CLOSED: Free Seeds for recent DG Subscribers (October 2011)

I've got tons of hollyhocks, as if Corey didn't know, or have enough already. I've separated (I think) the yellows and pinks, but I also have a large bunch of just plain "mixed" if anybody wants to try. They grow like weeds around here. Some rural folks call them "outhouse flowers" because that seems to be where they're mostly found.
They can be quite pretty, though. The more common ones have hibiscus type single flowers,but there is also a "Chattters Mix" that has double carnation type flowers. Most can be sowed in the Fall and over wintered in many areas.

Al

Flowers would be a big plus to an outhouse. I remember there being lots of flowers around my grandparents outhouse. Have to say though, to a little girl it didn't help much. I was scared to death of that thing. I am very thankful that I was born in a time with indoor plumbing. If I had to give up indoor plumbing or electricity, I would give up electricity. I"ld rather bbq than face the dark hole in the middle of the night.

I am guilty
I am guilty
I am maximally fguilty
(Or at least slow and distracted by work, visitors and m y own garden.)

Every time I have a visitor, i have to move all the New Bee stash and paraphenalia out of my living room into boxes and little spaces around the house where they won;t be stumbled over, then try to find things again after people leave. So most of my "NB time" goes into moving things around and losing them.

I owe PAGES of people their packets! I promise they'll get them beofre spring planting time!

Even the splitting / labelling has gone on hold, as long as i get them listed on the first page ... and I recntly found one collection of things sent in to the stash that hasn;t even made it onto the first-post list.

Mea culpa!

P.S. I have quite given up on IDing the "singleton" pkts with just a common name or latin name that I don;t recognize. I WILL still research and ID and split and label the new big packs , but older singletons will have to be given out gradualy as "extras" for New Bees to research ... and, if they don;t fit their zone, to give away or trade away.

So the new standard for New Bee mailings will be "at least 15 pkts" and probably more.

For all the saintly people who have been so patient and long-suffering, twice that many plus my apologies.

Mea maxima cupla.

I like looking the plants up. I find it more helpful sometimes to read the comments than the directions on the package. Commercial seeds have very generic directions so they are no overly helpful. I don't think anyone is losing sleep over the packet. And for more seed, what's a little waiting?

Very kindly said. Thank you.

>> more helpful sometimes to read the comments than the directions on the package.

True! Also, the DG PlamntFiles comments are often more helpfull than the DG PlantFile data entry!

I especially appreicate tow entires that differ: often by looking at the climate each contradictory comment came from, i can guess how it might grow in MY climate.

>> directions on the package

Botanical Interests has GREAT packets with usefull information. They cover the inside of the packet with fine print.

I save old seed catalogs from Johnnies and Territorial.

They have detailed Starting, Growing and Pest info by section, i.e. one block of detailed advice for "Tomatoes", and one for "Melons and Watermelons".

Johnnies test farm is in Maine, and Territorial is in Oregon, so I can compare their dates and cautions to guess at what I should do near the coast in WA.

Johnnies website has more even more planting guides, plus videos:
http://www.johnnyseeds.com/t-growers_library.aspx

Territorial also has videos, and WINTER growing guides:
http://www.territorialseed.com/grow_guide_winter_index

Corey ~ Please LMK if I can help in any way, besides sorting my own seeds and sending you what I don't need. If you d-mail me a list of names, maybe I can help you with them. That is all I can think of. as I have many books that give instructions on seed-sowing including the ones I got from the library. I have been going through this for a couple of years now.

On the other hand, I think if people get free seeds, they can look up the sowing/growing conditions themselves and you can get to the sorting and putting them in their envelopes. What do you think?

Evelyn - I agree with you, but Corey is determined to make himself (and us!!!) crazy with this mess he's gotten himself into!

I agree too! I like getting seeds with just the name on them. Looking them up is like opening a present. I have also met some very nice people on here when I've gone looking for more information on something. I would not expect a trader to label everything on each packet of seeds they sent me. If there are those who would be upset, let them pay for there seeds.

amen!

looking things up is a great way to learn and somehow makes the seeds mean more to me.

