Ep 020 - Eden Seeds, Home Grown Remedies and Seed Saving Tips with Ambre Whatley

In this episode Averill & Bernadette chat with Ambre Whatley of Eden Seeds.  Ambre speaks to us about her passion for plants and seeds, her knowledge of medicinal herbs and shares some of her 'go to' herbal remedies. 

Links for further information:

Eden Seeds & Select Organic - Buy heirloom vegetable, herb, flower and tree seeds online.

Seed Savers | Eden Seeds A list of seeds that are looking for reliable growers!

How One of the World’s Oldest Science Experiments Comes Up From the Dirt - The New York Times (nytimes.com) The Beal see viability experiment.

YEP tea: A Traditional Ways to Ward off Colds and Flu’s. – Empowered Health

Transcript

Before we start today, Seedy Chats would like to acknowledge the traditional custodians of the Ngunnawal and Ngamburi country, recognising their continued connection to this land. Traditional custodians of all our lands, from the water running through our creeks, the air we breathe in the mountains and the stars that shine brightly in the sky, we pay our respects to Elders past, present and emerging. Oh, hello and welcome. Welcome to Seedy Chats. Hello and welcome back. Welcome to Seedy Chats, the podcast where imperfect gardeners, Avril, that's me, and Bernadette. Hi, that's me. Chat about our favourite topics, gardening and life. So whether you're new to gardening, a seasoned pro or somewhere in between, join us on our journey to be mindful in gardening and life in general. How are you, Bernadette? Avril, I'm... Clawing back into life after being sick as a dog. How about you? We all have been sick. It is the season. It is the season, but I just, I just couldn't, I had like a chest infection that then went straight into gastro. That's when I, because I was in beautiful Perth and then when I came back, I was like, it's definitely COVID, but it wasn't COVID seemingly. And then straight into gastro and it went through our whole house. Never been so sick. And then I had a two week break. And then I was back in with a sinus infection. So my lint system. The trifecta. Bang, but we were kind of sick at the same time. Yours kind of came on a little bit earlier than mine, but yeah, we are clawing through a little bit of health. We need to. And that's the thing with kids, isn't it? Because you don't actually. It's a sore. You don't actually get to be sick, do you? Because when you're really sick, you still need to look after them. And they don't care. It's very cruel. My husband gets to be sick. Yeah. And I'm like. I'm sick and I have to look after the whole family. But actually, when he was sick with gastro, oh, I don't know whether I should be talking about this, but he was pretty bad. But anyway, I in my head, I thought to myself, OK, it's survival of the fittest. So he started the gastro started in our house, say, like Craig came in to me and went, I don't feel too well. And bang, it was around 11 o'clock. That's that dropping off. He went and I was like, oh, actually, the more I was listening to him. I was like, I actually don't feel too well myself. I'm actually not too sure if it's because I'm listening to the sound effects of this. To this demonic display of Castro. Apocalypse happening in the bathroom. It sounds like you're exercising a demon when you've got Castro, doesn't it? You're like, ah! Far out. And I was like, so, I actually went in, I went, excuse me, can you be, you're gonna wake the kids. Pfft. Can you just keep it down? Down a decimal, please. Anyway, I thought it was coming a bit rude. Can you die quietly? Because if these kids don't sleep, I'm probably... Then all of a sudden, I felt unwell and it started at about maybe one o'clock for me. And then the trifecta was three o'clock in the morning when Ava came running out of her bedroom to spew into her toilet and I was like, dear God. So when that happened... I'm next. When that happened, I was like, well, we've only got Callan to go, but I think he gave it to us all. He gave it to us. So he was over it. And then I went... Right, I've got two tablets in the kitchen on Dancetron, which are like, Zafran I think is the brand name. They give you- Anti-nausea. Not anti-nausea. So I literally went out secretly, I took one and I saved one for the kids because I get half each. Well in all fairness, Avril, you're the anchor that's gotta keep this ship steady. So I didn't tell Craig any of this, so I kind of got over my nausea sickness. You're actually not, babe. I'm actually feeling great. And he was... I've actually just done a five cat run. Hello, Seedy Charms. We're introducing our special guest today, Amber Watley. Amber has an arts background, working as an artist in residence and an educator at the Tambourine Mountain Community. She's a mother of three almost grown humans that are excellent test subjects for all of her wild and wondrous recipes and medicaments. Amber has a bachelor of health science in naturopathic