parsley.
Makes seven servings. Grow. Share. Prepare. is compiled by the Sustainable Food Center, sustainablefoodcenter.org.