A seed swap is being held at Wellington Market for green fingered gardeners on Saturday 23 October. Organised by the Wrekin Co-operative Allotment Society, the event is being held to enable keen gardeners to swap seeds and save on the costs of raising new plants.
Helen King, chair of the newly formed allotment society said, “Everyone is welcome to come along and bring any seed that they have saved from this year’s harvest. We are hoping people will bring a wide variety of flower and vegetable seeds on the day to swap for other seeds of their choice. There will also be tips and hints on how to dry and store seeds and it’s all free of charge.”
The Wrekin Co-operative Allotment Society has already attracted interest from over forty residents in the Wellington area who are keen to take up allotment gardening. A campaign was launched earlier in the year by Paul Kalinauckas to get more allotments after he found waiting lists closed to new entrants. He said, “I have been surprised by the high level of demand for new allotment sites. Most of the existing ones have long waiting lists and some people have been waiting for several years. There has been an upsurge in interest in home grown vegetables and this seed swap is a great opportunity to get some free seed and learn how to grow them.”
Pupils from the Sutherland Business and Enterprise College, a Co-operative Trust School, will also be at the seed swap with a variety of chutneys produced from vegetables grown in their school allotments. The event is supported by the Wellington Market Company and runs from 10.00am to 12.00pm.
Hi,
I happened to be in Wellington on the day of your seed swap ( a former resident, I now live in Cardiff) and I was greatly impressed with the efficiency of your scheme. As a member of an allotment association committee in Cardiff, I have been given the task of initiating our own seed swap scheme. Would you be able to tell me the sort of information required on seed envelopes? I noticed you had preprinted labels which we would like to adopt.
I would be very grateful of any advice you could give me.
Kind regards,
Nicola Sinclair
our relatively small [50-60] garden society is considering a seed swap at one of our annual shows: from your experience, do you have any constructive suggestions/guides on practical measures – i.e. size of packets/volume of seed or other useful tips?
Hi Roy – we found our seed swap to be a very popular event which, after some press coverage promoting it, attracted people from miles around.
Tips from what we learnt are:
1. We used a standard business envelope with a computer label stuck on it with details of seeds to be written on. Needs to be as specific as possible eg French Beans or French Climbing Beans with variety if known.
2. Most packets were 20 seeds
3. Some people brought old packets of seeds
4. Some people brought saved seeds
5. We didn’t charge for seeds but some people made a donation
Hope this helps
Paul