medicine. has spent over two decades exploring natural medicines by way of bringing healing foods and plants into her family's everyday lives. These days, Amber's taken on the role of stewarding the family business, Eden Seeds. Eden Seeds are committed to distributing traditional heirloom seeds of open pollinated varieties, and they're rooted in a strong ethos of sourcing from local organic and biodynamic growers wherever possible. They're strictly non-hybrid, free from genetic modification and never exposed to any chemical treatments. So right up our alley at all. It is so much to explore in this conversation. I don't know what, I know these terms, but I actually don't know exactly what they mean. Neither do I. And I do a lot of seed saving, but it'll be really interesting to learn a bit more of the theory behind that and what we might need to consider if we wanna save our own seeds. And as well, her... Her whole background in natural medicine. I know. I need to pick her brains because we've been very sick lately. I know, we're dying. We are dying. I need to ask her for some natural remedies. Our whole families are dying. Okay, so just for clarity, I'm Bernadette and I'm Avril. It's lovely to meet you. Nice to meet you both. And welcome to Seedy Chats. Thank you for speaking with us. Thank you. Thank you for having me on. Can you talk us through just an introduction about yourself, how you got to where you are today, the whole journey? Yeah, it's a big long story that I think I started to kind of go into over email with you, but then I realised it was rambling and it would go on forever. So I'll try to keep it somewhat concise. But I think the journey has started from, you know, the beginning, the beginning of our lives. It's one of those weird things that eventuated and then once you're there, you see the... stops along the way that makes sense now when you're looking back but didn't really mean anything along the way. Passion for plants, nature, God, that's just something that's been ingrained in me from birth, from conception and probably beyond before that as well. The ancestors and their gardens and all that, they were always very proud, my grandparents on both sides. But the Eden seeds thing came about... over a lifetime because my mum had originally met the owner about 25, 27 years ago-ish when she was helping to set up a Steiner School and he was looking in the area to possibly move the business Eden Seeds from the Sunshine Coast down to the Gold Coast hinterland and she had put a call out in a newspaper for donators to donate to the building of a new Steiner School. To get it off the ground. Yeah, that's right, from scratch, from the beginning. My younger sister was in the play group that kind of became the first class. I was a teenager myself by this point. So she originally met the owner back then and he ended up buying land on the same mountain that I was born and raised, which is now our home. So fast forward many, many years. And Mum had said something about one day, we had always wanted to do something, a business together. And I think about 20 years ago, we almost opened a florist together because I had done my straight out of high school kind of diploma in floral design and plants were always just part of the picture. So we were gonna do something together always. There was always this talk in the background, every couple of years we'd bring up, oh yeah, we could do that, or we could start that, we could launch this. Few years ago, she had said, Eden Seeds will probably be for sale one day soon, he'll retire. And, you know, and I said, well, make sure you, you know, keep a rest of that, because we want it. And, and then that kind of within the background for a couple of years. And then the time came where Alf, the original owner and the person that created this beautiful business was ready to move on and said, okay, well. but that's us, put our hands up. And he had tried to sell it a few times in the past, but it was often to big conglomerates or big national places that mostly just wanted either, the mailing list or something like that. Yes, thinking that it's something that it didn't align with his ethos maybe as well, that he really wanted to keep his stamp on it. That's right, yeah. And it was just a business move for those. places and they wanted to kind of pack it up and take parts of it away to one of the big cities and eventually we came along and I had a visit to the place I'd never been here before last year and so we had a few visits to the place and you know immediately just like yes I could just see it I could just see it all. I mean were they growing so you're walking through they're growing all the seeds you're seeing like did you just fall in love with it? I fell in love with the land it's about just under seven acres and did absolutely fall in love with the land. Again. this is the kind of the mountain that I, this is my hometown. Yeah. Had been gone for a long