packets of seeds and small jars of seeds spread out on a red tablecloth

How to Organize a Seed Swap

A seed swap is a gathering of people, usually gardeners and farmers, who have come together to share seeds. Open seed sharing is one of Seed Savers Exchange’s core values since our founding 50 years ago. Keep reading to learn how to organize a seed swap of your own!

A pile of many squashes with different colors, shapes, and sizes

How Tos

Squash Hand-Pollination

Hand-pollination of squash ensures that the plants produce true-to-type seed and that the flowers are not contaminated by the pollen from another variety when the required isolation distance is impractical. Because the large male and female blossoms are easily distinguished, hand-pollinating squash can be easy for gardeners of all skill levels.

Three pale yellow ears of corn with the husks pealed back

How Tos

Corn Hand-Pollination

In absence of isolation, hand-pollination ensures that the corn plant’s flowers are not contaminated by pollen from another variety. Hand-pollination prevents hybridization and ensures that the plant produces seeds that are true-to-type.

A small plant with four starter leaves in a plastic cell with soil.

How Tos

Thinning Seedlings

What?! I have to toss some of these perfectly healthy seedlings I worked so hard to start? Which do I save and which do I not? That is the reaction of many a new gardener upon first learning that thinning seedlings is a necessary step to ensure healthy growth of plant starts. The reality is that, if left in crowded environs, your seedlings will eventually suffer.

Many trees with no foliage and tree guards around their trunks, in an open space of grass and blue sky

How Tos

How to Prepare Fruit Trees for Winter

It’s essential to properly prepare fruit trees for winter. Tree guards are the best method to protect your trees.

How Tos

How to build a deer fence with fishing line

Anyone who has an orchard or garden knows how frustrating it is to work day in and day out only to find deer have eaten your lettuce, trampled your tomatoes, pulled up turnips and carrots, ripped the leaves off your young apple trees, or eaten the fruits off the trees.

Several glass jars with a variety of different seeds sit in a row on a glass shelf

How Tos

How to Store Seeds

Protect your rare or stock-up sale finds with these three proper storage tips that ensure your seeds are viable when the planting time is right. It doesn’t take much, especially if you are storing seeds for two years or less.

Red radishes growing in a mulched bed with leafy green tops

How Tos

Everything You Need to Know About Radishes

Radishes are wonderfully diverse with many different colors, shapes and sizes! Spring and summer varieties can be pink, red, white, golden, or purple. They can be shaped like bulbs, be more elongated like fingers, or even taper like carrots.

Rows of young plants in black plastic containers with white picket labels on a table

How Tos

How to plant tomato and pepper transplants

Two of the most popular crops to start indoors and transplant out are peppers and tomatoes. These tips will help ensure that you will have healthy, happy plants after you introduce them to the great outdoors.

Young potato plants growing in a row outdoors in trenches dug in the soil

How Tos

How to Grow Potatoes

Here are a few tips from SSE’s gardening crew on how to grow potatoes, when to plant, advice on watering, proper storage conditions and saving seed stock for a healthy and bountiful harvest. A wide variety of potatoes can be found listed on The Exchange.