If @Saskia and @Jacek is up for collaborating on making a grex for the benefit of us all, that’s a start. I hope others could be interested too: @mare.silba @Bore, @jackpeppiatt,@Anita what do you say?
I’ve made a separate thread just for organizing which varieties which could source: Please add any you know about and where to get them: Creating a Beet Grex 2026
Hi everyone, yes, I am interested in giving this a go - it sounds interesting, and like a cool opportunity to exchange some interesting genetics. I will post the varieties I am able to source in the Beet Grex thread.
My understanding is that the plan is to mix up red and golden varieties - do we have any concerns that over time the dominant genetics (which I assume is the red) will take over? I would be tempted to keep a red flock and a yellow flock (loosely isolated from each other).
In terms of sowing date, I can wait until April. I will try send the seed I order by mid-Feb.
Good question and one worth seeking out an answer to. And your assumption is right - for the initial grex, we will just mix all the genetics together. What we will do with it after that stage is very open and it is likely that people will take it in many different, exciting directions. It is very easy to separate out the phenotypes and just replant those for seed. If you want to separate a yellow and red flock from our big 2026 mix then you’re doing work for the group. It means from the same seed we could get both a highly diverse grex plus two color-coded flocks.
My suspicion is white might be more dominant, because sea beet has white roots (to my recall). I did a very fast search on Google scholar and found one article that might have clues: Watson, J. F., & Goldman, I. L. (1997). Inheritance of a gene conditioning blotchy root color in table beet (Beta vulgaris L.). Journal of Heredity, 88(6), 540-543. I can’t find the whole article though.
In general I think this is a really good idea, but for my garden timing will probably be an issue - my seasons are shifted copmared to all of you.
I need to sow them in February latest - anything later and plants really struggle with summer heat and drought, if they survive at all (do have in mind that I’m planting corn by mid March for example). Basically they need to be strong plants by mid May, and with my soils and weird spring weather last years, it takes time for beets to grow to the point they can survive summer.
Last year (2025) I’ve put them in the ground mid February, and this year I’m even planning to do main sowing at the end of January.
To conclude - if you all manage to go forward with collective seed sourcing I’ll see where and how me and my seeds can fit. And for you sending me a mix - that would be for my next season either for this year autumn sowing (still need to figure proper timing!, and if they will flower next spring or the one after) or for next year spring, since I’m guessing seed mix won’t be ready before March.
We’ll see how acquiring seed for the grex will go. I suspect we won’t have it all collected, mixed and sent out until after February.
There are other ways to focus on beet this year. Growing more seed, raising the bar or documenting more. Have you gotten ideas on how you want to participate and make your beet growing more focused than other years?
Reading about the beetroot focus I would really like to get involved but am limited in my participation due to the Swiss chard endemic population around here. I wanted to contact you anyway… with an idea: due to the relatively mild winters (in beet terms) I can actually sow and transplant beetroots any month of the year. I can assess, select and send the selected roots to other beetholics for speeding up the work… considering the bi-annual habit it could be a plus. This could be particularly useful during the cold months where I could sow them in early Autumn, send the selected roots up North for some of the other members to grow through spring until flowering. Autumn come and repeat, effectively having a new generation each year. Something like Borlaug’s “Shuttle Breding”.
Just an idea… if it doesn’t make sense, no problem.
Regardless of my participation, I have seeds to contribute to the grex. Both Shiraz and Three Root Grex seeds in the original Kokopelli packet for 2025. I should mention nevertheless, that almost every variety I got from Kokopelli came tremendously crossed/mixed/hybridized… did not confirm this for the beetroot yet but basically everything that does not exclusively self pollinate came from Kokopelli like this. I had previously grown Shiraz around 2015 and had it added to an inter mixed population comprised of close to a dozen varieties including a mix Wild Garden Seed used to sell. Was selecting for eating quality and smooth appearance of root under Autumn direct seeding and drought tolerance (in a particular dry spot of the garden). Like most of my life, the old photos are in a couple of hard drives from deceased laptop and pc… but I could locate this from one taste test in 2020.
