From away to garden.com and Robinhood Radio.com, this is Away to Garden with Margaret Roach. You're a weekly invitation to dig in and grow. On the weekend of August 8th and 9th, the beloved Seed Savers exchange will celebrate its 50th anniversary of preserving our seed heritage with festivities at its home base in Decora, Iowa. I wanted to celebrate seed savers here today a little too by learning more about some of their participatory programs that we gardeners can help with, including one called Adapt, where gardeners trial varieties from the seed savers seed bank in their own gardens and provide feedback on their performance to help seed savers understand the adaptability of these varieties to different environments around the country. So more in a moment about adapt and other ways to engage with the important work of seed savers exchange but first these messages. Underwriting support for a way to garden provided by color blends wholesale flower bulbs. A third-generation bulb company offering top-size flower bulbs directly to landscape professionals and ambitious residential gardeners on the web, color blends dot com.

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and by White FlowerO project verified. On the web, highmoingseeds.com and by Whiteflower Farm offering a wide range of carefully selected and expertly grown garden plants. On the web, whiteflowerfarm.com. I'm joined today by Mike Bollinger, Seeds savers executive director and Sydney Weldon, their evaluations and trials manager, who leads the Adapt program, a community-driven trialling initiative that connects gardeners and farmers across the US with unique open-pollinated crops from Seatsavers' extensive seed bank. I suspect most every gardener knows Seatsavers for its seed catalog of here-existable open-pollinated varieties, but Mike and Sydney are here to tell us about other projects like Adapt and More that we can engage with. So welcome to both of you and happy golden anniversary to you. Yeah, thank you so much, Margaret, for having us today. Hi, Mike. And hi, Sydney. How are you? Good. How are you doing? Okay. In this fear assist of summers, all over the country. You're drinking that here in Iowa too. Yeah. In a previous episode of the podcast that we can link to from the transcript of this show, I featured one popular element of seed savers exchange. It's original component that's simply called the exchange, sort of a giant virtual seed swap where people can share varieties they're growing and stewarding with one another. But that's by no means the only participatory community science program or participatory program at seed savers or the only way to get involved. So I wanted to talk about more of them. I find it very interesting that even as long as I've known seed savers, I didn't know about all of these dimensions So I know, sweet savers has the largest non-governmental seed bank in the US with something like 20,000 plus varieties, but you can't do it alone, this massive task of preservation of all this genetic heritage. So Mike, maybe you can start us off by reminding us of the mission of seed savers and then also explain about what I believe you call participatory preservation why it matters programs like the ones we're going to talk about. Yeah, yeah, that's it, you know, it's a great question. You know, I think that it really goes back to, you know, the kind of founding ethos of seed savers exchange and, you know, the way that I've always heard, you know, seed savers exchange reference and especially in in the context of founding ethos of Seatsay was exchange. And the way that I've always heard Seatsay was exchange reference, and especially in the context of the exchanges as a peoples organization. And so this work was always about people coming together and cheering seeds with each other and cheering stories and heritage and an effort to be able to keep those communities vibrant and you know, and resilient. And you know, with the idea ultimately that the more people that were, you know, growing out these seeds in their gardens, the safer that they were. And so, you know, this is a really, you know, the adapt program was a really incredible component of that because it's another way to meet people where they are. And so as we were thinking about our strategic priorities as an organization, that first priority or kind of focus area is community-based biodiversity preservation. And not everyone is a seat saver, right? I feel like seat saving is something that is a skill that goes beyond gardening. And so the beauty of the adapt program is really, I think, that we're not asking people to save seed. And you don't have to be a seat saver in order to be able to participate in this really valuable science-based work that Sydney is facilitating and managing through this program. So Sydney, maybe kind of tell us, you know, let's dig into a little bit about like what adapters like. How does it work specifically as you know as one example of of seat savers exchanges, participatory preservation efforts. How does it work?

