All posts by Jordan Charbonneau

Events

Ira Wallace: Speaking Events

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We’re excited to announce that Southern Exposure’s Ira Wallace will be giving a couple of talks this fall! For those new to Southern Exposure who don’t know Ira, she’s the guiding spirit behind Southern Exposure Seed Exchange; she’s been providing farmers and gardeners with high-quality, heirloom seed for decades. She supports food sovereignty and everyone’s right to save seed and is the author of an invaluable garden guidebook, The Timber Press Guide to Vegetable Gardening in the Southeast.

Black Farming: Community Land & Food Sovereignty Conference

The first event will be keynote remarks for the Black Farming: Community Land & Food Sovereignty Conference on September 11, 2021, at 3:00 pm. The conference will also feature other fantastic keynote speakers, including Dr. Jessica Gordon Nembhard, Leah Penniman, and Malik Yakini.

This year’s conference will focus on looking at the economic impacts and the power of the cooperative business model, emphasizing the power of growing your own food, from seed saving to community gardening, and celebrating the contributions of our black and underrepresented food and farming community.

The entire conference is a combination of virtual and live events on September 10th and 11th. You can find the full schedule, more information, and register for the conference here.

2021 American Community Gardening Association Conference

Later in the month, Ira will be a keynote speaker for the American Community Gardening Association Conference. She’ll be discussing Seed keeping: An Everyday Act of Resistance on Friday, September 23, 12:30 – 1:30.

She’ll discuss the importance of seed keeping to preserving cultural heritage with examples of historic varieties as well as the wealth of heirloom varieties from the African Diaspora, especially in the US and Caribbean. She’ll also touch on her work with Acorn Community Farm and Southern Exposure Seed Exchange which she says are her “legacy to young farmers looking for ways to do well doing good work.”

“Black and brown people are integral to the story of food and farming in this country. Learn how including them in our gardens through seed saving, storytelling about seeds, the traditions they represent, the taste they evoke, and the people who created great varieties can be an everyday act of resistance.” – Ira Wallace

The whole conference themed Gardening in Challenging Times will take place September 23 – 25, 2021, in Hampton, VA. It will feature more than 30 workshops where you can learn about community gardening with fellow gardeners, organizers, and sponsors from across the US.

You can find more information and register for the conference here.

Be sure to join us at one of these incredible conferences this fall! They’re an excellent way to connect with the gardening community and sharpen your gardening skills!

Garden Advice

Spring Flowers: Fall Sowing

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If you garden at all in the fall, you probably think primarily about leafy greens and root crops. The big focus is garlic, perennial onions, and tough vegetables that can overwinter in hoop houses and cold frames. However, fall is also a great time to start working on next season’s flower garden. 

Fall sown seeds will bloom earlier, helping you create a colorful garden throughout spring and summer. They won’t grow during the winter but will take off in the spring much faster than spring-sown flowers. Fall sowing can also allow you to direct sow more seeds rather than start them indoors in the spring. 

Cool-season annuals, flowers that readily self-sow, perennials, biennials, and native flowers are generally good choices for fall sowing. Some flowers like certain varieties of echinacea and Dara will grow better when fall sown. This is because these seeds require a cold period to germinate well. 

Helen Mt. Johnny Jump-Up

Flowers you can sow this fall include:

Generally, it’s best to sow or transplant these flowers 4 to 6 weeks before your first fall frost. You’ll notice that many flowers are dropping seeds around this time. This gives them time to establish a good root system before winter begins. Sow these flower seeds in beds that receive full sun. Prepare your bed ahead of time by loosening the soil with a garden fork or broad fork, adding a couple of inches of well-aged compost, and raking it smooth. Plant each variety as usual, according to packet instructions. 

Northern gardeners may need to provide their plants with extra protection such as low tunnels or wait until early spring.

You may also want to consider preparing for next summer by gathering materials for staking or trellising flowers that require it, such as sweet peas and hollyhocks. If you’re growing cut flowers, setting up a horizontal netting while the plants are still small and allowing the flowers to grow up through it can help keep them straight and tidy.

Announcements

7 Reasons to Join The Collard Community Seed Selection Project

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In case you haven’t already heard, we’re very excited about a project we’ve been working on, The Collard Community Selection Project. Last year, SESE, The Utopian Seed Project, and seven other trial sites grew a total of 21 heirloom collard varieties that were allowed to cross.

We’re now offering the Utopian Ultracross Collard as part of The Collard Community Selection Project.

The project’s objective is to save seeds from the most cold tolerant and tasty collards while preserving a wide diversity of types and colors. You can also save seeds based on your own selection criteria or not save seeds and simply enjoy the unknown wonders that these seeds contain!

  1. Learn how to save seed.

    When you join the community seed selection project, you’ll receive help and support to become a seed steward. The Utopian Seed Project will provide educational materials and videos to help you on your journey.

  2. You’re helping preserve genetic diversity.

    This variety represents a massive amount of genetic diversity. Twenty-one heirloom collards have been crossed! This project will help create more seed stewards and another open-pollinated variety for folks to grow for years to come.

  3. Come together with other gardeners.

    Sadly, we may not be able to come together in person during these pandemic times. However, we can come together as gardeners, food stewards, and seed savers.

  4. Reclaim rights to open-pollinated seeds.

    When you save and share seeds, you’re helping to support everyone’s right to save and grow seeds and breed plants. Learn more about this over at the Open Source Seed Initiative. 

  5. Adapt seeds to your garden.

    As you continue to save seeds from these collards and any other plants, you will slowly adapt them to your garden. Saving seed from the strongest will create plants that do well in your local climate. You can also select for any other desired traits.

  6. Support The Utopian Seed Project.

    The Utopian Seed Project is a crop trialing non-profit based in western North Carolina. Their vision is to develop a regional seed hub that can support, encourage and celebrate a diverse food system of regionally adapted crops. 50% of all packet sales go straight to supporting their work, and your contribution to helping save seed is priceless!

  7. It will be an adventure!

    As noted above, the project’s goal is to seek cold-tolerant, tasty collards. We are already one year into that selection, but given the broad cross-pollination of this seed mix, we are likely to experience a WIDE range of traits and outcomes (some good, some maybe not so good!). Enjoy the excitement with us.

Resources

If you decide to participate, we’ll be in contact to offer support and further resources will be available. For now, you can check out these links.

Order your seeds now to have time to grow your collard plants for the over-wintering trial and to enjoy fall-winter harvests! Plants sown now through early fall will be ready for seed harvest next year in late spring.