The labelling of the old seed got mixed up with the chard seed while I was working abroad… and, considering I have an enormous population of wild chard in the area, I will not be sending any of my own seeds to the beet focus group.
But, I would very much like to share a modest amount of Shiraz and Three Root Grex seed with the beet group.
I can spare around four or five gram each which should result in double or triple the amount of individual Shiraz seed relative to 3 Root Grex. Hope it is enough to add to the grex. In case it is not enough I can send seed to a member who commits to multiplying it and adding it to the grex.
Just to finish, these are not just any regular varieties… any Grex that includes genetics by Navazio and Kapuler is blessed in my book.
cheers
V
Hi,
Making a big mix sounds like a good plan to me! I’m in 
I am interested in joining.
I was planning on making a grex for myself before I found out about this collective effort.
I bought seven beet varieties from:
I tried to make a geographically varied selection.
Beets grow well here, if I can avoid intrusions from deer. My fence gets improved each year…
Great @Christopher, I invite you to pitch in on the thread designated for the beet grex and let us know which varieties you already bought: Creating a Beet Grex 2026
I have sown the beets on Sunday the 26th of April along with some chard for my wife:
6 rows of beets and 2 rows of chard.
Fingers crossed I didn’t sow too deep or too early. We have a long dry spell and I watered into the ditch and then put the seeds in and covered with dry soil. I have spread a wheelbarrow worth of compost over the area before planting.
I had tried beets in the two rows on the far left hand side last year and had 4 plants survive and produce a beet.
I have heavy soil that gets hard like concrete when dry.
I have also sowed beets yesterday 28th of April. I sowed the 55 variety mix on 40 m2 and smaller sowings of high geosmin, low geosmin, low oxalic acid and monogermic varieties in each their own row (about 20 m2 in total). I plan to sow around 40 m2 more, so about 100 m2 in total.
Have you got seeds of it or anyone else? Anyone tried to grow it? Is it biannual in nature also? Might be interesting to test it. Not sure how it would tolerate our winters, but concidering that only few hundred years ago it was as cold in central Europe as it’s now here during winter, there must be some inherent tolerance there.
Yes, I’ve grown it for about four years and got seed. I’ve collected wild seed from the coast too. Here it is a short-lived perennial, sometimes biannual. I think it is delicious and much sweeter than the chard that is grown in market gardens. If you grow it close to the ocean, it accumulates salt too like many other sea side herbs.
Have you tried hybridizing with either beets or chard? Over here there doesn’t seem to be many seedsellers (and those didn’t have at the moment), but there were some people who grow it so at least it survives the winter. Have to ask around if anyone has transplants or seeds around this area. It would be nice to start this year, but since purpose would mainly be to hybridize I would first have to see how I can get beets overwinter, in the ground or storage, to make that reality so not rush to get them. Storage I had beets survive winter, but those died once I tried to grow them. I wonder if it was because I moved them to too warm directly and should have moved them to pots on my balcony as soon as it remained above freezing. How did you overwinter them?
I overwinter them in sand in a cool shed in the city where it just dips below freezing but never gets really hard frost because of urban thermal mass. I haven’t hybridized with sea beet, but am potentially interested.
I think I included sea beets in the Serendipity Seed Swap box so it exists in our network
How did you go about planting them? Just put them in the ground early or grew to transplant? When I triedlast time, mine were clearly alive and pushing little growth in the spring, but they were quite shriveled. I suspect that maybe they would have needed a little longer time to rehydrate and root in cool conditions rather than going directly to hot days. Have to try again. It does help to see and hear how other people have managed it to trouble shoot for possible causes for failure.
I also have three plants growing since almost a year now and they have given me sweet plump leaves pretty much continuously since then. They are now going to seed, so I’ll keep some for sure. They are becoming monstrously huge though, so I will be moving them out of the annual garden spots I think.
I started my sea beets in plug trays and seed trays to then plant out later in the season or even next season (if I don’t have time to plant out perennials I just overwinter them in bunches in a greenhouse or similar protected environment like a cold bench).
From the first sowing I have just one surviving plant. I have resown the same area on the 21st of Mai and a few days later and today have discovered the first seedlings:
