 Okay, really what are heirloom vegetables? We might wonder, so what's an heirloom variety? It's basically an open pollinated variety that has some considerable ancestry and history of use. Much like these tomatoes here, everybody knows tomatoes, and those are different looking ones that we see in the grocery store, but they're the heirloom tomatoes, and probably the most of the vegetables varieties are tomatoes, so heirloom tomatoes. So what is an heirloom variety? Basically, age is open to discussion and the time period varies depending upon who you are. So some say introduced before 1951, some say that they have to be 100, 150 years old. Sometimes it's very difficult to trace the origins as many of these, and I'll talk about that a little bit, but basically I think and feel that they should be no less than 50 years old. Well, 50 years old puts it, let's do the arithmetic, that would be 1970. That's not 1951, and I'm gonna go with, I like 1951. Why? 1951, whether it's vegetables or grains or other things, are considered heirloom or heritage varieties, and much of that is because they are varieties that were developed before modern agriculture, so to speak, and when I say modern agriculture, I mean before the use of synthetic inputs and petrochemicals and fertilizers. So many of these vegetables that were before 1951, vets and crop varieties, I know we're sticking with vegetables here, but they're all similar. So before 1951 is important because that's before we bred these varieties with the use of synthetic inputs, so they became dependent upon them to do their goals, such as disease, they don't have it anyway. And so that's what's important, and also you guys will find out in the talk, it has a lot to do with breeding for yield, and as we bred for yield, we also bred out nutrients, unintended consequences. So basically two heirlooms, since we think about this with many things, heirlooms are things that are handed down, so the same thing happens with vegetables. So some definitions state they have to have a family history, brought to this country by our forefathers, grown for three or four generations, passed down from father to grand, grandfather to the next generation and such, and historians that are important too because they recreate famous gardens as closely as possible, much like the gardens at Monticello by Thomas Jefferson, one of our first presidents. And again, open pollinated, what does it mean? Well, they are not hybrids, everybody knows what hybrids are, and so they're seeds from OP plants or open pollinated that will grow plants that exhibit the desirable, vital characteristics that we like. In other words, they will reproduce themselves identically, provided there's no outcrossing. And an example would be growing two sweet corns beside each other, because corns are such outcrossers, they will cross and then create new varieties. So in order to hold on to open pollinated heirloom varieties, they must be grown without pollination, and that's why provided proper care has been taken to prevent outcrossing will keep them true. But many farmers or farmer breeders, gardeners, can breed their own varieties by letting them cross or doing crossing themselves. So again, a definition, a variety, what is a variety? What we all know what that is, that's a type of a vegetable species or crop species that has certain characteristics, purple corn, red corn, purple carrots, in the taste, the shape, the color, the length, the seasons, they're adapted to certain climatic areas on where they're developed and we're gonna have a good story on that at the end of the talk. Remember, adapted to certain climates and soils and they're resistant or sometimes not to certain pests and diseases. A variety can be open pollinated or hybrid. Heirlooms of tomorrow, I think that's a very interesting story or thought, but basically these are newer open pollinated varieties that don't yet have a history or record of use and a connection to a group of people. However, today's new open pollinated varieties will become tomorrow's heirloom varieties. And I used to be on the board of Organic Seed Alliance, a company that really works hard at developing varieties and works with farmers through a process called participatory plant breeding to develop their own varieties. And I think they may have been one of the first groups that coined that phrase. And it was actually with Spinach and a farmer by the name of Woody from the Pacific Northwest, he has a longstanding love for longstanding Bloomsdale and continues to breed and develop. Not cross it, but improve it because since these varieties have some variability, you can select them and get them to have better characteristics and more adapted to your climate or growing conditions. This still becomes the same variety because you selected from within them because remember there are variability. So heirlooms of tomorrow, interesting concept. One must wonder today, if you're doing that themselves, will a variety that you're developing in your garden become heirloom of variety tomorrow? Who knows? But the sky is the limit. But why are these important? Well, number one, I've said that already, they conserve genetic diversity. Why? Because we've seen a dramatic decline in crop diversity in varieties. If you don't realize that, it's with crop species, grains, corns, but it's also with vegetables. And a lot of times they start from 1980, the figures. And so a lot of the people that have cataloged this from 1980 to the