Submitted by
April Wells
The Kimberley Seed Library is a free community resource located at the Kimberley Public Library where you may pick up small packets of seeds available, free for the taking, and you don’t even need a library card.
All have been grown here in Kimberley by gardeners who share their surplus to encourage home food gardening. The Library have been generous in providing a public place for our Seed Library.
We are looking for donations of locally grown open-pollinated seeds for the Seed Library.
Does anyone save a family heirloom seed that does well here, and would you donate, even just a few? The librarian will be glad to show you the drop-box. We’d love to know the story of your seeds, how long they have been grown here and where they came from.
Open-pollinated means you could save the seed yourself and grow out a similar plant. If the seed is a hybrid, you will grow something with characteristics of the parent plants but not necessarily what you had hoped for. Or if your seed is genetically modified, it may have a Terminator gene and be infertile.
We hope to create a legacy for Kimberley of botanicals that have adapted to our short growing and high altitude.
Seed saved in Kimberley will be uniquely adapted to succeed here. Seed bought from seed companies has been chosen for uniformity of size, ease of transportation and long storage, and not for flavour and taste, because their largest customers are commercial growers. We may be able to grow the most delicious vegetables and fruit we’ve ever tasted.
Multinational seed companies are growing seed in Third World countries because the industry is labour intensive; the seeds you buy could be grown in India or Africa. Likely won’t adapt well to our mountain conditions. (Our East Kootenays are where Monsanto is growing its GMO canola seed, with its companion pesticide spraying); last year in Tata Creek and on St. Mary’s Road. They’re advertising for workers at this time.)
The Kimberley Seed Library is maintained by a group of volunteers who promote and grow food in our local area. We do not want our food to be genetically modified because this process has not been tested on humans and examples such as cold-water fish genes are inserted into California strawberries to protect them from frost for the past 25 years.
As well, chemical companies who now control seed of major food crops all over the world are modifying seeds to withstand toxic applications of Roundup and other chemicals and essentially they now control our food supply. The latest Dec/Jan Mother Earth News has an informative article on seeds and a graphic showing Monsanto and the companies it owns and its many subsidiaries, one of which is actually named Heritage Seeds. Personally I find these facts frightening.
Vegetable seed, flowers, herbs, fruit, shrubs and tree seeds are all welcome at the Kimberley Seed Library. Check it out – you may find some interesting seeds to grow that have proven success here in Kimberley.