I agree.

Ahhh ... then I can blame you if I send all tender tropicals to someone in Alaska? That might be a good plan!

In fact, so many new bags of fresh seeds came in that they can keep me plenty busy . I can chnage my policy for the older singleton-packets whose names I don't recognize: the recipients can each get some of those to research.

this even makes sense. If I'm splitting up and labelling 20-100 packets of something, and have to make a label anyway, I'll indulge my desire to look it up, and then record at least Annual / perennial / Zone and details like "tree - flower - grass - shrub or edible". I feel better that way, especially if someone asks for only flowers, or only perennials, or they live in Zone 2 or 3 (or 10).

Just don't stress. You are doing a great job! Looking up the singletons will be fun. If you don't recognize the name then theres a very good chance many of us won't. Sometimes mystery is really fun. And if it's something a person can't use, then trade, trade, trade.

Corey, I'm happy to look up basic info on the seeds you're splitting into many packets....feel free to send me a list of seeds, and I'll provide Annual/Perennial/Zone, type of plant etc.

Same here. Send me a list to look up.

me. too!

Corey -- I do have a few that I forgot to shove in Ella's package, and was thinking about sending to the "newbie fund" -- I see you are doing it now.

I dont have A LOT, but all will be packaged and labled -- I use Scientific & common names and tend to put zone hardiness on them.

If i get organized -- I'll pop you a note when i send.

I came across this online pamphlet and thought to share it with anyone who might be interested.
http://www.chilternseeds.co.uk/page.php?page=cultivation

It is worth it just to order their catalog, but if you should order just a few seeds from them, they will send you one.

Hi tcs!

Thank you! That would be really good, and greatly appreciated.

I do hope to spread some variety back from that other swap ionto the New Bee Stash.

>> I use Scientific & common names and tend to put zone hardiness on them.

Drool, slaver, appreciate! Especially the zone helps me find them to give them to people who can grow them. I just know that many eyerbows must go up when Alaskan New Bees receive tender tropical Whateveritis somethingorothereaea.


Umm, the people who offered to look things up - I think this might be over-exploiting your offer, but would you be open to receving a mailer full of seeds with names I don't recognize? If you can add anything like "flower - annual - perennial / Zone - shrub -vine - etc) I think that would add greatly to the value of what goes out.

On the other hand, I hear many people say they LIKE surprises. It just seems like a lot of work to research and label ONE pkt when we have so many fresher pkts in large multples that I can label 10-30 at a time.

On the OTHER other hand, if you look sdomething up and like it, it is yours! Then in 2-3 years, if it thrives, send a few seeds back along with your observations.

Corey, I'd be happy to help with some mystery seeds. I'll dmail you my address. Just to make sure I understand...I add info to or relabel the packets, and then send them back to you?

Corey, that sounds like a great idea. Count me in. I think looking up the less recognized plants will be great for me, maybe I'll broaden my horizons. Robyn

No comment. :D

Either way works for me. And if I was rich I could have a green house. I wouldn't know what to do with it, but I could have one. LOL. I'm hoping it takes a few years before I get that yearning for a green house. Right now I'm just waiting to try my hand at winter sowing.

I was planning to mail them, as taking less time than squinting and typing up the names .

Also, hoping that if someone can't find it online, they'll grow it out, ID it, name it, and then send some back three years from now (just kidding).

sunnyg:
>> Just to make sure I understand...I add info to or relabel the packets, and then send them back to you?

If you want to take that much trouble! The alternative would be to just treat everything I don;t recognize as bonus seeds and add them a few at a time to outgoing mailers as "extras". Becuase that works, too.

We do have a lot of seeds with names I do recognize, or was able to look up with reasonable confidence, but then figure that the time I put into the New Bee stasdh should ALL be spent getting mailers tog ether for people I owe them too. I've been too busy lately just working and living!

