Hereford Seedswap 2025

Not many photos of the actual swap I'm afraid, just a few before it all kicked off. 

As always it's great to be involved in this event. Hundreds of packets of seeds changed hands and I got to see some faces I only see at this event and lots of people I've met at gardening clubs when I do my talks. 

 We had a great talk as well from Catrina Fenton, who is head of the Heritage Seed library. Was really interesting to hear her talk about seed saving and the lengths they go to to keep varieties pure, as well as trying to find new old varieties to save. 

I think seed swaps are amazing things, it feels right, it feels like it's what we should be doing with seeds. Its encouraged me to save more seeds and I'm a far better seed saver because of all these years doing it. I had so many different types of tomato there this year someone said "Ah, so you're the tomato man..." Which made me laugh! 

Do you go to a local seed swap? What was your best find?

Seed Swap This Saturday

It's almost time for one of my favourite days of the year! The Seed Swap in Hereford! 

I've been going to this for nearly a decade now and I've been helping for quite a while as well (I think I started helping in 2018). Although I don't do much in the way of organising or planning, but I turn up full of enthusiasm, with a hundred packets of seeds or so and talk all day about growing! 

 So if you're in Hereford this weekend then please come down and say hello. If you don't have seeds to swap you can just leave a donation instead, you can honestly get all the seeds you need for the year if you time it right. 

I'm bringing a few blackcurrant and Jostaberry with me as well. 

Be great to see you there! 

Hereford Seed Swap This Weekend!

So it's the annual Hereford Seed Swap this weekend. 

I look forward to this every year, it's always such a fun event filled with likeminded people. I'll be behind the tables with the rest of the volunteers, giving out advice and trying to sort out seeds as they're handed in. 

 It really is incredible and you could easily get your whole years worth of seeds from this event! 

I'm sure the talk is going to be good as well, I've met Liz and she's lovely, really knows her subject well (her book is great). 

If you go make sure you say hello to me! I'll be easy to spot - pockets filled with seed packets and talking non stop about growing! 

Seed Swap Haul

I love coming back from the seed swap, tired but fired up about the garden year - Maybe this is what was missing from my gardening last year and why I seemed to have no mojo about it all!  

This is my haul, a lot of seeds, but then I took about 100 packets as well so I don't feel too guilty! 

Hereford Seed Swap 2022

 After last years seed swap couldn't go ahead I was almost worried about how this one would be received and whether we'd have to build it back up. 

Quite the opposite was true! The Seed swap was a huge success, so many attended and I've never seen so many seeds, even before we started the tables were swamped with packets. 

Seed Swap This Weekend

 So this coming weekend is the seed swap in Hereford. 

It's always a great day and one I really enjoy helping out with. There are always so many interesting seeds and always interesting people to talk to. 

Be lovely to see some of you there! 

Who else goes to seed swaps? 

What was your best swap or seed you acquired? 

Kentucky Wonder?

Every year I try out different varieties of french beans.

They're one of my favourite veg to grow and a dead easy one to save seed from.

Search For Alaska Pea!

I'm always on the lookout for new seeds to grow for the seedswap. I grow many that I get from Real Seeds but feel when I give their seeds away at swaps I'm not supporting their business. 

So now I'm trying out as many different varieties of things that I can. Whgile researching some I came across the Alaska pea. I liked that it was a super short season. Apparently used to be from England and called "Earliest of All" but I couldn't find anyone who still had it.

I put out a request on twitter after no US seed companies would ship to me. Luckily a lovely woman sent me some and more! I got this package of seeds just the other day! So I've increase my tomatoes, sowed some cucumbers and looking forward to trying these peas and seeing how they do. I've promised to send some seeds back as well.

What's the best seeds you've ever got in a swap?

SEED GIVEAWAY!!!

I decided that I should put one of packet of each type of seed I'd been doing for the seedswap together for a giveaway.

Ten packets in all - there's five varieties of tomato, a very unusual pea and some super winter squash seeds plus a few others.

If you'd like to enter make sure you follow my page on either facebook, instagram or twitter and comment on it. 

If you're not on any of those platforms just leave a comment below and I'll make sure to add you to the hat! Make sure you check back in a weeks time when I announce the winnerand you can contact me by email if you win! 

*I'm not sure on the legality of this but as I'm not charging think it's fine, it's just like a seed swap...

New Seed Packets

As I spent my free time last week writing out seed packets with the same bits of information on them I was thinking how I should modernise the process a little bit.

I looked online and saw that to have a label I could print on would cost me about 0.5p a sticker!

How I wish I'd looked sooner!

Never mind next year just got easier! And I still have lots to bag up for this year. I'm going to send some packets to some friends and with every craft item I sell on Etsy I'm going to put a packet or two of seed in there as a bonus (although at the moment I'm working on a bigger job so only have a few things listed).

What do you think to the new packets? I hope the instructions will help anyone new to gardening as well.

Should stop my bad spelling - hopefully!

