My seeds to share 2025 in EU, attention those going to Croatia live meeting

Thought I make some crude draft of what I have to share now that the Croatian meeting as coming. If @marcela_v can tag people that are coming so everyone sees this. I can send a package there hopefully by next week. Not all seeds are going to be available by then, but quite a lot. There are also lots of seeds from last year when I was a little too keen on saving seeds. Many F2s so better save more. Now there has been at least some selection. Don’t be shy. I can send a big package to Croatia and cost is based on weight so I can pack it as full as possible if there just is interest. Also smaller packages to individuals don’t cost that much that you would need to worry about it. The more growers, the better.

In no particular order, just what comes to mind.

Tomatoes: F2/F3/F4 (depending on the mix) mixes of domestic, domestic/pimpinellifolium, domestic/cheesmaiea, 50%domestic/25%pimpinellifolium/25%cheesmaniea, 50%domestic/25%habrochaites/12,5%pimpinellifolium/12,5%cheesmaniea.
No consistent LB tolerance, early.

Peppers, annuum: Domestic F2 (-24) mix and some half/quarter wilds. Also some pure wild/feral seeds of the ones I grew out from what I got from @polarca, but those are also some of the wilds in wild crosses.
Baccatum: F2 mix, 75%baccatum/25% praetermissum taller plants.

Tomatillo: F2 mix (mostly) sweet and green as separate mix

Ground cherries: F2 mix from last year and some of this years selection. I have some seeds to share from “huge” 3 lobed fruit if someone is really interested to see if it can be a source for big fruits. got probably 150-200 seeds and would like that most are grown out to see what comes out of it.

Eggplants: -24 F2 mix, haven’t saved a lot of this years yet and wont until later.

Sweet corn: sweetcorn from graincorn (will update that to my main thread shortly). Selected best producing plants (2-3 ears per plant), but otherwise only made some notes. Generally not much difference; fairly tall, some with tillers, some without, mostly no significant air roots and even those not that significant. Some are from my sweet corns that have been crosspollinated with the other most likely. There was some with high tilling.

Grain corn: -24 mix.

Bush beans: -24 mix
Pole beans: not many, but I separated some that had made their way to bush beans (so there might be some in -24 mix)

Melons: Several mixes, both older and newer. Even if years haven’t been successful it doesn’t need many fruits to produce surplus. Ask more.

Watermelons: Some seeds from this year and last. Possibly some mix from earlier seeds. Better get rid of them sooner than later.

Okra: two mixes from this year, fastest/most productive and rest that made some seeds. Pretty hard selection as only 6-7 plants made any seeds out of thousands sown. Some are from @marcela_v and some are what I have saved from kandahari pendi landrace (which wasn’t a landrace when got to me, but had some variability). From the latter I also have seeds from -24.

Sweet potatoes: I got some seeds, and it even looks like at least some are viable, But there isn’t really to share. I could send some (micro) tubers from those that I grew from seeds that were the first and/or most prolific to flower and likely reason why so many of the other varieties also made seeds. I can also send tubers of the varieties that flower freely or fairly well and made seeds this year. There aren’t really many micro tubers to share, but those look like they aren’t likely to survive long so better share them.

Some possible moschata x pepo or maxima interspecific crosses that happened when I didn’t have any male flowers available that I could see. I did try to look so carefully that it’s hard to see I missed, but possible orcourse. One of the fruits had mostly empty seeds and others just few seeds which could indicate that there was some problem with pollination supporting interspecific cross. I have earmarked some for @ThomasPicard, but if I open the last fruits there could be some to test for more people.

Basil: some seeds from -23, but those are mostly pure varieties with occasional cross to look for.

Carrots -24 mix, pictures of what I got from them to come shortly on survivor plot thread.

Parsnips: -24 mix.

There are also some older seeds from moschata, maxima, summer squash, cucumbers etc. Ask for more.

What I haven’t saved yet, but will have available later probably closer to spring;

Moschata; could say extra early/cold tolerant mix. Some sings of early female flowering trait, but seemed to be affected be weather (drought). Still probably there aren’t probably any moscahtas have gone through harder weather.

Maxima; grow out from last years survivor plot survivors. Not the most vigourous early on, but I’m thinking it might be due to late fruiting and hard conditions where the plants didn’t have time to get the full vigour. That should be sorted out now with these fruits having plenty of time to ripen. the plant were vigourous once they got over the early period.

Summer squash: Mix of some that I got from @marcela_v and @polarca with my own from last years survivors. I tried to hand pollinate them to have max variance.

That should be all and if there is something missing I’ll update it. Didn’t proofread it so excuse me if thereare mistakes :sweat_smile: . Ping @malterod here you go. PM me when you can.

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Wonderful :heart_eyes: I will send you a message about my wishes later, and for now I am just tagging people who are coming to the meeting who are here on the forum.

@stephane_rave @ThomasPicard @Hugo @mare.silba @malterod @Laura @Bore @Sebastien

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Thanks, you can also copy paste that list to emails to the rest if they want to have a look. If serendipity seedpack is coming to some the participants shortly, I could add some extra to be included. At least some of those smaller seeds that aren’t going to compromise it’s weight if I add a lot.