present, we've lost a diverse amount, tremendous amount of vegetable varieties, something like over 50%. Sometimes I read up to 80% of the varieties that we were growing in the 80s are already lost. And so if your favorite seed company quits carrying that, look hard or go to genetic gene banks and stuff, you'll find it. Join some of the genetic groups like Seed, Saver, Exchange, and others. You can find these. So dramatic loss of varieties. They're important too because they are source of pest resistance, whether it's disease and insects. And I'm gonna use a quick example from my crop background. Spring wheat is an important crop to North Dakota and always been, less now with corn and soybeans. But if you don't realize that the worst disease that's ever plagued spring wheat in North Dakota and around the world, it is not Fusarium and Head Blader scab, it is stem rust. And up until the 30s and 40s, stem rust was really a bad disease and it would wipe out fields. What happened was, plant scientists, and I believe it was from South Dakota or NDSU, but anyway, plant scientists found a source of resistance to stem rust. And you know where they found it? In Emmer, one of my favorite crops. Emmer is the hulled wheat, that's an ancient wheat that has a history in North Dakota. We'll talk about that a little bit later. But they found resistance because Emmer has a lot of natural disease resistance. And Emmer is a triticum, meaning in the same genus as wheat. And they were able to take the gene out of Emmer and put it in wheat and henceforth, we can raise wheat without stem rust and pesticides. So again, they're important because they stood the test of time. If they hung around that long, they're resilient or elastic. I like those terms because that's what we need in agriculture. We need things that will last instead of having to purchase more and synthetic inputs to hold them up. And so they are important because of the resiliency of their source of genes. And again, they're a piece of history. If your grandparents or someone like that have some seeds tucked away that they grew, I strongly urge you to dig them out, hoping they germinate and perpetuate them along. Then you'll be saving history and your own family's history. So look to your grandparents if they're alive, ask them if they have anything that they grow. I know a friend of mine who first started gardening while in seed saving and selling vegetables. She had a lady give her some vegetable seeds that she said was stored for a long time. The interesting story was she actually stored them in her nylon. And why? Because the mice wouldn't eat them and stuff like that and they preserved them. And Annie said, ah, if this lady started them in her nylons, they gotta be important. I'm gonna save them. Anyway, a quick story here, and I'm sorry this cut part of this off, but basically a book. And I show this for you to read if you want. But basically the book, Edible Memory, explores the nostalgia of food and why people seek a new culinary experience and a connection to the past. So it has a social aspect to it. And that's very important. And read the book by Jennifer Jordan, Edible Memory, it's very good. And another book is Gardening with heirloom seeds by Lynn Coulter. What she says is the heirloom seeds aren't just about gardening. Throughout the centuries they've been linked with medicine, love, romance, exploration, discovery and poisons. So they have a power of history, science, cooking, literature, fairytales, genetics and wildlife. They are wrapped up in farming, travel, state fairs, archeology, philosophy and so much more. So when you begin to plant heirloom seeds, remember where they've been. Keep them going, please. So why do people choose heirloom seeds? Well, the number one reason is exceptional taste. Many gardeners cite for this. They taste very well, but they don't have a fit in commercial production like we did. So we've lost taste and tomatoes are a prime example. Everyone says that commercial tomatoes don't taste good and it's because they've been bred to harvest with machines and ripen on the truck. Nothing like your garden vegetables. Excuse me, heirloom vegetables are likely being more nutritious than newer varieties. I told you that before. Through plant breeding, we have bred for yield and other characteristics like tomatoes for machine harvestability. But in doing that again, unintended consequences and we've lost nutrient density. Many gardeners prefer heirloom vegetables because they're open pollinated. And again, why? Because they can save their own seed and replant from year to year. heirloom vegetables are less uniform than hybrids which means they don't all ripen at once. And that's great. If you have a patio where you're growing one tomato plant, you know, if you have a modern variety they'll all ripen at once. This way if you have an heirloom variety that's not uniform, you will be able to harvest over time compared to again the commercial tomatoes that must ripen all at once so that they can harvest them with machine. In the catalogs and seed racks, heirloom or open pollinated vegetables are almost always less expensive than hybrids, particular hybrids. Now that doesn't always mean that they're less expensive but usually they are, especially for hybrids. And also there are times when some very, very rare vegetables are offered. They will demand a premium price. And I know that for myself because I've done that with some vegetables that are very rare that