Looking out the window these days, it's hard to imagine that seed starts will be going into trays in just a few short weeks. The recent cold weather has given us lots of time to huddle indoors, flipping through seed catalogues and making plans for the upcoming growing season. In between brainstorming sessions we have managed to get out and enjoy the snow, too. Here we are on our way to a yurt in Gatineau Park with friends - highly recommend! We found the accommodations to be quite luxurious ;) 

 On the business front, our hands and minds have not been idle! We are gearing up for upcoming Seedy Saturday events, which will be taking place in February and March. If you've never attended one of these, might we suggest you come out and enjoy the fun? They are a great opportunity for gardeners and farmers to scope out interesting seed varieties, make seeds swaps, attend workshops and enjoy a lively community event. We will be participating as seed vendors in the following Seedy Saturday Events: 

Click on the links above for more details, including locations of the events. We hope to see you there! In the meantime... we'll be packing seeds, seeds, and more seeds. 

Thanks for reading! 

Bird & Bee

Welcome to the inaugural blog post from Bird & Bee, a farm-based vegetable seed business located at Just Food Farm in the Eastern Greenbelt of Ottawa.  Our Farm team is made up of Jamie Farris Manning, & Jordan Bouchard, you can read more about us here.

This year is our first season under the Bird & Bee banner - we were previously known as Green's Creek Farm.  Over the last two seasons we have developed a modest catalogue of organic vegetable seed products and will be expanding our selection each year.  You are able to access our seeds using our online store, or by visiting us at one of the Seedy Saturday events we attend each spring (more details on that later).

In addition to what's available in the store, we have grown several experimental varieties through different breeding projects. A couple examples include two projects under the Just Food Regional Seed Programs: the Red Pepper Project (a community effort to select an early ripening red bell pepper), and the Ottawa Community Cucumber Project (a community project working to select a powdery mildew resistant cucumber plant). 

We have also grown seed lots for the Bauta Family initiative on Canadian Seed Security, and have grown out seeds for the Canadian Seed Library through Seeds of Diversity.  Over time more and more of our "seed projects," will become available for purchase as we achieve some of our growing targets, and identify new goals for the future.

This blog will be updated periodically with updates from our farm, stories of seed from around the world and our region, and information on the seed/farming/gardening community in our area.

Thanks for visiting!  

Jamie and Jordan
Bird & Bee