Seeds Matter to Me
My garden began with seeds long before I was aware of it. Without an area to cultivate as a child with an adult in my life to help, I observed what occurred in nature, in the urban setting, and on every piece of earth around me. And it was pure luck—and a kind of privilege—that I was able to stay in the same home throughout my entire childhood. I was rooted deeply there, and it was from that space, as a human creature, I observed. Much of what I know about seeds, I now realize is instinctual, and it’s a part of the warp and weft of who I am to my core.
Our family depended upon the kindness of customers who subscribed to the sport fishing magazines my father published, and it was often at great financial risk that he (solely) agreed to publish the work of one author or another in the form of books. We had some poor sellers for sure, but luckily many successful titles kept the family business afloat. Investing in the research and the hard work of one writer (over another) was quite a process to watch, and I’m honored to have met and known so many hard-working and talented writers. I owe them many thanks as they not only helped our company thrive, supporting my comfortable childhood, but they also often sat with me to talk, and offer advice.
They saw in me a young naturalist, an explorer, a thinker, a reader, a future writer, teacher, and an unusual young woman. Looking back, it is fun now to recall how I’d debate with the men on topics I knew little about at the time, but I felt fiercely how much I wanted to know more. They gave me the space to think and speak freely about ecosystems, climate, and conservation. I developed my voice at our big kitchen table, and I needed that development to balance out my tendency to retreat into my thoughts and observations. Most of the time, no one agreed with me, but they were respectful when we had our discussions. That wasn’t always the case though, and I’m especially grateful to the great supporters in the bunch. They helped me grow.
We lived by seasonal fish runs. Our home ran by the publishing sales calendar, and I lived by the regimented calendar of parochial school until I was 18. The seasons mattered, and I grew up with the natural world guiding me through the days of my earliest development.
So I grow from seed because I observe and because I want to “give voice” to plant life. I grow seeds because I live by the seasons. I started my garden this way because I had little to no income and I was so ill I couldn’t work. I grew plants from seed because my Sicilian family had done so with vegetables and they’d made a living, and build a home and happy family by doing so.
I started selling seeds years ago on ETSY because I thought that might be a good way to be able to stay at home and work. It became too much during the pandemic, I never really earned enough, and I chose to stop because I worked at two nurseries and was giving them everything I absolutely had physically.
Seeds called me back though—much like a salmon to spawn. And now I’ve returned to the source.
Since last doing this my professional skills have grown—and I am still growing. I’m a horticulturist now. It is my craft, and it is one that we do in community. Teamwork is key. As part of a team at a nursery business it means a lot when your skills are considered to be important to the process of growing crops. It is exciting and fun to watch and be included as instrumental in the whole process. Great leaders in horticulture acknowledge that—feeding the growth of “budding” talent. I have immense respect from those who’ve mentored me, validated that my work was good, and I appreciate those who regularly acknowledge what I do—which is absolutely not ever part of the aesthetic pleasure garden viewers experience when they love gardening and plants—unless you are the intrepid (seemingly always male) plant hunter raising from seed what you’ve collected and love the most.
Plant tastemakers, like artists or rock stars, are the ones with the envious roles having fans flocking to them—but it is changing in the post-postmodern sense into an explosion blasting shards of its former self everywhere all at once. Plant Influencers are made daily now thanks to social media. With just a cell phone, some sharp marketing and tech skills, anyone clever enough is able to get in on the glory. It’s sad really. It’s adverts at their best—and worst—I suppose.
The difficulty now is just in being heard in the chaotic cacophonic mess… meanwhile, many of the smallest and best nurseries in the country are closing as everyone looks away to be entertained and wholesale growers keep growing.
So yes, we always know the names of the great chefs, but the cooks, well, they continue to toil, striving to become great chefs—and many just disappear along the way. This system is not a new one to any of us. Many wander off once they tire of it, or they simply find some other way to earn their way in life. There are many creative fields of work that exist in this form.
For me, this is just “life” now and it is the world I’ve chosen to be part of, and the great plant influencers in my life will continue to be those who work in community with others, giving credit when it is due.
So here I am again, having slowed my physical work life, honoring my life energy and respecting it, to take better care of myself, and to foster my own seed skills alone again—in a new way. This won’t be a traditional seed shop.
I hope to help others to better understand why seeds matter so much, and I won’t be doing so from any other perspective than my own professional experience—and that means from the mixed community of science and horticulture that I live in and love so much.
I’m nothing without my crew of peeps, and in the conservation and ecological work that we’re all shifting to more, I hope to be part of that change in my own way by showing others that plants, and their seeds, are more than a commodity, unit, or product. We need to work harder to think about plants less as investments, or as “rare” status symbols, but more as a meaningful part of the communities we live in—even if we move around a lot.
I don’t know how I will do this, but I’m going to try. I want to give voice to this thing I love so much in the way that I speak privately about it with my colleagues, but in a more meaningful way to the public that can help build connections beyond myself.
Lastly, yes, seed growing is not for everyone. I can say with 100% certainly that many people completely lack the skills required. You will need to be able to observe over an extended period of time, fight rodents and birds, be patient, be humble when you seek advice about what you did wrong, accept failure, and can I mention patience one more time?
User error is real.
Seed starting takes up a lot of space too. This can make either your house or garden look a bit, uh, like a production nursery—and I DO NOT mean a retail space that is magically created to look pretty by retail elves. Seed starting can be “ugly”. I’m not going to sugar coat that, but I’m not going to lie, maybe it’s ugly to look for order and design everywhere you look, and to be upset when you see messy racks with seed flats.
I’m going to be wild and suggest to the Beauty and Design Queens out there that maybe you should consider loosening up a bit and thinking maybe more about how gardens can help change things for the better, loving where plants come from, and maybe, just maybe, how it can all begin here at the source, at the ugly flats with seeds just about ready to emerge.
All hail the rack of seeds!!! lol