Hereford Seed Swap 2020

Every year I come back from the seed swap absolutely buzzing about gardening!

This year was no exception! I get to spend the day geeking out about all things growing, I love it.

Herefordshire Seed Swap This Weekend!!!

This weekend is the big seed swap in Hereford at the courtyard.

This is a great event and even if you haven't got anything to swap we won't mind! We ask for nothing in return but would love it if it encouraged anyone to save some seeds and bring them back for next year.

I'm doing the talk this year (so a little nervious) but I'm looking forward to it and looking forward to meeting lots of like minded people. Make sure you come and say hello if you're about Hereford on Saturday. Be great to see you.

Seed Swap Herefordshire 2018

I've had just the best day!

I've got to talk about trees, vegetables and seeds for the whole day and no one has told me to shut up!

I'm so grateful to be a tiny part of the amazing Seed Swap Herefordshire. It was great fun being behind the tables this year. Such a high level of knowledge in the group, each time we meet up I end up learning more and more about the amazing world of seed saving. I've made some great friends since I joined up to help over the last 12 months and I've loved growing more plants to save for seed.

I was so impressed with what some people had brought with them today. So much effort had gone into growing them and packing seeds up to bring to the swap.

I also picked up some really interesting seeds to grow in the spring.

If there's a seed swap by you make sure you go and get inspired for the next growing season and make sure you save some seeds!

Seed Swap Next Saturday

A couple of weekends ago the seed swap group I'm a part of had a meet up to sort and bag seeds. Unfortunately I was feeling under the weather and didn't want to pass on my germs so I had to miss it. 

 So on Friday I forced my children into helping me sort and bag up seeds.

We got a lot done, but I've still got more to do. We had french beans to pod and lots of packets to write up and fill.

We managed to do two types of peas, chives, tomatoes, french beans and Korean mint plus a few others. Over a hundred packets so far! I want to get at least double that ready by Saturday! I also need to fire up my seed cleaner to clean up some Heritage lettuce seed I grew. 

If you're around Hereford on Saturday I strongly recommend you pop by the Courtyard and come to the swap, even if you have nothing to bring with you, we won't mind!
It opens at 10.00am and runs until 2.00pm with a talk at 11.30 by Chris Collins who is doing a talk on Urban Organics, he is a former Blue peter gardener and Chelsea medal winner - should be good!

Seed Swappers BBQ

As I'm the newest (and youngest) member of the Herefordshire Seed Swap I suggested a BBQ at mine for the summer meet up. I think they were all quite keen to see what we get up to here and where we were. 

Before we ate I took everyone on a whistle stop tour of the homestead, showing them the veg gardens, orchard, coppice, sheep and chickens, I'm just hopeful most could see past all the nettles and see the produce growing around it! The children provided much entertainment as well, stealing carrots and getting stung by the nettles! 

Such an amazing spread of food

Everyone brought some food with them and we had slow cooked a large joint of mutton and my wife baked bread rolls, it was a lovely spread of food. We all ate very well! With cakes and plums for pudding! 

These three did me proud and were very well behaved! 

It was a lovely evening, the weather was perfect and we sat out on the patio as it got dark. 

They're a lovely group of people and the seed swap is a great thing that I'm really keen to be a part of, I've got lots of crops for seed this year so I should be able to provide even more seed next year. It's also a group with a large bank of knowledge that I'm only too keen to tap into! 

Our next meet up is in October and it'll be interesting to see what seed we've managed to produce as a group! 

If there is a seed swap group near you why don't you try and get involved?

My Seed Problem

The other day Tricky posted about his seed problem and listed all the seeds he had.

Well this week my seed order turned up and I was really excited to see them all laid out. 

I've tried to put my money where my mouth is this year and I've bought all non-hybrid, open pollinated varieties (except one variety of sweet pepper I thought my daughter would like and a few F1's from previous years - sweetcorn & a couple of types squash). 

I've also tried to buy the vast majority of my seed from The Real Seed Catalogue. I've mentioned them before on this blog and I know many of you already buy seed from them, I just feel that their ethos matches (or betters!) mine and I want to grow seeds that are produced in this country rather than China or Thailand and are adapted to a climate similar to mine. 

I did get a nice selection from the seed swap earlier in the month as well and of course I've bought seeds from a few other places as well, I always see a variety that I like the look of or there are some things I want to plant in bulk. Carrots and beets that I can never grow enough of, so I use a couple of wholesale sellers that sell bigger packs of seeds (Kings and Moles seeds are both quite good for this). 

I do think I've probably gone a little bit over board but I know I'll end up planting most of them. I seem to have a lot of squashes and dwarf french beans, both great veg to grow and eat, but hopefully I'll start selling a few veg this year and I want to keep experimenting with growing staples that produce large amounts of the calories that we need. 

As well as this I have the rest of my seeds organised into 12 separate boxes that I group by either family or how I plant them. 