I fruit and they demand a price. And given so it's supply and demand. And also again, the stories. Many heirloom vegetables have wonderful stories and I think that's so important to have vegetables in our seeds carry a story. It's a part of our past, it's social. I'm going on and on about it but I think you get the point. So how do they get distributed? Basically through groups of seed savers, individual seed savers, seed exchanges where you get together and people exchange seeds, seed societies like the Kerns of Society or seed savers exchange individuals, neighbors to neighbor, trade in seeds and then of course seed catalogs. So one thing I want to talk about is a slow food international arc of taste. And if you've never heard of that, that's something that started in Italy and what it was just as it said, the group that did it, and I can't remember the fellow's name, no important if you would look it up if you want. But basically it was tired of the fast food industry and processed foods and everybody eating so unhealthy. He demanded to start this group called slow food international and then they enter varieties specific or certain vegetable types or seed types in this and they carry, they also must carry a history, again that history, that story. And there are seeds that are from around the world and they get entered in there and they can be fruits, vegetables, breads, cheeses, animal breeds, cheeses, breads, sweets, meat, curd meats. I want to tell you also about my favorite crop, emmer. Emmer which has a cultural history to North Dakota because the early immigrant farmers, particularly the German Russians from the Black Sea area, brought that seed with them. They were growing it for over 120 years ago when they first came here. Now emmer is getting a resurgent and I do research on that, a favorite crop of mine. And myself, a farmer from North Dakota, seedsman and a grain miller from Arizona that has ties to North Dakota, we took it upon ourselves to get emmer into the slow food international arc of taste. And so you can find a crop that was grown in North Dakota that has a cultural history in there. And I thought that was so cool to have something from our great state of North Dakota. I know I like North Dakota and I'm sure you do too. Sorry, Minnesotans, but it's North Dakota. We have a 10,000 lakes too, but they're just not lakes. They're called pottles. Anyway, what are the top 10 seed companies that sell heirloom seeds? Well, there are many of them and I just throw it probably the most popular 10. And we'll talk about a couple in a little more detail, but seed savers exchanged without a doubt. Probably started at all and it's one of the biggest ones. Baker Creek is too. Seed Savers Exchange is in Dakar, Iowa. Baker Creek is in Missouri. Clear Creek Seeds in Oklahoma, Southern Exposure Seed Exchange, very good seed company. I've worked with them a little bit, been to different seed education sessions with their leader. Fedco Seeds in Maine, one of the companies I do sell to. And Fedco is really unique too because that's actually owned, they're co-op seed packers, meaning they're a cooperative. And we all well know, North Dakota is known as the land of cooperatives, something that take great pride in them being in the state. And I think cooperatives are so cool because it's the people doing, you know, taking control of their company themselves. You know, Renee's Seeds in California, Peace Valley in California, Johnny's Selected Seed in Maine. Just down the road, I've been to both of them at the same time did a tour of them. They're only a couple miles from each other. Now, Johnny's is a little bit different. It's company owned, very big seed house and seed catalog, but they do sell many types of seeds and many hybrids. Most that all the first companies I said sell no hybrid seeds. Matter of fact, none of them, I don't believe any of the seeds companies on here other than Johnny's sell hybrids. Not that hybrids are bad, it's just your choice. But if we're talking heirloom, they're not hybrids. Territorial Seed Company in Oregon and Seeds of Change in California. And going without due, and I'm not promoting any of these companies, I was asked to educate you on them. And so I have to do it. But one cannot go without talking about Prairie Road Organic Seed near Fullerton, North Dakota. This is North Dakota Seed. And I call them the pros. And they're the seed company. Meet your farmers, Dan and Teresa Podol. They grow all their seeds themselves. This year was their first seed catalog. They've been selling for a while. It's a startup company. Mainly because Dan's brother, David, who is the elder and is the manager of the farm. David is a self-taught plant breeder. And everybody knows, and I'm sure most of the people on here have planted Uncle David's Dakota desert squash that he developed. And he developed many other things from Dakota tears to many, at least 10 different vegetables they sell. But they sell their own developed seed and grow their own seed and do all the work themselves. Two people, Dan and Teresa, hard workers, excuse me. And also they also take older heirloom varieties and put them to the acid test and develop them to have stronger resistance. Remember I said selecting? Like they have a disease garden for their tomatoes that they deliberately has disease. It's their testing grounds. So they'll plant varieties that were lost because there was disease and no seed companies wanted to grow them anymore. And then