Monkeymomr and sunnyg, I will sned some pkts to you as soon as I can, but once agin a guest is coming and I have to move all the New Bee boxes lists and envelopes out of the living room and stack them in my bedroom. And lose things in the process! So maybe before cvhristamaws and amaybe not - cleaning house for a guest is a multi=day task.

I have both your addresses.

>> No need to send me anything. Just d-mail your list to me and if I can, I will give you the info.

That's what I don;t have time to do. I was hoping someone would scribble the info onto an existing paper label or envelope, or tuck a slip of paper inside a clear Ziplock. My handwriting would be no better than no onformation at all!

>> I can at least give to the basics...in categories, such as - tender annual, hardy annual, tender shrub, tree, hardy tree or shrub, biennial,

Yup, that is what I don;t know if I threw them in the "reasearch these" bags when I did my first sort. "Tender vs hardy" is a good enoguh Zone approximation that I can work these off by giving them to people who ought to be at least close to being able to grow them.

People in Zone 3 certainly know their own issues better than I do! If they give me a genus name, I can work with that. Or they may be used to not being able to use 90% of the seeds people send them.
I think they are all hardy.


>> Oh, you mean I have to give you all that info on the seeds I send...LOL

Not when they are pkts big enough to split several ways and they have [b]an unambiguous name that I can look up and know what it means. [/b]

More than half of all common names I have tried to look up are used for [b]many very different plants [/b], maybe in different parts of the country. And that kind of ambiguity does frustrate me, so I ask the donor if they know WHICH plant they use that name for, like by sneding them links to pictures and descritpions of the the flowers, shrubs, herbs or vines that the one common name mi8ght mean.

Probably in the refgion where some common name is used, it means only one thing, and I seem like an idiot for not knowing such a common t6hing, but trust me! Many common names for plants are like "Joe". You know, Joe from Wisconsin. What do you mean, WHICH JOE?!?

And when there are yhundreds of "onesie" pkts, O throw up my hands and figure I can;t research them until i retire.

Other gardeners have other priorities than precise names, I know.
Or enjoy growing out a few mysetry plants just to see what they are and whether they can live in their climate.

But if there are 7 things that "Joe" might be, that's only a 14% chance that I'm right, so i won't type up a label like that.

P.S.

Does anyone have a few spare seeds of this? I know someone who's looking for it.
I'll trade and pay postage to send it to him.

Sweet Woodruff,
Our Lady's Lace,
Sweetscented Bedstraw,
Galium odoratum,
http://davesgarden.com/guides/pf/go/55/

Groundcover / Fragrant Herb [P Zone 4]

Don't shoot yourself in the foot over this Corey, enjoy the Holiday like the rest of us! Golly, we don't start planting until SPRING!

Al

Corey -- i checked the "haves" list and arejay59 has it listed...

Thank you Terese! I forgot to look in Plant Files. I'll ask her!

When you get a chance send me a big box. I don't work and usually take care of the grandkids in the AM so I have time. But please, take time to enjoy the holidays. Next year is too near to be stressed right now. I love a mystery and am stubborn as a bull dog so looking these up will bring me joy. Boy, does that say something about my life?

Actually if the very basic info is on each seed pkt., the new bee should be able to look for more info if need be. I would not be good as to recognizing seeds and knowing their names without info, so maybe I'll be no help at all.

I would rather not grow unlabeled seeds as I have so many already that are labeled, but not sown...LOL!!

If I ever get them re-sorted, I should be able to send some to you, as long as they are not too old.

I got good at seed regonizing because I bought one of those wildflower mixes. Good grief, I had no idea what was what. It drove me crazy! Those mixes should come with warnings, "throw seed and field and enjoy." I planted them in my flower bed and had all kinds of craziness. Super tall in front, poor little flower in the back under another. At least if I'm growing something I know is unknown I can put it in a pot and watch it and know the other plants are not being bullies.

Indeed I wonder about the ages of some of the "Onesie" pkts - few have the date on them.

