January 7, 2009 

inda called me from Missouri last night. It was so exciting talking to her!!!! We talked about all sorts of things and I just love being able to talk to someone for over an hour about homesteading stuff. You would not have believed all the topics we hit and I bet we could have talked for another couple hours, let alone days.

Yes, Linda, the seed duffle bag you (and everyone else) have heard about for the last few years, really does exist. The bag weighs about 18 pounds and I have used it as long as I can remember. Maybe 14 years or more? The bag itself used to be my book bag from high school.

Why is it in a duffle bag? Well in case there is ever a house fire or other emergency of course. Many of the seeds cannot be replaced. For a list (which is not complete, but I have been working on for a couple of years, is located here.)

There are seeds which are from plants that my father grew and saved seeds from, and then in turn I saved seeds from the later generations of those same plants.

Some of the seeds are not available anywhere commercially and yet others are on the rare and endangered lists.

There is living history in these seeds and they as well as my photo albums are some of the first few things I would grab in case of an emergency. They are not just seeds to me, they are history of my family, and the history of some of my friends families. They cannot be lost.

And no, not all of my saved seed is in plastic bags, I have only about 5 in such a container. Most are in paper.

I store my seeds where it is dark, cold and dry. Onion seeds are only supposed to be good for a year and I know some of the seeds I saved off my Walla Walla's were good 6 years later. Unfortunately I seeded alot, as I thought the germination would be low.