they'll select the plants that live. This is like natural selection or evolution in a hurry. And then they release these varieties. So they have about 100 varieties this year and there'll be many more. But I just wanted to promote them because locally adapted seed is most important and there's no other seed company within our proximity. So again, not promoting, but promoting the thoughts and concepts. So I have to talk about their seeds. Congratulations, Dan and Teresa. You do a great job and I'm proud to call you my friends. Okay, Seed Savers Exchange. I'll just talk a little bit about that. Basically it's a nonprofit that aims to conserve and promote America's culturally diverse but endangered garden and food crop heritage for future generations by collecting, growing and sharing heirloom seeds and plants. It was founded in 1975 by Diane Ott-Wheely and Kent-Wheely. Basically what started the company was Grandpa Ott's Morning Glory Flower and German Pink Tomato. They had the idea because they carried on that tradition of planting Diane's grandfather planted these and that's what started the company. And incidentally, I did notice in the catalog that actually Prairie Road Organic Seed has, I think Grandpa Ott's Morning Glory and I'm not sure if they have German Pink Tomato. Anyway, Seed Savers Exchange has over 20,000 varieties and 13,000 members. Heritage Farm in Iowa, 890 acres and they have annual events like tours and seed swaps and other things. I wanna go there someday so bad and I hope I can. The other seed company that we need to talk about is Baker Creek Heirloom Seeds, a very big company. Jared Gettle started this company. He had a passion for growing things, go figure, huh? His first garden was at age three. His first seed catalog of 1998, he currently distributes or they currently distribute over one million catalogs annually. That is huge. Large selection of seeds from the 19th century, many Asian and European varieties and they again hold festivals and stuff annually. And also, again, not to get off subject, but I don't know if many of you are aware but in the last month or so, particularly with COVID-19, seed sales for these companies are going through the rough unprecedented in the amount of seed sales. Basically, Baker Creek three or four weeks ago, their sales were up so much that they shut down orders over the weekend to do an inventory of what they had because they couldn't even keep up and to know what they want, they didn't oversell it. So if you haven't bought your garden seeds, I would strongly suggest buying them quick while they're still around. I'm not trying to cause panic, I'm trying to ensure that you will get seeds because they are very, very busy and high-mowing seeds right now actually quit selling to gardeners because the demand is up so much and they're selling only to market gardeners, CSAs and small-scale farmers that will then sell and get vegetables to people, ensuring that you have food to eat this year. I want to talk about just two vegetables a little bit just to kind of give you some background, but corn, everybody loves sweet corn, easiest thing to sell, everybody wants. In golden bantam corn, it's the first most flavorful corn grown, first true, fresh eating corn. It was introduced by Burpee in 1902, first known as the choice early corn. It was recognized by a seedsman, E.L. Koi, who was visiting from Washington County, New York, he immediately recognized just how good this new corn was. He said some seed to Burpee who grew it in trials and guess what, the rest was history. So brandywine tomato, again, something everybody knows. I picked out corn and tomatoes to explain in detail to you because those are probably the two vegetables that people like the most. Again, everybody loves tomatoes, they say garden tomatoes taste so good and we explained the reason why. Where did it come from, the origin? Unknown. Brandywine tomato has been around for more than 100 years. It may have been an old Amish introduction. It may have been introduced in 1889 by Johnson & Stokes, a Philadelphia seed company, or from Burpee's in 1886. So even something as famous as this with seed companies that have a history, we still are losing some of that knowledge on where it come from. It's first known as Turner's hybrid. The brandywine plant is a potato leaf type tomato. It produces generous amounts of big two-fisted tomatoes with ooh, memorable, excellent flavor. It's described as brilliant deep red and like I said, everybody loves tomatoes in sweet corn. But it goes beyond vegetables. Look at this, Seed Savers Exchange sells, they sell an apple tree that originated in Europe when it was first recorded in 1598. If I do my math a long time ago and the other one is 1911. So we can even see things like apple trees have a history. And by the way, if you're gonna do something like this, it wouldn't be bad to plant, because guess what, that I think it'll outlive you. They've been around for a while. So with that, I'm just gonna run through quickly and for your record, you can look at these, but you can just see the diverse amount and colorful vegetables. And again, most of these slides here are courtesy of Seed Savers Exchange and available through them. So look at all the wonderful, beautiful colors and shapes and sizes of lettuce. Everybody loves lettuce. It's the first thing we get out of our garden. Ooh, I can't wait, it's not far away. Look at the eggplant, the potatoes. Everybody loves potatoes. In Yukon