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Irish Seed Savers Association (ISSA) based in Scarriff county clare inspires a new movement of seed guardians.

Over the last 8 months I have had my perspective of farming changed.

I cant believe at 33 and a farmer, it is only in the last year that I have gained an understanding of the full farming cycle. Thanks to SeedSavers (ISSA).  The Seed Guardians is a project put together by Seed Savers in Clare and Irish Organic Growers. Its objective is to save and make commercially viable a lot of the old verities of vegetable seeds that have been grown in Ireland over the last 100 years. Old verities that were selectively bred and suited to our climate

I used to sow carrot, Swede and a whole verity of root crops. sowing my seed (bought of course, sure how else would you do it.) in spring and harvesting in autumn. Little did I think that I had only experienced half of my crops life cycle.

It was at our first Seed Guardians gathering at seed savers in early February that I got an incline that I had been missing something.

We started by selecting the best of the recently harvested carrots for characteristics that we would want in the next generation and the generation after that. I was thinking hmmm lovely eating carrots, I would have eaten the best seed stock. Several months and seed guardian sessions passed. Then at our last gathering we revisited the carrots we selected several months earlier which had been planted again in the spring to continue their full life cycle, to go to seed

It was alien to me to see a carrot in seed, 4 feet high and a blossom of flower. They say you learn something new every day. I learned enough in the few seed guardian sessions at seed savers to fill my years quota. Its was an inspireing place to be and people to meet.

Distribution of course

February

Facing into the 2011 season, thoughts return once more to the crops to be sown, plans to be laid, seeds to be saved. Inspired by the Round table discussion in conjunction with Brown Envelope Seeds held at Seed Savers in early November where we not only heard about the work of Matthew Dillon and the American Organic Seed Alliance, but also discussed our ideas and plans for developing a stronger community of seed savers around the country, to empower growers once more in food security and seed sovereignty. Seed Savers were certainly very excited about bringing this work to the gardens of a much larger group in the coming year and years ahead.

One of the key areas identified to help develop this community or network of seed savers was to give training in seed saving in early 2011, to provide not only the starter pack of seeds but also the knowledge and skills needed to successfully bring the seeds full-cycle to seed harvest.

The first day focused on:

• Introductions from participants.

• How to save seeds – looking at the fascinating “love life” of plants. A look at annuals, biennials, inbreeders, outbreeders etc.,

• Plant selection – practical session looking at crops grown in the ISSA seed gardens (carrots, onions, leeks, parsnips, cabbages, swedes etc.)

• Creating the 2011 guardian network – distribution of seeds, crop-specific instructions etc.,

• Discussion on developing the Seed Network – questions and answers

June

Field trip to Brown Envelope Seeds, near Skibbereen in West Cork. This was be a great opportunity to see another seed-saving holding, and Madeline, Mike and Ruth were be there to show us around the farm and their newly-developed seed facilities.

We got a tour of the farm and an insight into what is involved in the saving of seed at farm level.

July

Focused on harvesting seed from the over-wintered crops, as well as looking at the ongoing maintenance of all seed crops. We are hoping to look at seed ripened to the optimum point for harvest thus also be able to show some of the hands-on processing techniques : threshing, winnowing, sieving, cleaning and drying.

Over the day we will also take at look at the crops sown this year, particular pest, disease or virus problems and roguing out any off-types from the breeding population.

August

Include hands-on harvesting and threshing techniques of various seed crops, and subsequent seed-cleaning; selecting next year's seed from potatoes and shallots; noting the development of the seed crops at this stage of the year; processing tomatoes for seed production; hand-pollination techniques on Cucurbits. We will also take a look at seed drying and planning and sowing over-winter crops in the tunnel.

Sept

The course covered the final aspects of seed saving - harvesting seed from some crops that weren't yet ready (carrots, peppers, cucumbers, squash, beans etc.), constructing seed cleaning equipment (sieves and trays), as well as having a final discussion on the course, the crops covered, plans for next year etc. Please note - there will not be an exam on this day!