>> Actually if the very basic info is on each seed pkt., the new bee should be able to look for more info

That basic info is a unique name, but I don;t have time to look each one up and label it UNTIL I get out the late mailers first. Indeed, few or none of those will go before Christmas! Maybe not even the Mystery Pkts to the angels offering to do research and relabel onsie pkts!

The main reason I would like to get more info than just a name (even a unique name) is that I would like to not send huge tropical trees to someone with a square foot garden in Alaska.

I "ought" to go through the "I Dunno" onesies and sort out the ones that have a scientific name or a common name so unusual that it probably identifies one general kind of plant, like a genus, 5that's close enough for most purposes.

The ones with "common common names" none of us should worry about unless you can ID seeds by their appreanrce!

P.S. I;'ve said before but should repeat: anyone who might send seeds in for me to split up and share, hardly any info is really needed! If I can't ID them from the name you give, I'll either Dmail you to ask "which of these 2-3 links does it look more like?" , or just copy the name you give and the recipients will probably know them better than I do.



This message was edited Dec 15, 2011 9:47 PM

>> I got good at seed recgonizing because I bought one of those wildflower mixes.

Laughing long and Loud! Me too, except I never recognize the seeds! Now I avoid those mixes becuase they give me mental palpitations trying to figure them out!

So few sporuted and survived the slugs that it was faiurly easy to ID the plants. First, very few plants are slug-resistant! From the "contents list" plus "slug-resistant", I narrowed them down to Siberian Wallflower and Alyssum.

I realize I am the opposite of many people. Some people look at me kind of pityingly and say "You know, if it's pretty, I grow it, and that seems to work out OK."

Different strokes for different folks. Personally, I even like to know the variety so I can save seeds and trade them with a specific ID. That's just me.

I like things organized too. I have all my seeda listed in a notebook with the basic info so I can reference it easy when looking at other seeds or planting. I'm trying to find a container that would work for keeping the seeds in a filing cabinet kind of order. I'm annul retintive.

Corey... for formatting, you need to use the greater than and less than, not brackets in here. < B > etc. ;-)

It's actually O. Seed D. Obsessive-Compulsive ORDER!

I just say that I love details. I do drive some people around me nuts, but that's becuase they don't APPRECIATE details!

(The part of NB I love is typing up many details about the incoming seeds, and splitting them into little packets, and filing them where I can FIND them again. That is orderly, finite and knowable, as long as I can ask the donors questions. The result is tidy and orderly and organized and ... kind of DEFINED.

It's the seeds that might be any of 100 species or dozens of genuses that drive me batty.
So I put most of them in bags in a box and put that box at the BOTTOM of the heap and I don't go there very often.
But I guessthey prey at my mind. Darn, now I think I MAY be crazy.

But loving details works so WELL in engineering and science and software!
And ambiguity in software makes planes and computers crash.

Even finding seeds to give people is somewhat frusitrating to my O Seed D, because there are no clear answers unless someone says "I want this one and this one and that one". However, as long as I know what our seeds ARE, I can deal with thibngs like "pretty cottagy flowers" or "vegtables that grow well where I live".

I figure it is some kind of challenge or "growth opportunity" for me, to deal with hundreds of ambiguous things in some way other than hiding them in bags inside a box under a stack.

I think it was Amanda who first suggested something like "why not just give some random seeds to random people until they're gone?"

And indeed that would be smart, becuase we DO have lots of known seeds in addition to The Mystery Onesies.

But there is more anguish over one ambiguous seed, than joy about the 99 that are known!

And so to bed.

Thanks tcs, got it!

Angle brackets, not square brackets, check!

So much for my mastery of details, ehh?
Oh, well, I love 'em, but I don't always handle them right.

I'm sure my DSO would recognize that pattern ...

Sending some with each package is a good idea. You make up a form letter that goes with them about how they are unidentified. The person will either deal with them by searching info or planting them or will pass them on to someone who is interested in them. I know as a neebie, I have yet to meet a seed I don't like. I've just learned to plant the things I'm not sure about in a different area until I figure it out.