Gold, everybody knows Yukon Gold by name. And it's even sold by name. My friend Jim Garrison from Upstate Maine who has a seed company there, he says that Yukon Gold is the first potato variety that the consumer, and I really don't like to use the word consumer, so I use eaters, that the eater has recognized by a variety name and is sold by a variety name. So I think that's pretty good. And Yukon Gold isn't that old. It was developed in the 50s in Canada and that recognized until years later when local foods and farmer markets and CSAs started happening. So Yukon Gold is the best. I love my Yukon Golds. Corn, look at the wonderful corns, the colors, the shapes. Painted Mountains are famous. That's actually been bred by a farmer in Montana and Painted Mountain is sold all over. It's a flower corn, it's not a sweet corn. Some of these flower corns can be used, if picked right and early, can be used as a sweet corn in such diversity, but our corns are so important to our heritage, particularly since it was the Native American, the indigenous people of North America and South America that actually were the people that held these seeds and kept them so we had them. So corn is such an important crop to us. Beans are the same thing. They're again Native to North America and the indigenous people, the Native Americans, were the ones that were the shareholders, particularly Hedatsa Shield bean. That's a beautiful bean and guess where it came from? From the Missouri River bottoms near Bismarck, much where Tom lives. And again, it was the Mandan Hedatsa, the rickera. They're responsible, they were the farmers and the farmers were the women. It was not the men, the women were the farmers. It wasn't until European started settling this country and men started farming and messed it all up. So the women were the first farmers here and they were the best. Cherokee trails of tears is excellent. Excellent bean has an excellent story. It's actually when the Cherokee were moving from a reservation, moving to a reservation a number of years ago, that it was very hard for them to be, because their culture and their social aspect was torn from them. And the bean then carried their tradition and their story of tears as they traveled on feet for a distance to their relocation place. So these seeds are important for us and they have a history and to some people very culturally important. And so that's why I say these vegetables are important. Find one of your own. Find your grandparents seeds and grow them. It's important. Look at all the peas. Everybody loves fresh peas out of the garden. So many different types and even fava beans. But and yeah, peas are just cool. Watermelon, ooh, we can't wait. That luscious watermelon that we get to harvest late summer. Watermelon, musk melon, they're all cool. Many different types. And of course, cucumbers and squash, carrots. And of course too, I mentioned cultural places like Thomas Jefferson, a seed saver. Thomas Jefferson was one of the first seed savers. He was very diverse on alternative crops and tried to get everything. One of the things he tried and he couldn't do it, he wanted an olive tree to be able to grow on his Monticello farm. But they've kept this farm and they sell seeds to help support it. So it's important when you buy heirloom seeds you're also sharing and supporting part of our history. Our own president. And one cannot talk about heirloom seeds without talking about Oscar Will. And for those of you who don't know Oscar Will, he was really a cool man. Right in Bismarck, North Dakota, Oscar Will's pioneer seed house of the North. And he attributes much of his success on selling corns and improving them to the Native Americans where he got the seed from. That is why you see on his seed catalogs, pictures depicting Native Americans and other things. And even this one here on the left from 1937, a pioneer there. And he's also responsible for more than vegetables, nursery and other things. So he created many of the plants when we first settled this great state. And it's so important. So Oscar Will, attribute to him. He's known as, he's actually listed in the North Dakota Agricultural Hall of Fame. The oldest member or the longest a goal, for lack of better way to say it. So if you ever get to the Valley City Winter Show, that's where the North Dakota Hall of Fame is and Oscar Will will be inducted into that or has been. So what about this? The last thing we'll close with is from Diane Othwealy, the co-founder of the Seed Savers Exchange. As she says, we can only preserve heirloom seeds through active stewardship. If we don't use them, if we don't allow them to grow again, they become lost. And please don't let them be lost, be a part of that, help us all out. And really, what is all this about? It's about nutritious food that tastes good. And I'm sorry if I talked too long, but it's probably time for questions. Thank you very much for listening to me and taking this time this evening. Thank you, Steve. And does anybody have any questions for Steve? Don't be shy. Steve, what's your favorite tomato variety? You know, I'm gonna go with Cheyenne Bread by NDSU. I really like that variety because it does well. It's a little bit low acid and stuff. And so selling at the farmer's market, a lot of people like that. And it's a nice size. And again, developed, I can't quite remember, I think in the 60s or 70s by, I believe it was Neil Holland, the former tomato breeder. And after that, then I'm gonna go with my