First: the catalogue

Sifting through seed lists, online or in-hand is the vital work of January, says Kitty Scully.

Even the most resilient gardener will spend most of January indoors, be that fussing over house plants or simply browsing through new seed catalogues. If you haven’t received any catalogues in the post, go online or pick up the phone and order your preferred seed suppliers 2014 catalogue now. Imagining your garden in July, bursting with bounty and teaming with vegetables, herbs and edible flowers is the perfect antidote to these long January days.

It can pay to write a list of all the vegetables and varieties you would like to grow, making it as long and fanciful as you dare but then paring down to something more pragmatic lest you spend a fortune on seeds that realistically you don’t have the time, or space to grow. It’s certainly too soon to sow most seeds but it’s essential to place orders early to ensure you avail of the best choices before stock levels run out.

If you are new to vegetable growing, and glancing through your first seed catalogue, you may be feeling super-excited, if not a little overwhelmed by the plethora of possibilities that present themselves before you. Yesterday, lettuce was simply lettuce, however, now ‘Butterhead’, ‘Batavia’, ‘Cos’, ‘Crisp Head’, ‘Loose Leaf ’ and ‘Winter’, with their hundreds of sub-varieties, are the norm. From risqué ‘Roxy’ and ‘Drunken Woman’ lettuce to the twee-titled ‘Marvel of Four Seasons’, vegetable names can be just as intriguing as their unique tastes and appearances.

If you ask any seasoned vegetable grower, which varieties they grow, they will be sure to list off their ‘tried and tested’ favourites. Ask another gardener and you’ll probably get a different list. The good news is, that as you mature as a gardener, the more proficient you become at picking out exactly what varieties work best for your soil, space, climate and taste buds. So, if you are new to edible gardening and do not yet have your tried-and-tested favourites, here are a few tips to help you along the way.

LOCATION, LOCATION

My advice is to shop local, as seeds saved and trialled in Ireland, will be most suited to growing in Ireland. Brown Envelope Seeds (www.brownenvelopeseeds.com) in West Cork and the Irish Seed Savers Association (www.irishseedsavers.ie) in Co Clare have lots of great varieties of Irish saved seeds to choose from.

DISEASE RESISTANCE

Home gardeners who have witnessed their precious vegetables succumb to disease or pests know only too well the devastating heartbreak it entails. One helpful preventative measure is to use varieties that contain resistance to certain diseases or pests, without compromising flavour. For example: Potatoes, ‘Sarpo-Axona’ and ‘Sarpo Mira’ are blight resistant; parsnip ‘Javelin’ is resistant to canker; pea ‘Greenshaft is resistant to mildew and carrot ‘Flyaway’ has a higher resistance to carrot root-fly. Some vegetable varieties are slower to bolt, such as beetroot ‘Boltardy’ and lettuce ‘Fatima’.

OPEN POLLINATED SEEDS

Open-pollinated vegetable varieties are those that will grow true from seed. In other words, the seeds saved from these, once sown, will produce replicas of the parent plant. Open pollinated varieties, tend to mature over a longer harvest window and are a must for self-reliant gardeners who wish to save seed. These vegetables have been cultivated for generations for exactly that reason and besides taste, most have other benefits such as productivity, tenderness, winter storage, hardiness and some of the older varieties also possess a natural resistance to pests and/or diseases. By definition, heirloom varieties are open-pollinated, but how old a cultivar has to be to earn an heirloom title is open to discussion.

HYBRID SEEDS

On the other hand, hybrid varieties (often designated F1) will not grow true from seed, as they are the result of a cross between two different varieties of the same plant species, selected for desirable traits. Cross breeding has been a common practice for centuries and is not to be confused with genetic modification. Hybrids tend to possess ‘hybrid vigour’ and have consistent, uniform yields and cropping time. This is very important for the mechanical harvesting of 2,000 heads of lettuce in one day, but certainly less critical for the home grower. Hybrid seeds are more expensive and cannot be used for seed saving.

I tend to use mostly open pollinated varieties and only grow F1’s for particular vegetables, such as Squash ‘Crown Prince (F1)’, which will occupy the ground for a long time and stores exceptionally well. Another F1 I grow are Brussel Sprouts ‘Brigitte’, which also occupy the ground for a long time and consistently bear sprouts that are slow to ‘blow’ and taste great. If you are interested in sourcing F1 seeds in Ireland, check out Klaus Laitenberger’s seed shop on www.greenvegetableseeds.com where you can source the above varieties amongst a host of heirlooms and open pollinated varieties.

One last piece of advice is to ensure you keep a pen, paper and diary to hand to take note of what does well, tastes great and what doesn’t. With these noted, you will soon establish your own ‘tried and tested’ list of greatest garden hits which will make seed ordering less of a daunting chore each year.