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Call for Squash Growers

As our Canadian Seed Library expands, we need more growers to keep our seed supply viable and get  rare varieties into gardens across the country. This year, we've identified the Squash Family (squashes, zucchini, cucumbers, melons) as a priority since they require large isolation distances for seed saving, making them more difficult to find appropriate growers for.

We're looking for members who could grow out seed for us. Here's how it would work:

• We send you a handful of seeds
• You grow them for the season, carrying out basic roguing procedures to select for true/strong plants but leaving a population of at least 20 to fully mature
• Collect, clean and dry seeds
• Send as many seeds back to us as possible

Here's the catch - pollinators can carry grains of pollen from male to female flowers across a distance of up to 1.5km! That means, for seeds to grow true to type, the cucurbit family requires 1.5km of isolation from other plants of the same species, since all varieties within one species will cross-pollinate with other varieties of the same species. When this happens, the fruit will grow to look like its mother plant, but the seeds inside - when grown out the next season - will produce fruit that is a hybrid of the mother plant and the plant from which the pollen was obtained.

There are 7 species of common food crops in the Squash Family:

• Cucumis sativus - cucumbers
• Cucumis melo - soft melons such as muskmelons, cantaoupes and honeydews
• Citrullus lanatus - watermelons
• Cucurbita pepo - summer squashes, crooknecks, most pumpkins, and some winter squashes such as acorn squash 
• Cucurbita moschata - butternut squashes and some pumpkins
• Cucurbita maxima - long-storing winter squashes including turban squashes and some pumpkins
• Cucurbita mixta/argyrosperma - some winter squashes

The varieties we're hoping to grow out are not carried by many Canadian seed companies, so expanding our supplies is particularly important. We need growers with large isolation distances from others growing varieties of the same species, or those with experience with hand pollination. Please email our Seed Library Outreach Coordinator, angie [at] seeds.ca, at angie [at] seeds.ca if you're interested.

Even if you can't grow yourself, please consider supporting the Seed Library by adopting a variety. $250 will protect a variety in perpetuity, but any amount helps!

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