again, another one of my favorites, cannonball, bread by NDSU. And it's as it says, they're huge big ones. That makes it good for canning. So I like both of those. So I'm gonna go with Cheyenne and cannonball. Do you know, where can we get the Cheyenne seeds or plants? Well, actually, that's a good question, Tom. You can get seeds from Prairie Rover, organic seed. Again, not promoting them, because I know I'm not supposed to do that, but yeah. So they've reintroduced them. I think they're one of the first seed companies that offered seed. But I also have noticed when you buy transplants, it's bakers and fargo will have them as transplants. And also, it's because of, and I have to get a tribute to them. The major reason why you can purchase these and why they became available, and he's not with us anymore, but a former technician research specialist in the horticulture department, now the plant science department, Bryce Farnsworth. Bryce Farnsworth spent 45 years of his career or more working in the potato breeding project under various breeders finishing with Dr. Suzy Thompson. Excuse me, who is our potato breeder? Well, Bryce became a seed saver, and he kept a lot of these older seeds and then reintroduced them. And he was actually the person responsible first for bakers to get them to grow them as transplants. So, if it wasn't for Bryce, you may have to go to places like Grin, that's our government gene bank, that anybody can get seeds from once of one variety. And they house all these varieties, so they're never lost. But if it wasn't for Bryce, I'm almost positive that they would not be available to gardeners through transplants or even prairie rower against seed selling them as seed. So, what was that, Grin? What is it? It's Degeneric Resource Information Network. It is our government gene bank. They house, there's nine of them across the country, and each one has specific plants, vegetables, grain varieties and stuff, specifically that they can grow in that area. And so what they do, they constantly grow them out, catalog them, and then you as a scientist, as a gardener, as a farmer, it's really a good website and very informative and you can sit and shop and pick out varieties that will mature in your area because they give you characteristics like days to maturity and other things, and then descriptions. And so just about everything that's housed there, I've done quite a bit of work myself and with other groups where that's where we've gotten some of the varieties to reproduce and then grow. But again, they're smart. You only get about 50 seeds or depending upon what crop species you're getting, but generally about 50 seeds and each person can only get them once. So someone doesn't, you know, if they grow them and don't take good care and then wanna get them again or tries to get a bunch and sell. So that's why we can only receive them once. Let's try to get some quick questions here. There's a general question about how you go about saving seeds. Maybe can you just have a couple of tips for success with saving tomatoes? And maybe Steve, do you have like a reference book that you would highly recommend for someone who wants to get into this? Oh, sure, sure. There's many different places that do it. And again, one of the premier places that has a lot of publications free online and works with farmers. And that tells you many things on how to save each type in detail. Organic seed alliance. Kudos to them for what they've done. They're in the Pacific Northwest in Washington. And in an area that's one of the premier vegetable growing seed areas in the world, you know. So they have a lot of good publications. There's many different places that have done that now. You could get a lot of information from Seed Savers Exchange. But I know the one that has a lot of good free online publications that you can print out specific to every vegetable variety. Tells you things like minimum number of plants you should start with to maintain the population. The distance you need between crops that are outcrossers. It's important to understand if you're going to save seed, whether you're dealing with selfers, meaning plants that self themselves, and you can plant them beside others without crossing, or outcrossers that are, like it says, tall and can travel distances and make crosses. Two private examples are corn and squash. Squash is up two miles. So if you think you've got a farm that you're going to save squash seed from, and your neighbor one mile away has some squash, guess what? They can cross, I'm going to move that far. So pollen is very vicarious, so to speak. Pardon me? I think there's some special tricks for all those crops, right? Some are much easier than others, like tomatoes, like squash. Squashes could have two right beside each other. If you learn how to pollinate your plant yourself with the pollen from the plant, because they have male and female, and then bag that female after you've, so there's tricks and too much to talk about, but you can learn that. So that's what you need to do. Tomatoes, they're not outcrossers. And so, tomatoes is kind of a long drawn out process on how you do it and extract the seed and ferment it, and then float it off in water and keep the good ones. But basically, if you really want to do it, you can easily find on the internet how to do it. And there's probably many YouTube videos, which were all visual learners. And so, YouTube is a great tool for learning how to do things. I know a person I used