What happens? How do people get involved in it? Yeah, so like we mentioned, adapt is like a nationwide prop variety trial and program under our community science umbrella here at SeatsAvers. And so we invite folks from all over the country, community gardens, seed libraries, gardeners, farmers, researchers, growers of all types to trial these varieties from the seed bank, we focus on flowers and food crops. And so through the program folks, they hear from me in the dead of winter, early January to figure out which crop trials we are offering that year. And so they select which crop varieties they're interested in and from a greater list of varieties that we're trialing in that year, participants will receive three different varieties. we ask that they grow them side by side in the same growing condition and that they try to aim for at least three plants of each variety. And so we use this platform called seed linked. It's a web and mobile platform that we've been partnering with since 2018. And their participants are able to log their observations of these varieties in the garden. They're looking at things like bigger and yield disease resistance, drought tolerance, which is especially important these days, at least here. Yes, even Northeast Iowa. And one aspect of seedlings that I just truly enjoy is the live community feed feature. And so folks are able to share photos of how things are performing. They're able to ask for growing advice. Folks are having issues with raccoons and deer. And so folks are able to comment and let them know what they're doing in their gardens and what's been working and what hasn't been. They're able to share their garden stories and perhaps most exciting way to me as someone who grows vegetables all day but doesn't necessarily have the zest to cook in the evenings. People are sharing really beautiful recipes of how they're preparing their bounty this season, which has been really inspiring. Seedlanked, I'm speaking of participatory preservationatory preservation. We should shout out Seed length in general. I mean, that's just an incredible example. And you're one of the, the sort of, I don't know if the word is partners or contributors or however you collaborate or since seed length, but that's been an incredible thing to see going the last few years. Yeah, yeah. Nico Engelberg lives, you know hour from here in Verokua. I would call him all of those things, a partner, a collaborator, and a friend. It's really that interaction has facilitated this program being great as well as just a lot of ideas and inspiration about how to engage with community and with people to help facilitate us learning more about how crops perform in different parts of the country and in different microclamates. Right, and that's so important, especially in these changing quickly changing times. Is that you're in Iowa, and even if you had the manpower and the

and the the acreage and whatever to grow out every single one of those treasures in your

seed bank as needed, you know, to keep to keep a viable supply of every single one,

whatever, it would only be those seed would only be adapted since seeds are alive, you know, and adaptive to where they are grown and so forth over time. I mean, you would have a strain, the Iowa strain of everything, but you wouldn't know. And your observations would only be, hey,

this didn't work well for us, or hey, this was earlier than we thought or later than we thought to produce. Or, like you said before, drought, all of these things, the observations would be very site specific to one place. And that's not going to help, we know, the preservation of these varieties or help people around a large area grow them, know which ones to grow. Yeah, yeah, I think the participant, the participation and growth in that, I think speaks volumes to kind of the magnitude of interest in this program. So maybe you wanna talk talk a little bit about how many participants we have and what those distribution packets look like. Yeah, and what are some of the wild and crazy things you're growing that they're all trialing? Yeah. What kinds of crops is it? Yeah, sure. So this year we were able to partner with the USDA to kind of broaden our impact. And so between the two of us, we're hosting 15 trials. Adapt is hosting Amaranth, Sweetcorn, a plant, spring radishes, red okra, which has been so beautiful. Wow. Snow peas, beef stick D's, D's, D's, D's, D's, D's, D's, D's, D's, D's, D's, D's, D's, D's, D's, D's, D's, D's, D's, D's, D's, D's, D's, D's, D's, D's, D's, D's, D those as well. And so last year in 2024, the ADAP program had 650-ish participants that were growing crops from seed bank in their gardens. And this year between adapting the USDA, we have 1,462 folks across the country from Alaska, Hawaii, Iowa, obviously all over the country at Maine, California. And so we're really able to see how these varieties are performing in all different kinds of environments. Yeah, this year we distributed almost 10,000 packets of seed to folks.

And in total, with all of those people and all of the trials that they signed up for, there's almost 3,300 individual trials being conducted. Wow. Now, you listed some of the things that you're that are being trialled this year. How is, how do you, when you look at, again, I think I said the number is more than 20,000 kinds of seed in the seed bank there,

in the collection.

So the... How is, how do you, when you look at, again, I think I said the number is more than 20,000 kinds of seed in the seed bank there, in the collection, so to speak, how do you decide what to, to trial, what are the factors in deciding what to trial? It's a kind of a game of Tetris. I'm looking at historic trials that we've done in the past. And I think most importantly, I'm looking at the quantity of distributable inventory that we have. Not everything in the seed bank has enough seed to be able to offer on the exchange or these that are required for 1,400 people to participate. And so that's certainly one of the things that I'm thinking about. I mentioned the space considerations and having a diversity of crops for people to trial. And I also like to sneak in some more unusual crops or crops that folks are not as familiar with. in 2024 we did a Sorgan trial with Slow Food USA.

