Workshops:

 

Yakotsenhtha, Emily Guinane and Dylan Gale will share teachings, thoughts and excitement about Corn, her roots and history, experiences growing corn on Denman and the magic of making your own Masa from home grown corn. This talk will start at 11 am.

Join herbalist and author, Philippa Joly, to learn how to see your garden weeds in a new light. Philippa will be teaching folks to build new relationships with these potentially anoying plants by discussing the herbal healing powers of common garden weeds in our region. This talk will start at 1 pm.

 

Vendors confirmed so far:

 

Good Seed Land - sell mostly indigenous cultivars of beans, corn and squash, as well as some herbs lettuces and grains. They farm in Saanich.

 

Home Grown Bee - a beekeeping supplies and education business located in the Comox Valley . I would be able to offer educational displays and demonstrations on honeybees, along with mason bee products and local honey.

 

Monika Grunberg - with everything mason bees and wild garlic seedlings.
 

Omega Blue Farms

 

Sweet Rock Farm Seeds

 

Lunch and snacks will be provided by Bee Balm 

 

The DIGPA 2024 AGM will take place following Seedy Saturday. Stay after or come down and join us for a quick meeting (at 2 pm). We will be doing the regular AGM business and discussing plans for upcoming projects. If you have ideas about tools that would be good to add to our tool library please let us know ahead of time of come on down and we can discuss it.

 

In case you missed it, here is the Flagstone article about Seedy Saturday:

 

Time to dig out last year’s seeds and dust them off, find the gaps and the extras to share, and get ready for the big seed exchange at the Community Hall on Saturday January 27th from 10 am to 2 pm.

 

There will be locally sourced commercial seed companies, garden – related organizations with information for sharing and a trade table organized by the local seed-saving group.

 

There will also be guest speakers with interesting talks and a lunch/snack counter available for hot drinks and goodies.

 

Last year, there were over 150 Seedy Saturday and Sunday events across the country! However, 35 years ago, in 1989, the idea of conserving heritage varieties of crops was in its infancy in Canada. It was very difficult to find heritage varieties of vegetables, fruits, flowers and grains. Sharon Rempel, a director of Seeds of Diversity at the time, had a vision of building a regional community seed collection and a group of people to conserve the seeds. She wanted to find a way to bring a large number of people together to share seeds and stories.

 

On March 16, 1990, her vision became a reality. Curator Roy Forster from the VanDusen Botanical Gardens hosted Canada’s first Seedy Saturday in Vancouver, BC. Over 500 people attended the event! Along with enthusiastic seed savers and seed exchangers, this inaugural Seedy Saturday’s participants included seed producers, community organizations, and growers associations. Seedy Saturdays and Sundays gradually started spreading eastwards, across the country. By the year 2000 there were 30 events, in several provinces. In 2016, for the first time, there were events held in all ten provinces in the same year.

 

Each event is different, shaped by the community it is in, and the people by whom it is organized, but the one thing they all have in common is the seed swap or exchange, the raison d’etre of each day. It is a place for people to swap and share their seeds and the stories that go with them – of the best ways to cultivate the plants, the ways in which each variety got its name, and how seed savers came upon the seed. Come and be part of Denman’s version, now in its 15th year!