to work with, a corn breeder called, named it Frank Kutka, who was an extension staff at India, he's a plant breeder that works, not at a university, but kind of has his own seed company, and a very good man and plant breeder. He's put out many YouTube videos that he just shot with his smartphone or whatever. And the hits he had on them, I remember his squash video that one summer had something like 12,000 hits. And so, YouTube is a great way to learn. So, I think I said enough on that without wanting to detail. It'll be easy to learn. It's just, what you have to do is want to do it and have a passion for it. And so, everybody can become a plant breeder. David Podall did. That's right. There's a lot of comments here about people who know where they get Cheyenne plants. The West Fargo Farmers Market in West Fargo, Cashman Nursery in Bismarck. I know the Lowes Garden Company, based in Minot cells, a lot of the old NDSU heirloom varieties. And do you have any determined tomato varieties that are special to you, Steve? No, I don't really. You're right. I'm determined and indeterminate in many plant species. But no, I'd have to say no, Tom. I don't grow any of those. You know, we're opposites on that. That's about all I grow because they're so easy. And because you don't have to really trellis them or prune them that much. So I'll recommend Stupist. That's one of my, that's a Czech heirloom Stupist. And you know, Roma's a determinate heirloom and that's very commonly available. Here's lots of the Siberian ultra-earlies. That's, there's lots of determinate ones out there. And just go through those seed catalogs that you listed there. Those are great sources, I agree. How about here's somebody who's just gonna test you, Steve, here, there's a purple pole bean from Gurney that they can't find anymore. What would you, how would you go about trying to, would you contact Gurney's and find out? That's a good, good question. I'm not particularly familiar with what they're talking about, but this seems to happen quite often. And what, it's someplace. Some gardener, someplace is saving it because they liked it and they knew the seed company was dropped it, so they saved their seeds. Despite whether they saved their own seeds or not, that's what turns some people first into seed savers is because their favorite variety was dropped. So someplace it'll be grown. And I can almost guarantee you if they know the variety name, they can find it on Grin and get it that way. So thank you for our government. Is there a fee for that service? No, they're free. Free, there you go. So you gotta contact Gurney's and find out the actual variety. In the variety name, yep. Or if they get on Grin and search pole beans, they may be able to find it if they take the time and go through the whole list. Okay, here's somebody has a question that they've had their garden seeds package from a year or longer and stored in a room temperature, dry location. Do you think those seeds would still be viable? Oh, yes. Now, I can't speak for what it is, because I don't know. But conditions make a difference and the type of vegetable and even the variety. But typically, again, some of the places like organic seed alliance and others list the typical time under good storage conditions that vegetable seeds will last. Now, if you notice your seed packets, that's why all the companies put on their packaged four. Now, that doesn't mean they'll last longer, but what they're doing that for is to ensure that you're using good quality seed because the most important thing to use in your garden or farm is your seed. And by using poor quality, low vigorous seed, you're doomed for failure. And that's one of my theories why a lot of people started quit gardening was because they were using inferior seed and got frustrated and didn't know it. Now, another thing I wanna tell you because I've learned this firsthand. And again, not all vegetable varieties are all heirloom varieties, but in particular, some of the seeds I work with, Native Americans beans and the corns, some of them under good storing conditions and that's important. Some of them last for 20 years and still germinate. Now, because the seed germinates when it's old, doesn't mean it's gonna have vigor. So think about that. We all understand what vigor is, meaning how well the plant grows. And I've witnessed this firsthand and you always do it through research or observation. When you have two things planted beside each other and one is vigorous and the other one isn't, you go like, whoa, now I see how important vigorous seed is. And I've seen that with the same variety. I've done studies where I've planted seeds over five years old and seeds that were one and you can just see the difference in performance and measure it and yield. So take care of your seeds, good storage conditions. Generally, medium humidity and temperatures. And I forget now, excuse me, you can find this, but there's a number that they use that they add the humidity and the temperature. And I think it's something like a hundred or something like that is an ideal one. Meaning, and my numbers aren't right, so don't quote me. But like say, if it's 50% humidity and 50 degrees, that's a hundred and that's what they like to see as a general rule of thumb for storage of our seeds. Low light, medium humidity, lower temperatures. Heat destroys seeds, so please don't leave seeds in your car when you buy them. Thank you, Steve. Thank you. Thank you for listening and having me.