Seed Savers Exchange

Since 1975, Seed Savers Exchange has been connecting farmers and gardeners to high-quality, historic, and open-pollinated seeds. As we approach our milestone 50th anniversary in 2025, we are getting ready to launch the celebration with a special 50th-anniversary edition catalog. This expanded catalog includes 16 new varieties (bringing the total varieties offered to 604) as well as even more pages devoted to Seed Savers Exchange history, seed and stewardship stories, recipes, and more! The catalog has been sent to the printer, right on schedule, and will start hitting mailboxes in mid-November—just in time for the holiday season. Sign up today to receive your FREE copy! If you have placed an order within the past two years or requested a catalog within the past year, you will automatically receive a catalog. Sign up here: https://lnkd.in/gwf3sv6k P.S. The 50th-anniversary festivities go beyond our special edition catalog. Keep an eye out in 2025 for announcements about events—including our big 50th anniversary celebration in August! #Nonprofit #SeedCatalog #HeirloomSeeds #50thAnniversary #MilestoneYear

Cindy Goodner, development director, recently represented SSE at the Iowa Nature Summit!

The Lillian Goldman Visitors Center at Heritage Farm will CLOSE on Sunday (October 27) at 5:00 pm until March 2025. Thank you to everyone who has stopped by the Visitors Center during the 2024 gardening season! Although the Visitors Center will be closed until March, Heritage Farm is open to the public 365 days a year from sunrise to sunset. Come and visit us! LGVC hours for this week are 10 am - 5 pm CT daily. If you can’t make it by our last day, October 27, don’t worry! Orders for seeds, tools, books, and apparel can be placed online at shop.seedsavers.org all year long.

Save your cucumber seeds! Follow along with Alan, greenhouse coordinator at Seed Savers Exchange, as he walks you through the steps of extracting, cleaning, and drying seeds from cucumbers grown at Heritage Farm. With a few buckets, a strainer, and a coffee filter, you too can save cucumber seeds for future planting! Watch the full video on our YouTube channel: https://lnkd.in/gHFtmGvu #HeritageFarm #SaveCucumberSeeds #GrowCucumbers #SeedSaving #Tutorial

The stunning northern lights danced over Heritage Farm last week! ✨ Did you see the northern lights? #NorthernLights #HeritageFarm #NaturalWonders #Auroras #DecorahIowa

Today is World Food Day, a day to celebrate the world’s food traditions. It is also a day to remember the pressing issue of food security facing our planet, including the loss of crop biodiversity. Over the last century, the world has lost more than 75% of its edible plant varieties. A system that depends so heavily on so few crops is extremely fragile. When seed diversity is strong, our food system is protected, as this diversity increases the likelihood of having crop varieties that can adapt to different climate conditions and become resistant to certain diseases. SSE lifetime member Dr. Cary Fowler—the U.S. Special Envoy for Global Food Security, former SSE board member, and developer of the Svalbard Global Seed Vault—is co-recipient of the 2024 World Food Prize, alongside Dr. Geoffrey Hawtin, the first executive director of the Global Crop Diversity Trust. Fowler and Hawtin are being honored for their leadership in protecting the world’s heritage of crop biodiversity. The presentation of the World Food Prize will be held in conjunction with the "Borlaug Dialogue," a three-day symposium that brings together international experts, policy leaders, business executives and farmers to address cutting-edge issues in global food security and nutrition. The 2024 Borlaug Dialogue, themed “Seeds of Opportunity: Bridging Generations and Cultivating Diplomacy," will take place Oct. 29-31 in Des Moines, Iowa. Stop by the Seed Savers Exchange booth, where SSE representatives will be present! Register for this event at https://lnkd.in/g_FeAAJ. World Food Prize Foundation Crop Trust #WorldFoodPrize #SvalbardGlobalSeedVault #FoodPrize24 #CropBiodiversity #SeedBiodiversity #FoodSecurity

Hurricane Disaster Relief Opportunities: Our hearts are with everyone impacted by hurricanes Helene and Milton. These storms have devastated homes and businesses, and have tragically taken many lives. These storms have also caused catastrophic damage to farms and gardens. Seed Savers Exchange wants to do what we can to extend a hand. If your farm or garden has been impacted by hurricanes or other natural disasters, consider signing up to receive seeds through our disaster relief seed donation program. We also donate seeds to nonprofit, community, and educational organizations and gardens in need through our Herman’s Garden program. We encourage organizations that meet these qualifications to apply for Herman’s Garden donations. Recipients of disaster relief aid will be shipped a box of 50 different seed varieties. These boxes are pre-packed by our volunteers and contain a wide selection of varieties and crop types. Learn more and sign up/apply here: https://lnkd.in/gKgcWf6M We typically ask seed-donation recipients for $15 to cover the shipping and handling of 50 seed packets. If you are able to pay, it will help us greatly and increase the reach of our donation program. If not, we understand and will be happy to cover it. We have a donation form set up for those wishing to support shipping costs for those affected. That link is: https://lnkd.in/gazvVAem Due to customs regulations and shipping restrictions, we cannot honor requests outside of the United States. Those who have not completed the application process will not receive a seed donation. Please share this information with those in your community who have been affected by Helene or Milton or any other natural disaster. #DisasterRelief #HurricaneHelene #HurricaneMilton #Nonprofit

Save your own tomato seeds! Every fall, Alan, SSE’s greenhouse coordinator, works hard to process tomatoes from the gardens at Heritage Farm. Follow along with Alan to learn how you can save tomato seeds from your own garden! Watch the full video on our YouTube channel: https://lnkd.in/gAbyEiDN We also have crop-by-crop seed saving guides on our website: https://lnkd.in/gdVaER93 #HeritageFarm #SaveSeeds #GrowTomatoes #TomatoSeeds

I am so honored to be part of that project and have SeedLinked as a catalyst.Thanks Seed Savers Exchange for this amazing opportunity. "When crises hit, scientists dig through these seed archives to find crop varieties that can resist new pests, diseases or weather patterns, and breed them into new, resilient commercial crops." We are enriching those archives with multi location phenotyping data at low-cost. DM me if you are interested in doing similar project with another seed bank!

We want to shout out our volunteer AmeriCorps member, Blanca! Blanca has been helping our  preservation staff in the gardens, recruiting volunteers, and representing SSE at the Decorah Farmers Market. She also has been putting a lot of time into maintaining Diane’s Garden (pictured) and interacting with guests! Thank you, Blanca! Blanca will be leading three tours in October 2024, free and open to the public. Tours start at the Lillian Goldman Visitors Center at 11:00 am and 2:00 pm on the following Saturdays: October 12, 19, and 26. Come and visit us! #VolunteerAppreciation #AmeriCorps #SeedSaversExchange #Nonprofit