Heritage seeds: Building a future from the past

Heritage and heirloom seeds have been quietly building a strong presence in the national seed market for a number of years now.

They can be ordered from the Internet, and books and articles on them are numerous, with the effort to increase the seed base always an active goal.


They are, essentially, the seeds of vegetables types that can theoretically date back as far as thousands of years, but typically go back only to the 20th or 19th century.

Heirloom and heritage vegetables are usually pure strains, not hybrids, and reproduce their seeds through natural, open-air pollination.

They are often the remnant populations from which today’s genetically engineered vegetable seeds were originally designed.

While they perhaps may not have as smooth a skin, or don’t always grow as large, or maybe are not as resistant to bugs or blight as the commercially manufactured seeds now in common use, many proponents feel they have advantages that far outweigh any shortcomings.

Foremost among the advantages is flavor, which heirloom advocates will quickly state is so far in advance of the genetic varieties, that it makes them seem flat and tasteless.

They’ll also state that it’s not just imagination, in that size, shelf life, bug and disease resistance, and visual appeal are usually the target goals for genetically produced seeds, which have their origin based in commerce and profit.

Flavor and taste have fallen by the wayside as a result, say heirloom advocates, who note that growing from heritage species is not only one way to recover that loss, but also provides the biodiversity that is important to a balance of nature, especially with crop foods.

Heritage and heirloom seeds have, in fact, become so well known and visible, that in Hunter they have moved from the agricultural world into the artistic one, just in time for Earth Day and the unfolding of spring.

Kaaterskill Fine Arts, on Main Street, recently opened a new exhibition based on the visual beauty of heirloom vegetables and their seed packets.

The artwork is based on the designs of seed packets from southern Ulster County’s Hudson Valley Seed Library, an on-line membership heritage seed company that is also actively working to rebuild the heirloom seed base of the greater Hudson Valley and Catskill Mountains region.

The show includes not only large reproductions of the specially commissioned and designed HVSL seed packets, each of which is by a different artist, but also — and in keeping with the heritage/heirloom theme — enlarged reproductions of a selection of beautiful 20th century seed packets and catalogs.

Westkill landscape gardener Karin Edmondson, a pure foods advocate and local agriculture proponent, said Tuesday she sees the show as a good opportunity for sharing the botanical, culinary, and cultural significance of heritage seeds, as well as appropriate to spring and Earth Day.

“Earth Day is celebrating biodiversity,” said Edmondson, “and that is what these natural vegetables are all about.”

“These seeds are pure,” she said. “There’s no engineering in them.”

“These are seeds of the Earth,” said Edmondson. “These are not seeds of the chemist’s tube glass.”

Edmondson said the regional and local origins of the assorted vegetable strains are of both botanical and cultural import.

“They’re really of ‘the place’,” she said.

“I think they absolutely fill a need for gardeners,” she said, “for professional and home gardeners alike.”

“Hudson Valley Seed Library is rejuvenating all these vegetables that this area has not had access to (for decades),” said Edmondson.

“Some of these seeds,” she said, “might not have been available for fifty years.”

“They’re saving the biodiversity of all these very delicious heritage vegetables and foods,” said Edmondson.

She also explained that because the heirloom vegetables are grown locally for their seed harvest, they are appropriate for the area’s growing season and its conditions.

“They’re providing locally grown seed that is hardy to this area,” said Edmondson. “The seeds are from their garden.”

Edmondson said that another good point about HVSL’s local heritage seeds is that because the growing location of all seeds distributed by them is known, the grower can alway have confidence in the validity of the strain.

She also noted that while the concept of heritage and heirloom seeds is based in both a philosophical and environmental mindset, “It’s also just fun.”

Edmondson said that, for example, HVSL has “Aunt Ruby’s Green Tomato,” which she has not yet had a chance to cook with, but looks forward to.

“So it’s a great resource for people who like to cook and try new things,” she said.

“And,” she added, “it’s all local.”