Seed Selection for a MODERN-DAY VICTORY Garden
When planning your modern-day victory garden, choosing which seeds to purchase should involve more forethought than just stopping by the local box store and picking up your favorite fruit and vegetable seed packets from the seasonal section. Likewise, ordering a container of "survival seeds" is not the best solution. This is because in both of those scenarios, the seeds have not been selected for the specific growing conditions that are unique to your region or the micro-climate aspects of your property.
Back when victory gardens were being grown during WWII, the American system of commerce was far more localized. This meant that when you wanted to obtain seeds for your garden, those seeds were being sourced and sold by a local business, such as a livestock feed store. These local businesses sourced the majority of their products from regional farmers, meaning that the types of seeds being offered from these local growers were proven to be hardy in that general geographic area. So, unless you are obtaining your seeds from a local source with micro-climate conditions that are similar to those on your property, you'll need to take a few key considerations into account.
Should you obtain seeds that did not come from a locally grown source (such as a farmer's market, seed bank or neighbor), you'll want to confirm if the time it takes for the plant to reach maturity (meaning when the fruit or vegetable can be harvested) fits within the limitations of the growing season on your property. This growing season is typically referred to as the average number of frost-free days for your area. This is calculated as the number of consecutive days from the last killing frost in the spring, until the first killing frost in the fall. Unless you have an artificial micro-climate condition (such as in a greenhouse, hoop-house, low tunnel, etc.), the days to maturity (time from transplant to harvest) listed for the plant needs to be shorter than the average frost-free period for your property. Otherwise, it is very likely that your plants will die from a late spring frost shortly after being transplanted outside, or they will be killed by an early fall frost before reaching harvest time.
As an example, one variety of sweet pepper takes an average of 80 days to reach maturity, while a similar variety of sweet pepper requires an average of only 65 days. Those 15 days of variance can mean the difference between harvesting fresh homegrown peppers and waking up one morning shortly before the peppers have ripened to discover all of your plants and their unripe peppers are wilted and dying from a frost that took place the previous night.
Selecting a natural micro-climate or creating an artificial micro-climate that protects your plants and extends your growing season will help you reduce the risk of loss and expand the variety of plants you can grow. So, you'll need to determine if such a micro-climate will be available before you select your seeds.
With garden seed selection it is also important to take a long-term view on this low-cost investment. Purchasing good seeds now will lay the foundation for reducing future seed costs, increasing your food security and increasing the likelihood of being able to reliably produce the same crop year after year.
To select seeds that will grow resilient plants, nutrient dense crops, and facilitate the ability to collect more seeds that will reliably produce similar traits to the parent plants, you should select USDA Organic heirloom seeds. By selecting USDA Organic seeds you'll be avoiding the synthetic fertilizers, fungicides and pesticides that are commonly coated on commercial seeds. These synthesized chemicals can harm the beneficial organisms in your soil and weaken the plants natural resistance to pests and disease. Heirloom seeds will provide a strong consistent genetic lineage that will breed true and be open pollinated. This means that you can collect seeds from these plants that will produce the next generation of plants carrying the same traits as the parent plants. The combination of USDA Organic and heirloom seeds will allow you to grow resilient plants from a reliable lineage year after year from just a few thoughtfully selected initial seeds.
Avoid seeds that are hybrid and/or treated (these include common commercial seeds, genetically modified seeds, or ones that are only labeled as open pollinated). These types of seeds will reduce the quality of your soil, produce less resilient plants, not breed true or not produce viable seeds to be harvested for the growth of future crops.
