Please join us from 9:00 a.m. to Noon at the Amy B.H. Greenwell Ethnobotanical Garden in Captain Cook for the 8th Annual Hawai'i Island Seed Exchange.

This year's exchange will be very different from the previous years.  Since we just finished putting on the statewide Seed Symposium last month that created a statewide seed working group of UH Manoa, UH Hilo, and Island Representatives, this year's Seed Exchange will be low key and more of a planning meeting than a festival.

If you have seed you have saved from food crops that do well on your farm or in your garden, and you would like to offer some to the gardening community in exchange for taking home seed from others, please join us and there is no change.   If you are not a seed saver yet, there will be a fee of $10 for the event.  The money will go toward the next Seed Exchange in 2011.  In past few years, many people have come to take seed home, but very few have come with seed to share.  You can also bring cuttings and roots. No potted plants please, as we all are concerned about spreading the Little Fire Ant.

This year, I would like to see all those farmers and gardeners who are really interested in learning to grow, select and save seed and network with community to build our food self-reliance resources on Hawai'i Island. 

We will have a short meeting at the beginning (9:00 a.m.) about the Seed Symposium and talk about forming "seed working groups" around the Island. We will look at furthering our knowledge, networking together, perhaps doing variety trials and field days on each others' farms and gardens to learn from one another.  We will be partnering with UH Manoa and Hilo in more organized variety trials. 

After our meeting is pau, I will give a demonstration on saving and cleaning lettuce seed for anyone who would like to know more about that, and if any of you would like to do a demonstration on another crop let me know. 

We will have plenty time to network and talk story from 10:30-12:00.

Please bring a lunch or plan to purchase the delicious food that will be available from the Lotus Cafe.  Lunch will be from 12-1 p.m.  We can enjoy each others' company.