I’m still a little bleary-eyed from all the seed catalog reading I did this weekend. But…the 2010 garden is planned and the order has been sent. First big gardening job of the year–and possibly the most important: done and done.
Because of space considerations, we didn’t go into the fine detail of making a seed order in Mike & Roxie’s Vegetable Paradise. But as I felt myself succumbing to the glossy color photos and the siren song of catalog seed descriptions, I thought it might be useful to say a few things about how we choose our seeds.
It should surprise no one that the ad copy that describes the seeds is the last thing to look at when making your order. Just read a page or so. It’s possible to find one variety touting the absence of, say, green shoulders on a tomato, followed closely by another variety boasting of gorgeous green near the stem end. Fruits with a tendency to crack and catface have an
Cat-faced tomato
“interesting” shape and great flavor. Fruits that are tasteless have “uniform, sturdy shape that holds up to handling” and flavor “better than most.”
And when a vegetable “has to be seen to be believed?” Watch out.
But the ad copy is fun. So if you must read it, save it for last.
There are other, more important things to consider. Here’s my short list:
*Days to maturity. Usually this is the first number after the variety name. If you know roughly when you’re going to plant, you can figure about what week it will be–and what the weather will be like–when the vegs are ready. Let’s say you want to plant spinach, but the days to maturity show it won’t be ready until after Memorial Day, when the summer heat can set in. You’d be better off with a shorter days variety, since spinach does not do well in hot weather.
Usually, the catalog will specify whether the days to maturity starts when you start the seed or when you transplant it outside, but you might have to look around on the page a bit to find this.
*AAS Winner!–This phrase influences me far more than any catalog ad copy. AAS stands for All America Selection. It means that independent judges have evaluated the variety for sturdiness, flavor, disease resistance and production. The best are given the AAS label. If I’m torn between two similar varieties and one is an AAS but the other is not, I’ll most likely choose the AAS winner. It’s never disappointed me (provided it’s a plant that can be grown successfully in this climate.) Check out the AAS homepage for more info.
*Disease resistance–It’s always a good idea to look for a plant that can handle the types of diseases common to this area. Organic growing techniques are, let’s face it, not always effective against the worst of the diseases Kansas City can throw your way. For peas and vining plants, I always look for resistance to downy or powdery mildew, which can be very damaging given the right weather.
Tomatoes are especially prone to certain kinds of blights and rots. So most catalogs will follow their tomato varieties with an alphabet soup of disease resistance. You’ll have to look around for a key to decode this. But just in general, more letters means more resistance to things like verticilium and fusarium wilts, tobacco mosaic, crown rot, nematodes and leaf spot.
*Heirloom or “open pollinated”–I go for heirloom on some things where I just want old-fashioned flavor or interesting colors. Or if I want to save the seed myself. One of the more disturbing trends in hybrid seeds is the sweetening of vegetables. Peas, carrots, beans, beets and especially corn seem to get sweeter every year. Sometimes I just want my beans to taste like beans and not like sugar. That’s usually when I go for an heirloom.
Open pollinated just means you can save your own seed if you want to, because it’s not a hybrid.
The only drawback is that some heirlooms don’t have as good a resistance to disease as the hybrids.
*USDA Organic–This label has cropped up recently in some catalogs. As far as I can tell, it means the seed was taken from organically grown plants. And this is a nice idea. But remember, “growing organic” means growing organic. It’s a technique, not a product. If you put organic seeds in the ground, then spray and fertilize them with synthetic chemicals all season, you will not end up with organic vegetables.
*Packet size–It’s impossible to know whether you’re being gouged at the checkout counter if you don’t know how many seeds are in a packet. Again, you’ll have to search around on the page to find this. Once you know how many seeds you’re getting, it’s possible to compare prices between catalogs.
There now. Go have some fun. It will be spring before you know it!
Posted by: Roxie
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