Chickens with pedigree papers

Livingseeds has become a household name in South Africa, and its 6 900 customers know the company for its variety of exceptional heirloom vegetable seeds. Its owners have recently hatched a new idea: a range of rare chicken breeds. Now that will give home gardeners something to crow about!

Arriving at their farm outside Henley on Klip just before 07:00 might feel early, but the Freeman family – Sean, Nicola and their five children – rises as the cocks crow each morning.

Sean walks past the vegetable show garden, making his way towards New Yolk City. The wintery sun illuminates the newly erected sign on the exterior of the 32 chicken runs. The letter “o”, frames a yellow egg yolk – and above it is an illustration of a city skyline with a chicken emulating the Statue of Liberty.

“The kids refer to this as a typical dad joke,” Sean says. Courtney (23), Robyn (22), Daniel (20), and the twins, Leah and Jenna (18), are all involved in the business. “Courtney is in charge of design and social media work, and I offered her another option: Butt Nugget Central. They reluctantly settled for New Yolk City.”

THE FREEMANS’ JOURNEY started in 1997 when they began growing vegetables after Courtney was born; Sean and Nicola wanted nutritious food for their firstborn.

“But my love of seeds started much earlier, in Muckleneuk, Pretoria, because my ouma had this massive veggie garden,” Sean says. “As a young boy, I used to collect all types of seeds from trees and flowers, which I kept safe in a little wooden box.”

He was involved in IT when they launched Livingseeds in 2009 with 30-something varieties listed on their website. Today, they have about 1 200 seed varieties for sale – mainly tomatoes, beans, chillies, garlic, maize and sunflowers.

“This is the seed store.” Sean points to rows of seed packets on the shelves. >

Sean and Nicola Freeman stand among their Evening Sun sunflowers. Livingseeds currently sells six varieties of sunflower seeds.

A curious Light Sussex pullet inspects the camera lens through the mesh of its chicken run.

The Freemans’ 1 200 varieties of seeds are neatly packaged and ready to be collected or couriered from their seed store. Honey is harvested on the farm for personal use, and the family leaves dead tree stumps to serve as insect hotels for other pollinators. A green and a ripe jelly melon beside each other in the show garden – both are edible. Livingseeds has 11 varieties of gourd seeds available. Cuccuzi can grow up to 1 m long, and the Speckled Swan, which has a swan-like shape, is mostly used for crafts and decoration. Sean and Nicola enjoying the sun in front of New Yolk City late in May. This is a quieter time at Livingseeds and the chickens molt during autumn. Visit in spring to see the space in all its glory. Nicola says the jelly-covered seeds of a jelly melon can be used to add a fruity flavour to gin and tonic or cocktails. Livingseeds stocks the widest variety of chilli seeds, 400 of them, including the hottest chilli in the world: the Carolina Reaper.