It's all getting a bit seedy

It's seed swaps I am talking about there are lots taking place this month up and down the country. The home of seed swaps is in Brighton over 14 years ago and has now grown into a massive event. Thousands of keen gardeners, growers, and food lovers come together to swap seeds share hints and tips and make new friends. This Saturday was the first one to take place in Northampton it was held in The Looking Glass Theatre in the centre of Northampton.

The event was run in conjunction with Fruitful Abundance which is a Northampton based group which was set up to prevent food waste, encourage more people to grow there own food and generally live a more healthier life style.

The event opened it's doors to the public at 11am there was a steady flow of public all day all where heading straight to the seed swap tables with hands full of there own seeds eager to swap. The way it works is you hand over the seeds you want to swap to one of the lady's they then put them in the different category's Cabbage, Beans etc. Then just help your self to the new seeds you want to grow this year and if you haven't any seeds to swap you just give a donation for what you take. 

There was lots of seeds available to swap thanks to the generosity of Thompson and Morgan, Suttons Seeds, Unwin's Seeds and Marshalls Seeds. Also some local growers donated lots of heritage variety's so there was a good choice of variety's on offer something for every one.

There was lots of talks taking place through out the day on seed saving, urban gardening, bees and eating weeds

Seedy Saturday also saw the first opening of Elsie's Café which is a pay as you feel Real Junk Food Café. There was lots of cakes, biscuits and light lunches all made from food that would have other wise ended up in land fill. So why feed the tip when you can feed belly's come the end of the day there was just a few crumbs left so the food must have been good.

It was a great day and I'm looking forward to next year's already.



Marshalls Seeds new Catalogue

The Marshall's catalogue is one that i can remember from being a boy my dad would spend many hours flicking through the pages. Deciding on what he was going to grow in the garden next year as kids we always got to open the parcel when it arrived excited to see what was in it. Back then the seed packets where very simple sometimes they just had the name written on the packet things have come on a long way since then. Marshall's seeds only used to be a mail order seed company but they have expanded there range and are now in most good garden centers. 

There are many new variety's on offer this year as well as all the Marshall's favorites that you would expect. There front cover features the new Garlic 'Red Duke' it is a hard neck variety it has lovely big fat reddish cloves. With a good garlic flavor it is also buy one get one free at the moment so well worth a try i have planted it in my new raised bed already I'm looking forward to seeing how it performs over the growing season.

My Garlic cloves 'Red Duke' waiting to be planted.

Another good one to try is going to be Celery 'Blush' this is a British bread variety with a lovely blushed pink stalks will look great in the salad bowl. Courgette 'Lemona' not only is it almost spineless produces a prolific crop of lovely long yellow Courgettes up to 20cm long. another garden staple is the pea and Marshall's have introduced the new vaverity 'Twin Set' it is a very productive variety producing two pods on each node with each pod containing 10 peas with good disease resistance.

To get your hands on your own copy of the new Marshall's catalogue just order through thee website www.marshalls-seeds.co.uk or view on line hear.