I'll put up my planting plan next week if anyone would like to see it - I have at least 30 beds to organise and I think it might even be more than that by the time I'm finished setting up this year! 

I don't have many vices but this is certainly one of them! 

Who else buys or collects far too many seeds?

Seed Swap Herefordshire 2017

Another great seed swap today in Hereford.

I really look forward to this day every year, I'm a bit addicted to seeds and I love seeing all the different sorts there. I also met up with a couple of friends who love gardening and then after a quick car picnic with Kirsty we went and watched another really interesting talk by Adam Alexander about being a seed detective. I think the stories behind seeds are fascinating and this man collects such wonderful tales as well as the seeds, I could listen for hours. 

He also talked a bit about how he was in Syria before the war collecting seeds and he's now breeding these varieties out to save the seed and sending them to Syrian refugees around the world so they can grow crops they are familiar with. Without his efforts some of these varieties could have been lost forever.

The other great thing for me was meeting lots of like minded people. I got talking to all the helpers/organisers of the event and I've put my name forward to become involved in the future. I'm pretty passionate about seed saving so it'll be great to be involved in a group and have their collective knowledge to pull on. As well as this I'll be trying to grow more for the seed swap in future years, and hopefully getting better at it!

Who else has been to a seed swap lately?

What plant do you always save your own seed from?

Seed Swap On Saturday!

It's almost that time of year again - The seed swap in one of our local cities (Hereford) is on this weekend. 

I always look forward to it. I've even put off ordering my seeds until afterwards so I know what I need. 

Today was a wet and miserable day so I took the time to bag up some parsnip seed I saved from earlier in the year, I had a little help as well. 

I've got some more things to bag up yet as well as plenty more parsnip seed! If anyone wants any parsnip seed then please let me know, this stuff is last years seed and grown in the UK so I'm hoping it should be good stuff!

Anyone else going to a seed swap this year? 

Seed Swap Herefordshire 2016

At the weekend I went to the seed swap in Hereford for the second time. 

This time I met up with some friends and had a great morning gaining lots of seeds to grow over the coming year. 

 It was great to talk with like minded and passionate people and I was pleased to see it was busy again this year.

 There was another great talk put on, this year it was by Adam Alexander (website www.veggingoutwithadam.com) who is a seed hunter and self confessed vegaholic. His talk was really interesting and I loved how each seed in his collection came with a story, he's literally been all round the world collecting seeds from people that have been growing the same vegetables for generations. He also stores all his seeds in the fridge, something I might consider in the future (although I think I will need a dedicated fridge for this or it might drive my wife mad).

I came home with a good number of seeds and a bit more knowledge! A great way to spend a Saturday morning and hopefully it'll encourage more people to save seeds.
I have plans to dig all my parsnips at the weekend and sort out the bests ones to regrow for seed in the spring.
Has anyone else been to a seed swap this year? Anyone else growing on biannuals for seed?

Seed Swap Herefordshire

Yesterday I went to my first ever organised seed swap. 

It was good! 

I normally work on Saturdays but I decided to just work the afternoon and go to the seed swap with my mum instead. I was glad I did, it was really well organised, with stalls selling second hand tools, honey and plants and then the main bit with all the seeds, tubers and plants for swapping.

 The swap was really busy with a massive collection of seeds. You could quite literary get all your seeds for the next year from this swap if you wanted, there was a good selection of saved seeds as well as commercial seeds people had brought in.

They had an hour long talk by Pauline Pear, who has written a few books for garden organic, on saving seeds. I learnt a some new nuggets of information and reinforced some ideas I had about how I was going to go about saving seeds this year (more information towards one of my self sufficiency goals).  There was also some great examples of seed saving and keeping strains pure, like the guy who grows heirloom broad beans on his allotment and to prevent cross pollination he provides everyone on the allotment with his seeds!

Some really knowledgeable people manned the stall for the swap

Some of my offerings - some autumn fruiting raspberries dug up and given away at the seed swap

 I took quite a few packets of seeds that I grew, including chilli peppers, cucamelons and fennel, as well as six bags autumn fruiting raspberries, so I didn't feel guilty taking a few packets to grow this year (although it's a "swap" you don't have to bring anything with you).

I labled my seeds up quite nicely (and even put a shameless link to my blog)

Some of my spoils

Who can guess what this is?

 I managed to get a few really interesting packets of seed, some heirloom lettuces seeds, chickpeas (which many of you will know I was on for growing this year anyway), some different types of beans for drying to use as staples through the winter and an interesting tuber to experiment with. The tuber is another I had looked at buying but decided against it as I've already bought a few different ones this year anyway, Can anyone guess what it is? No prizes - just for fun!

Anyone else been to a seed swap this year or planning on going to one? There are lots on around the country at the moment and I'm sure they'd be glad for you to go along with or without seeds! 

P.S.

I've still got some cucamelon and Cherry Bomb chilli pepper seeds left from my own seed saving last year, if anyone would still like some, just send me an email and let me know (details in the link).