odd veg

[unsure]

ive been on ebay again . not the best place i know .

ive been looking at seeds and it go me thinking .
there are black sweetcorn , purple toms and even red or blonde carrots omongst other things .

now would it be worth keeping these kind of seeds , seeing as most people think carrots come from cans or are all ways orange in colour , would they think that any other colour could be bad or just tainted so as not to eat them or more importantly steal them from you .

[grenfell]

I've been thinking of growing the purple carrots ( and also white ones too although that's more a re-enactment thing) and have grown tomatoes like Black Russians , dark skins and pretty ugly looking but nice and tasty. I'd say it is worth you getting the seed but not necessarily for the reasons you are thinking as I reckon most people wouldn't know a carrot top from a weed. Perhaps a better policy to protect veggies may be to not plant in rows and don't weed too much. Your plot would then look like an uncared for garden leaving the crops , and edible weeds , hopefully safe.

[moocher]

I ordered from Sutton seeds and bought white strawberries and other oddities linked with James wongs book,I also ordered a ground cherry? It has the fruit in a paper like seed pod,so looks like a ornamental plant.
My back garden is waterlogged so I think I will be delaying my planting this year,plus I still need to sort out flower/veg beds.

[lonewolf]

if your going to save the seed don't buy packets marked F1 or Hybrid, what you need are "heirloom" varieties.

[adrian007]

I like that idea.

The plus point is obvious, some of the scavangers will think twice...not all, but it may make a difference, in which case it's a no loss chance worth taking.

There is a possible downside - some of the heritage varieties lost popularity owing to appearance...that's OK. Some lost popularity amongst suppliers because they weren't productive enough. That is your jeopardy.

The seeds may be dearer, but if you avoid F1 types, as said above, youl'll be able to build up a growing stock of seeds, that sorts out the expense and may alleviate the productivity prblrm as well.

Thought about it a little more and I still like the idea.

And' I'm loving the idea of lying low, hearing some ner'do'wells go in your garden pick something 'go sod that for a lark' and move on...be hard to smother the giggles!

[featherstick]

Real Seeds do very good heirloom and heritage varieties and they give full seed-saving instructions for all they sell. Well worth having a look at their catalogue.

To be honest I can't imagine getting black maize or purple carrots will disguise your crops. They will still look like cultivated crops in a row in a garden and any scavenger will just take a chance. In my experience, there is plenty of nicking that goes on on allotment sites already.

However it is definitely worth looking at non-traditional food crops, like oca, quinoa, sea-kale, dahlias, physalis (your ground cherry), and so on. Not only are they less familiar so less likely to be nicked, they are less likely to fall to disease as they are not widely grown here.

[redskies]

Real Seeds are great, and so are Tamar Organics.


The untidy garden idea is a good one, and would probably work quite well