Selfsufficientish.com

Apologies in advance for the abundance of posts at the moment there's so much we want to pick brains about!

Anyway, we were just thinking about seeds. We've saved seeds from shop bought things (our tomatoes have been a huge success ) and then bought some too. Where do you get your seed? What do you not grow from seed?

EBay and wherever I see some I fancy when I'm out shopping, I'm not picky. I've not bought any seedlings or plants this year, the price puts me off.

Although I would have been tempted by cucumber plants at the Farmer's Market today if we hadn't planted some ourselves recently.

I do find ebay fantastic for seeds. After my Forest Gardening cource I was keen to get seeds, out of 40 named species I got 34 on ebay, 4 off of Chiltern Seeds, and two sorts of bamboo you can only get from pots and they wanted £80 a pop, needless to say I got some other seeds from ebay for 99p!

My Annuals I got from Premier Seeds Direct on ebay, and I must say the germination rates were mental, especially when compared to Wilkinsons, Lidl and the poundshop.

seedaholic.com
irishseedsavers.ie
Amazon
Evergreenseeds.com
brownenvelopeseeds.com

Never tried ebay, but I do get some good deals on amazon sometimes.

Local garden centre mostly as my friend works there and I am able to get a bit of discount!

I try to save as much seed as I can and otherwise I pick common things up in £1 shops or local garden centres and try to get Franchi seeds, as they give much bigger quantities for the money, but otherwise for specific varieties you have to hunt around on the internet, but I find Nicky's seeds good, nothing very special just good value, well packaged complete with label to plant with your seeds.

We got a load of seeds from realseeds this year, they only stock non-hybrid, open pollinated varieties and even give you instructions on how to save more seeds from what you grow.

The Garden Organic catalogue. You might pay a bit more but the money goes to a worthy cause and they offer some unusual varieties.

Stormy Hall Seeds - lots of seeds for your money and Biodynamically grown
Real Seeds - interesting varieties and fair amount of seeds
G T Browns good germination and reasonably fair prices
Lidl - very cheap

I find ebay looks cheap , but when you get the seeds there arent many of them

All the best
Sue

Thumbs up for realseeds.co.uk from from me as well. You've got to admire a company that specifically helps you give away and multiply it's produce.

Wulf

I've also ordered my seeds from premier seeds direct (ebay) this year. we ordered the first lot of purple veg to use as part of our wedding favours. there's a lot of choice and generous packet size (you can print the info & pic from the listing, they come in mini zip bags, which is why they are cheap). I don't know enough to comment on their quality though.

Wish I had known about real seeds sooner! Definitely going to buy from them next year

:edit: Bugger it, I bought some to experiment with

http://myworld.ebay.co.uk/willow8spike_ ... X:SELLERID

Fantastic seeds from Ireland, I bought ground cover from them, Lemon Balm, Comfrey, Good Kind Henry, & Miners Lettuce, arrived within 48 hours of ordering, with the most fantastic intructions!

i buy quite a few from Tuckers they are a local firm - but you can order onine too. They have a lot of interesting heritage varieties etc.

We used Realseeds earlier this year too and will definitely use them again.