Survival Seeds from Hometown Seeds

Many of you were right--it was seeds! Laura gets a gold star for guessing "survival seeds." Hometown Seeds sent me their Survival Seeds, a collection of 16 non-hybrid vegetable seeds that can plant up to 3/4 of an acre.

Survival Food Storage

This Mylar-sealed package will keep up to 10 years if frozen and unopened. Or, if you want to plant them right away, you can save seeds from your plants, all of which are open-pollinated varieties.

I really like this ready-made garden collection, because I suffer from a kind of overload when I'm browsing through seed catalogs. I thought I had it bad when I was just receiving the big-name nursery catalogs that do mostly hybrids. Then I fell into the world of heirlooms and seed savers coops....and my gardeners' paralysis got a million times worse! I mean, how do you choose between 267 varieties of tomatoes, each with a tantalizing list of virtues and qualities? Should I plant Winterbor or Nero di Toscana kale? Ice-bred or Sylvetta arugula? (I definitely prefer the ruffly Winterbor over the flat Nero di Toscana; I planted both last year in a fit of indecision.)

Even if you're not planning on putting in a big garden this year, you might want to have a collection of seeds in your long-term food storage. Survival Seeds are made just for this purpose. They come in a resealable Mylar pouch. Each seed type comes in a plastic, rather than paper, packet. Included in the packet are:

• Lincoln Peas: 5 oz.
• Detroit Dark Red Beets: 10 grams
• Kentucky Wonder Brown Pole Bean: 5 oz.
• Yolo Wonder Pepper: 5 grams
• Champion Radish: 10 grams
• Lucullus Swiss Chard: 10 grams
• Black Beauty: 10 grams
• Waltham Butternut Winter Squash: 10 grams
• Bloomsdale Longstanding Spinach: 10 grams
• Scarlet Nantes Carrots: 10 grams
• Long Green Improved Cucumber: 10 grams
• Rutgers Tomato: 5 grams
• Golden Acre Cabbage: 10 grams
• Romaine Paris Island Cos Lettuce: 5 grams
• Golden Bantem Sweet Corn: 5 oz.
• Yellow Sweet Spanish Onion: 10 grams

Survival Seeds also come with detailed planting, harvesting, and seed-saving instructions for each variety, arranged by hardiness group. I like that all of the information is in one stapled handout--no sifting through opened seed packets to find when to plant your peas or your beets. I especially appreciated the seed collection instructions. I had no idea, for example, that carrots and beets were biennials.

My own garden is off to a good start. This spring I've already planted peas, carrots, mache, mesclun, spinach, shallots, leeks, garlic, and onions. I started two large flats of seeds this week, from Cherokee Purple tomatoes to 95-day artichokes to mystery melons that we liked from the farmer's market. Last years' raspberries, strawberries, blackberries, asparagus, rhubarb, overwintered kale, chives, sage, and parsley are thriving. I'm also putting in a collection of fruit plants: Juneberries, honeyberries, currants, gooseberries, and jostaberries, plus more raspberries and strawberries. I wanted to put in a dwarf fruit tree orchard, but I think I'll have to delay that until next growing season.

I'd love to hear about your garden plans/dreams/ideas for this year!