Marie duQuesnay lives on an exposed hill around 850ft above sea level in Pembrokeshire and has been a seed guardian for nine years.

Seed guardians are volunteer gardeners who grow and preserve historic vegetable varieties.

There are currently more than 800 varieties of seeds in the Garden Organic Heritage Seed Library. Some of the seeds include rare landrace varieties which are adapted to specific growing conditions, heirloom varieties that have been saved over generations and varieties that are no longer available to buy. The library is based at Garden Organic’s headquarters in Ryton Gardens near Coventry and the collection is called the National Collection of Heritage Vegetables.

In total, there are 185 amateur gardeners volunteering as seed guardians and growing heirloom beans, peas and other notable vegetables all across the UK to protect biodiversity and the food of the future.

Ms duQuesnay is growing heritage varieties of Brussels sprouts, beans and the Duke of Albany pea despite the challenges of the altitude of her garden, cold winds, stormy weather and regularly being enveloped by cloud.

She said: “It’s been fantastic to have the opportunity to play a tiny part in such an important project as the Heritage Seed Library.

“It is so sad to see that the intensification of farming is narrowing the range of what’s grown and coupled with regulations (especially in the EU) around what seeds are certified for sale, we’re losing very local varieties. And once they’re gone, that’s it.

“We’re going to have to start to grow different varieties and different crops. And we need the Heritage Seed Library like never before. It will save lives and livelihoods I’m sure of it.”

The UN’s food and agriculture organisation estimates around 75 per cent of crop diversity has been lost between 1900 and 2000.

The seed guardians grow the plants in their gardens and allotments, collecting, cleaning and drying the seed and sending it back to the Heritage Seed Library so that it can be conserved. They also provide feedback on factors like performance, pest and disease resistance as well as taste.

Catrina Fenton, head of the Heritage Seed Library, said: “Up and down the country seed guardians are carefully carrying out conservation work with us, and we simply couldn’t do the work we do without their help.

“I rarely get to meet these amazing volunteers in person, so it was an absolute pleasure to chat with Marie when we were interviewed by Jonny Massey of Radio 4’s PM programme – her enthusiasm and dedication is exactly why the Heritage Seed Library has been around for almost 50 years.

“This work is more important than ever to ensure diversity in our food systems is available for future generations and to develop better adapted plants in a changing climate.”

Each year, up to 150 varieties of heritage seeds and included in the annual Heritage Seed Library seed list. Varieties have included amaranth Mrs McGhie, White Belgium carrots, Table Talk pea and the Mescher lettuce.

Between the beginning of December and the end of February, members of the Seed Library can choose six free packets to seeds to grow.

For more information about the Heritage Seed Library or to become a seed guardian visit www.gardenorganic.org.uk/hsl.

Granny Miller’s heirloom tomatoes or simply saving money at the garden center, collecting seeds is just another adventure in gardening. There are so many seeds to save and share with others, and as many reasons as there are seeds.

Seed saving started when humans settled in one area growing plants rather than gathering what was available while traveling.

Thousands of plants have sprouted with no help from humans, relying on animals, wind and insects to carry pollen from one plant to the next. These open pollinated plants, often called heirlooms, grow true to their parent plant and are the best seeds for saving.

Hybrid seeds may be sterile or not grow back to the plant you want. Saving these seeds will result in unpredictable combinations of the traits of the grandparent plants instead of the parent plant from which you saved seed.

While not good for saving, hybrids are important for all growers — especially organic growers who benefit from the disease resistance or another aspect of certain hybrids.

After the flower or vegetable has matured, you may harvest the seeds. The seedhead or seedpod will often turn a shade of brown when they dry out. This lets you know the seeds are mature and ready to harvest. You need to watch certain seed heads as many open by themselves when seeds are ripe, and you might lose them to the wind or to the ground (and they are too difficult to find!) Tie a bag over the flower’s head, shake the plant and the ripe seeds will fall into the bag. If you’re collecting seeds from a variety of plants at the same time, carry paper lunch bags with you and label as you go. Pick peas and beans right off the vines when the pods have dried out.

After saving black-eyed susans, coneflowers, and zinnias, I just crumble the dried flower heads into prepared soil to plant in spring. I always leave some flowers for the birds. Flower heads of small seed heads are easy to separate by rubbing the flower head across a mesh screen nailed onto a simple wood frame. Large seeds from sunflowers come off the flower head by rubbing two heads together after allowing them to ripen and dry for a couple of months.

Vegetables such as pumpkins, cucumbers, melons and squash and the seeds of tomatoes have a lot of pulp surrounding the seeds. To harvest seeds from these plants, pick the fruit when it is perfectly ripe. Scrape the pulp and seeds out of the fruit and place it into a large bowl of water.

The seeds are easily removed from the pulp after an hour or so of soaking. Place the seeds on a screen or cloth and put them in a warm place for at least one week to dry.

I love to introduce children to gardening so after having them help me collect seeds, we make seed envelopes that they can color and write the seed information on. I place the envelopes into a wide-mouth canning jar with a small muslin bag of silica powder, then place it in the refrigerator.

For details on saving seeds, storage information, and germination tests go to http://go.osu.edu/savingseed

Baytos is an Ohio State University Extension Master Gardener Volunteer in Mahoning County.

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