That was a part of the show. And I just love sorghum. I love crops that are multi-purpose, versatile, drought tolerance, both amaranth that we're trialing this year and sorghum, dry down really beautifully and amaranth. you can eat the greens, some are more grain varieties where you harvest the larger seeds and incorporate them into a porridge or use them as a gluten-free alternative. And so I really want to open people's eyes to the different kinds of things they can grow in their garden. I mean, you all of a beef steak tomato, but yeah, just getting people curious about things that can offer a lot of interest in the garden and in the kitchen. And I don't need to, don't participate. I don't need to know how to save seed. I'm not going to send seed back to you. You're strictly wanting my observations about the variety and how it performed and so forth. Do you taste tests as well? By the way, do people tell you how it tasted? Do they do that too? Oh, absolutely. That's fine. OK. You were interested in how do you like this variety? We've been hearing from a couple folks in the Adapt Program directly via email. And one of participant Doren, she's actively, we're we're good partners and she is letting us know that the Golden Ponderosa, the state tomato, is absolutely delicious. One of her chefs that she works with over in Pennsylvania bought up her whole supply for last week. Oh yeah, he didn't he didn't care for the other ones, but he absolutely loves the Golden Ponderosa. And so that's awesome information for us. One of our goals with Adapt, we have many, but one of them is to kind of gauge community enthusiasm and look at that performance data. And hopefully that informs our regeneration priorities here for the seed bank and also informs which varieties we put into our larger catalog that has a much larger reach. We want to share varieties that taste good and perform well. And hopefully get people excited to continue growing and trying new things. And hopefully one day feeling a deeper connection with those varieties and stewarding them themselves. Mm. So if people want to get involved, it sounds like the signups happen in the new year, but is there like a wait list, so to speak, is there a place to, that we can give a link in the transcript or somewhere where they can be on the lookout for that? Or, what's that? Yeah, absolutely. We have our 2026 interest signup. And so, that's our website and we can pass that to you. Great, thanks. Yeah, I hope you can try um sign up for next year's trials. Um right now as soon as we close trials in January, um I I put the interest link up for the next year. Okay. We'll be looking to get on the list right away. Perfect. Um so my other other um participatory things like this, you know as I said I've talked on a previous episode about the exchange itself, the big seed swap, the kind of thing, but other things that you want to shout out a little bit, yeah. We're thinking about engagement across, or meeting people where they are. And I think that that's, I think we have a number of ways to be able to do that. You know, you know, the, the, that program is, you know, such a beautiful initiative because, you know, like we've talked about here a little bit, we're not asking people to save seed, we're just looking for observation and documentation, and, you know, and their feedback. And that has real value because so many of the things that we're growing out, we need that additional information on, you know, with a collection in the seed bank, the size that it is and so many varieties that came in in those early years. You know, the documentation isn't always where we'd like it to be. And so, you know, outside of being a really fun program, you know, it does serve real value uh it to be. And so outside of being a really fun program, it does serve real value to us in this work. Another program that we have that is really incredible is the Renew program. And so what we're doing with Renew is we are actually asking people to care for a seed.

And this took on, you know, was a, you know, a version or there was, you know, kind of a time where, you know, Kent and Diane, when they got started, we're really, you know, looking at, you know, sending seeds out to folks, having them, you know, grow and save the seed and then, and then send some back. and I think that sometimes that worked well and sometimes it didn't, you know, things could

cross up or, you know or there'd be a crop failure in a given year. And so that renew program is really just working with folks that are interested in saving seed that have a little bit of experience, but we're just sending them one variety. And that's so large that they have to have room for a larger number in order to

just growing one plant or something. Are they?

Yeah, it's not just one plant, but it's not like, you know, an acre of squash or something

like that, right? Right.

But it's, it's yeah. So it's a little, it's not, it's a little bit bigger scale than

what we're just talking about. Yeah, okay. Yeah, exactly. And then, and so, that's wonderful because then, that helps us do some of the multiplication work that we need in the seed bank too. And then that ties back to us being able to increase accessibility, the things that are in the seed bank and offer you know, an offer through the exchange. I mean, you know,

of course, goes up without saying, I mean, you did, you know, you did an episode on, you know, on the exchange and, you know, that is just, you know, unlike any other opportunity to be able to, you know, to engage with other folks. I mean, with so many, you know, so many people growing and saving their own seed, you know, all across the country and listing those.

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