Part of our series of Earth Month activities for kids. Join us as we celebrate and learn about our earth all month long! Looking for Earth Day books? See our picks here.
Before hybrid seeds were developed in the 1880s everybody who grew food used to save seeds. Seeds were a community’s lifeline — without them there would be no crop the next year. They were a treasure.
Read: The Story of Frog Belly Rat Bone
Explore:
Do you know about the Svalbard Global Seed Vault? Deep inside an arctic mountain, this vault holds seeds representing every important crop variety available in the world today. The seeds are secured in a climate-controlled vault impervious to natural disaster where they can be kept for centuries.
Check out Seed Savers Exchange. Member gardeners can buy heirloom seeds and swap for seeds they’ve collected. This year they are offering 13,012 unique varieties to members from members.
Try saving seed yourself! If you have a garden, choose an heirloom variety to plant (hybrids won’t reliably produce offspring that match the parent plant). If you don’t have a garden, once fresh heirloom vegetables are available, buy one to use for seed saving. One tomato produces a lot of seeds, so even a slice will give you a few treasures to plant in a pot next year!
Watch this video to see how to save seeds from a tomato:
