This just in! Acres U.S.A., one of the leading magazines for sustainable agriculture, has just published a feature article by Native Seeds/SEARCH Excecutive Director Bill McDorman and Development Assistant Stephen Thomas. Titled "Sowing Revolution", the piece explores the burgeoning seed library movement from its roots over 10 years ago in the pioneering Bay Area Seed Interchange Library (BASIL) to the recent explosion of community seed libraries like Richmond Grows, started by Seed School graduate Rebecca Newburn. It's quite the captivating read... dig in!

Click the image to download the PDF.

Want to learn how to start your own seed library? Sign up for our upcoming Seed Library School, taught by Rebecca Newburn at the NS/S Conservation Center in Tucson. The 3-day course begins April 12, 2012. Click here for more details.

NS/S co-directors Bill McDorman and Belle Starr are heading to Santa Barbara this weekend for a seed-saving extravaganza hosted by the Santa Barbara Permaculture Network. Bill will be the keynote speaker on Friday night at the SB Downtown Public library, giving a talk called "Going to Seed". On Saturday, Bill and Belle will lead an all-day Seed School workshop at Fairview Gardens sponsored by Fairview and Santa Barbara Permaculture. Then on Sunday, the 4th-annual Santa Barbara Community Seed Swap will commence!

If you are in the area, come join us for this fabulous weekend of seeds, community, and fun. We're looking forward to seeing all our local California friends!

Friday January 27 -- 7 PM
Going to Seed - Keynote Talk with Bill McDorman
Santa Barbara Downtown Public Library, Faulkner Gallery

Saturday January 28 -- 9 AM - 4 PM
Seed School Workshop
Center for Urban Agriculture at Fairview Gardens

Sunday January 29 -- 11 AM - 3 PM
4th-Annual Santa Barbara Community Seed Swap
Santa Barbara Downtown Public Library, Faulkner Gallery

Click here for more details on these events.

We are proud to introduce our newly-designed 2012 seed packets, which feature color photos and helpful historical, cultural and seed saving information. We are gradually phasing them in and welcome your feedback.

If you’ve seen one seed catalog, you’ve seen them all… right? Well, allow us to break the mold. The new 2012 Seedlisting from Native Seeds/SEARCH is brimming with groundbreaking, eye-popping surprises. It is now available for download and will be hitting mailboxes shortly. Take a look!

A Bounty of Uncommon Beauty

From the vibrant purple-silk Hopi Sweet Corn to a rainbow of delectable tepary beans, the heirloom varieties we offer are the jewels of any garden. Mouths water at the sight of our panoply of native chile peppers, with spices and flavors to suit any palate. And jaded gardeners need look no further for inspiration than our Hopi Short Staple Cotton, Paiute Devil’s Claw, or Teosinte, the ancient progenitor of modern corn. You won’t find seeds like these from “the other guys!”

Extra, Extra — Seed All About It!

Thumbing through the lush, full-color pages of the Native Seeds/SEARCH Seedlisting is like dancing through the fields of our ancestors. Gathered from indigenous tribes and kept alive through our nonprofit conservation organization and seed bank, these rare and coveted seed offerings are available nowhere else.

But wait, there’s more—as if our bonanza of heirloom beauties wasn’t enough! This year’s seedlisting introduces Tucson Seed, a new line of desert-hardy varieties of common garden vegetables. Now you can grow Native Seeds/SEARCH carrots alongside your chiltepines, or sow arugula with your amaranth—all selected for their performance in arid conditions.

Happy growing!

Upcoming sessions of Seed School have been scheduled for 2012!

Seed School
March 4-9, 2012
Summer Saturdays (June 16, 23, 30; July 7, 14)
Oct 28 - Nov 2 (in Phoenix)

Join NS/S Executive Director Bill McDorman and special guests for a 6-day immersion into a new regional and sustainable seed production and distribution system. Bill is a 30 year veteran of the seed industry who has recently joined NS/S as Executive Director. Bill has founded three seed companies and co-founded several nonprofits.

Course Details

Seed Library School
April 12-14, 2012

Rebecca Newburn, Seed School graduate and founder of the pioneering Richmond Grows Seed Lending Library, joins us for an exciting three-day training intensive into starting your own seed library. Everything from location scouting to materials and organization will be covered in this first-of-its-kind learning experience.

Course Details

Unless otherwise stated, all courses will be held at the NS/S Conservation Center - 3584 E. River Road, Tucson, AZ.