Wow thanks Jessel! Wonderful offer. I’ll PM you with my wishes. Thanks a million!

Anyone wants to try broccolis, caulis or fennels? I have some storebought seeds from few years back (so no guarentee they will sprout) and don’t know I have the enthusiasm to grow them right now. My last attempts at getting seeds from broccolis and fennels didn’t work and caulis aren’t any easier. So I’d like to get rid of those seeds now when I’m cleaning my seed storage and maybe tap into if someone can make diverse mix in few years. And same with spinach too.

Just checked the pricing and it seems it has gotten even cheaper to send bulk. Only size of the package matters if it’s under 10kg (I think I can manage that). Medium size package seems to be the way to go. That was something like 20x30x60cm and cost little over 20€. Smaller was only 1€ cheaper. If anyone else still wants to get seeds it doesn’t change the price. I have gotten messages from those that already have sent them. I’m just gathering the seeds and today put some sweetcorn to test germinate to make sure after this years failure. If all goes well should have package ready to go mid this week. It says it takes max 7 days to Croatia. I’m a little doubtful, but should have plenty enough time to get there by the time meeting is finished.

I grow fennel only for the seeds. I doubt you have that. And Brocolli i don’t bother with anymore. But i’m sure someone will be happy with whatever you have to offer.

Getting seeds was the problem for me. Or at least the year I tried to get seeds they didn’t make any even though they flowered. Might have been too late and didn’t get pollinated. Over here they want to bolt early and if you want to get bulb then you need to keep them happy that they don’t bolt too early, but then they start to bolt late july/august which can be a little late. Maybe it’s still possible, but I don’t want to try again with staple/F1 varieties. I could try with diverse population as I still like to grow them. They are fairly easy besides tendency to bolt (which with some varieties might be too much this far north) and don’t have any pests.

Yes, I have stated to put all sorts of seed packages that I’m not using (and likely still are viable) so that they could be included to serendipity seed pack or you can take what you like.

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Hi, send them if you have… I will have a new plot of land of 10000m2 next year to try out all kinds of crazy things. So if I don’t manage to plant them in 2026, I will for sure in 2027 because brassicas are quite challenging here.

I was able to plant one diverse plot of cabbages, and hopefully they make it until next year to cross-pollinate.

You can put in the box whatever you have extra and you think you will not be able to use it in time, we will divide it and see what would be the best strategy to multiply those seeds and adapt them to new environments.

My address is:
Marcela VELFL
Lemeš 15
48260 KRIŽEVCI
CROATIA
+385918948060

Sent the package today. Took a little longer than expected. Not that I have been working on it all day every day, but still took quite a lot of hours. Not specifically making the package as I was also trying to tide up my seed storage. Moving seeds to smaller packs if they fit or removing empty packs etc. Had to go for smaller package, which still isn’t small, because they didn’t have medium available. Luckily everything fit nicely and could keep to the instructions to “make sure package is packed tightly and use paper etc to fill in gaps”. Well, there wasn’t any gaps to fill :sweat_smile:. 15 litres of pure seeds. Also learned that cheap price is only if package is logged in via internet so had to make it from my phone to save 20€. Also no weight limit if logged via internet. Quite handy system, but easier to do from computer. Package might arrive next week, the week after at latest (hopefully).

I made separate packages to those who requested seeds, but some are also in bigger or smaller packs so go through if there is something interesting or something that you requested isn’t in your package. There aren’t any cucumbers. There was less to share in the first place than I thought, but also while I was packing other seeds cucumber seeds disappeared mysteriously and I haven’t been able to find them. Got bored of looking for them so maybe next year. I did try to make sure that this time I didn’t loose anything by sending with the whole pack accidentally. You can ask if you have any questions. I tried to label them as well as possible. Feel free to take as much as you need from the packages. Those that are my seeds I have usually plenty more.

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Also tested sweet corn to have about 50% fast germination, but I didn’t label it. Might be still good to note that. Generally germination should be fairly good, although better expect that is 50% rather than 100%. I don’t know if the age of some the seeds will lower the germination, but at least some of the melons might have considerable amount of empty shell. So look before using them whether they look like better sow more extra than usual.

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thank you very much Jessel

Marcela showed us photos of your package that arrived in Croatia… and I would just like to add WOW! :open_mouth:
it’s incredible :upside_down_face:
thank you for all that, I think you made a lot of space in your stocks…

tell us what you are especially looking for, let’s get our hands on it during the big exchange that will take place with the croatian public.

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Thank you all for the christmas card. It was a little strange surprise as a have already gotten used to time after postcards.

Hopefully there is little for everybody. I didn’t find cucumber seed, not that I tried to look for them. There is always change that I might have accidentally put them in melon mixes, even if it’s unlikely. Just heads up if you start getting weird looking melons.

I still have seeds if someone is interested. Right now I’m processing summer squashes and have them dry before xmas. I also have only few maximas left that I might process them shortly also. Moschatas have to wait.

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