Whoa!
My seed shopping list is getting out of control. I have been having too much fun pouring over catalogues and seed company web pages.
Unfortunately, my seed shopping fun is being overshadowed by other items appearing in my search. Let's just say not all searches are coming back as "organic." We are talking genetic modification and food security.
I made a pledge to myself I would not discuss this issue again in my column. Twice I have touched on GMOs and have heard from the big M (Monsanto) both times.
However, by honouring my pledge I would be derelict in what I perceive is my duty as a garden writer ... to educate the readership in all aspects relating to the garden. Luckily, most of the time I get to dwell on positive subjects but sometimes, just sometimes, one has to face the negative.
Alarm bells were set off by an article written by Doug Hall in the Learn to Grow section of the Organic Gardening website.
He lists a number of seed companies they order seed from for their test garden. A helpful resource until you cross reference with the list on the Seminis website, (a wholly-owned Monsanto company), of the seed companies they supply seeds to.
Three on the Organic Gardening list get some of their seeds from Seminis.
Seminis states they are hybridizers ... producers of F1 varieties of seeds bred specifically for resistance to one or more types of disease. This, in itself, is not a bad thing. The farmer's income is healthier if he/she can grow a tomato resistant to the crop-decimating late blight.
The downside is ... you are tied to the seed company year after year. You cannot save the seed from a hybridized plant to grow the same variety the following year.
But again, this may not be so bad when the cost of new seed is weighed against a bumper crop of marketable veggies.
Some do save seeds from hybridized plants ... those gardeners who like to dabble in plant breeding. They readily use hybridized plants, along with open pollinated varieties, in their own breeding program towards developing a better plant specifically for conditions in their region.
The red flag for me was something I read in an article by Matthew Dillon, a director for Organic Seed Alliance. It is a thing called a utility patent.
On the surface, it sounds pretty innocuous but digging deeper into the article I read this patent disallows anyone from saving any seed for any purpose. Notice of such a patent is affirmed by, in this case, Seminis, placing a technology agreement on their seed packets which clearly states seeds are not to be saved for breeding or any other purpose.
Until recently, these utility patents and technology agreements have largely been confined to the biotechnology crops which have historically only been available to commercial growers. (Genetically engineered is one such biotech crop.)
But they are now making their way onto vegetable seed packets such as Big Beef, an F1 tomato ... to name just one.
Matthew's article mentioned only Seminis seeds. It also did not specify whether the technology agreement was confined to the vegetable varieties available solely to commercial growers or those available to home gardeners as well. But I fear the worst.
It saddens me gardeners are losing their right to save seeds. In my humble opinion, the road we are heading down in our efforts to feed the world is fraught with potholes.
Do we really need to develop new varieties of vegetables and fruits? Perhaps the perceived problems have not been in the varieties being grown for centuries but instead lie in the methods incorporated for growing them since the Industrial Revolution.
I care about seeds. Thank goodness there are like-minded heirloom seed companies still in operation as well as seed banks intent on acquiring as many varieties as possible for preservation and growing out annually.
Their dedication towards maintaining food security and a healthy environment for future generations is indeed admirable.
Leslie Cox co-owns Growing Concern Cottage Garden in Black Creek. Her column appears every second Friday.