The 13th-Annual Flavors of the Desert
Saturday April 28, 2012 - 6-9 PM
Under the stars at Tohono Chul Park - Tucson, AZ

Celebrating our 29-year old seed conservation organization and the amazing, sumptuous bounty of the Sonoran Desert.

In 1981, one hundred folks gathered in Tucson to talk about industrial agriculture and the need to increase crop diversity region by region. Called Seed Banks Serving People, this landmark event featured those who would become the luminaries of the seed world: Cary Fowler, Executive Director of the Global Crop Diversity Trust; Rob Johnston, the founder of Johnny’s Selected Seeds; Forest Shomer, founder of Abundant Life Seeds, Gary Nabhan cofounder of Native Seeds/SEARCH and many others.

Native Seeds/SEARCH will recognize the 30th anniversary of this historic event at Flavors of the Desert on April 28. Flavors celebrates the amazing, sumptuous bounty of the Sonoran Desert and our treasured collection of Southwest indigenous seeds at NS/S.

Continuing our scrumptious series of Native Seeds/SEARCH Salons, we've got some appetizing and enlightening events lined up you won't want to miss!

Cooking with Chile Pastes, with Celia Riddle

February 20th, 2012
5:30-7:30 PM

In this tongue-tingling Salon, Celia Riddle, owner and creator of "Hot Flash" Chile Products, will show you how to use her Roasted Green and Red Chile pastes to spice up your culinary chops. Samples will be on hand to savor, so prepare your taste buds for a Southwestern flavor adventure. Spices used will be of medium heat -- so don't be deterred if you're spice-sensitive!

Holy Mole! with Amy Schwemm

March 19th, 2012
5:30-7:30 PM

Join us for another delectable Salon as we welcome mole artisan extraordinaire Amy Schwemm. Her mouth-watering line of mole powders, Mano y Metate, are best-sellers at the Native Seeds/SEARCH store. Amy will show you creative and inspiring ways to incorporate mole sauces into your favorite recipes. With flavors including Mole Dulce, Mole Verde, and Mole Pipian Rojo, there's something to suit every palate.

Native Seeds/SEARCH Salons happen every third Monday of the month at our Retail Store at 3061 N. Campbell Road, and have a little something for anyone who has ever wielded a fork or pitchfork. Bring your juiciest ideas and appetite for mind-watering conversations.

Experience a piece of Tucson's history at the 31st-annual Fort Lowell Day Celebration. Historic sites are open to explore throughout the Old Fort Lowell Neighborhood along a self-guided tour. Enjoy a vintage baseball game, festive live music, delicious food, and activities for young and old. Native Seeds/SEARCH will be in attendance with a booth, so stop by and say hello!

Saturday, February 11, 2012
10 a.m. - 4 p.m

Click here for full details.

The NS/S Seed Library opened its drawers to the public on January 15th, to much excitement. Located inside the Native Seeds/SEARCH Retail Store, this community seed reserve is the first of its kind in Arizona. Come sign up for free and check out what all the buzz is about!

Seed libraries function similarly to book-lending libraries. People “check out” seeds, grow them in gardens, and keep a few plants in the ground to go to seed. The saved seed is then “returned” to the library, ideally in more abundance than what was borrowed. As this process continues year after year, the seeds in the library become more productive and hardy by building up adaptations to local growing conditions. The concept is taking off across the country with more than 30 seed libraries currently underway.

Everybody's talking about this exciting innovation in community resilience and local biodiversity. Our own Deputy Director Belle Starr and NS/S board member Martha "Muffin" Burgess recently made an appearance on the KVOA morning news discussing the new seed library. Watch the video here.

The Native Seeds/SEARCH Seed Library is located inside the NS/S Retail Store at 3061 North Campbell Avenue in Tucson. Docents are on hand to help answer questions and assist with using the library. Membership is free, and all are welcome to join, grow, and save their seeds. Come check it out!

When our ancestral gardeners needed seed, there were no glossy catalogs to leaf through. They acquired their replanting stock through the time-honored practice of seed saving, a tradition that stretches back some 10,000 years. We encourage a return to this lost art as a vital step toward reconnecting humans with seeds—the source of all sustenance.

To assist gardeners in making seed purchases that allow for seed saving, we’ve developed Seed Watch. This wallet-sized booklet demystifies often-confusing terminology and serves as a seed buyer’s guide to making choices that support genetically diverse, small-scale bioregional agriculture. Thanks to a generous grant from the Southwestern Foundation in Tucson, we’ve printed 30,000 copies of Seed Watch to freely share with other soil-loving seedheads from nonprofits, educational groups and community organizations. Contact Belle Starr for details and requests: belle@nativeseeds.org