time, 25 years or something. But that's an interesting point because these days, at the moment anyways, we'll be changing that, but at the moment Eden Seeds doesn't produce any of the seeds that they sell. The seeds are, some of them in the past did come from here, but I think it was probably just too much to run a business and produce. Yeah. It's just this one guy, it was just him. Yeah. He was the only one living here, working the land, etc. And so it hasn't been producing anything for many years. And so it's kind of a blank slate for us. And we've only been on the property for, well, less than six months. So we will be producing not nearly everything. We've got over a thousand seed varieties. There's no way that one place could produce them. Even if you had a really big land, it's still just not possible because, as you guys probably know, a lot of things cross. So you can't actually, it would take. years to build up any sort of a supply of all these different seeds. You can only have a few things going at once and a lot of the stuff we sell. I mean, everything would probably be... Southeast Queensland is such a happy growing place. You can grow almost year round, almost everything. The climate is beautiful, yes. The climate's great. Yeah. good amount of rain on the mountains. We have that good rich soil. So, you know, we can grow here. Yeah, that's so fertile. Yeah, we will. We've already put in a lot of gardens, but the plan is we're gonna have a lot. We're gonna have tons of gardens. So we'll grow a few things. Beautiful. Yeah. There's nothing here at the moment that is being produced for Eden. We have lots of seed suppliers all over the place. So, yeah. And for those that might not be familiar with Eden seeds, what kind of things can they get from you? So, foundation of Eden seeds is it is the heritage varieties that are falling by the wayside that are becoming hard to find if not impossible non-GMO untreated open pollinated seed. So what does that really mean? Let's break that down because everyone was saying we hear these words we're dealing with it all the time but we don't really fully understand. And I was like they're good that's what you want but I don't know why. What are they? Yeah. So non-GMO is self-explanatory. That's plants that have not had their DNA altered by introducing traits that don't occur. Open pollinated means that it is pollinated by nature. Oh. So it's not. Yeah, so it's not me with my pumpkins playing Barry White with a paintbrush going bouchiquant. I mean I do this too. And in some, you know, in some, like if you're growing in a greenhouse you're not going to have pollinators in there. Generally, I mean you might but generally you won't. It's kind of a sealed environment. You're going to have to, you know, do this. But yeah, it is pollinated by nature. It's not done, you know, in a lab or done, you know, by man. You know, it is it is seeds that can be open pollinated as well, because some seeds do rely on, you know, man or machine to do that, especially if they're in the wrong part of the world or you know. And what about heritage? Heritage, this is a contentious one, because it depends on where you look and who you ask. But generally heritage. slash heirloom refers to seeds that are older than about 50 years. But that's where, you know, that's where you're going to get a different answer from everyone. I tend to buy a lot of heirloom in certain stores. And they would be seedlings, heirloom seedlings. And I always think it's good. That's where I want to be. But I never know why. My husband always says, why are you just buying? There's another one over there. It's not heirloom. Sorry. Can't have that. So it's good to know. Well it's nice isn't it, just kind of, you know, connecting with our ancestors in that way with these traditional varieties that our grandmothers, grandmothers would have grown in their backyards. And a lot of these traditional ones are falling out of favour. And there's some old fashioned vegetables in there, you know, your salsifies and your turnips and your, you know, different cabbages that are just the old fashioned style that aren't the trendy. I like that though as well because part of what I like about gardening is growing things that you don't get at the supermarket that you haven't seen before or that they're different. So I guess that's part of the appeal with the heirloom varieties as well is that you can find these sort of hidden gems that you're like, you know, maybe it's not perfect to be kept at the grocery store for a long time on the shelf, but it's so cool and interesting to grow. That's right. Yeah. Yeah, that's right. Exactly. That's right. There's so many of them that we are finding very, very hard to get now. And, you know, so we're always looking for growers. We're always looking for seed savers to grow out these varieties so that we have, you know, a source and so we can keep them. We have a seed bank as well. So we keep small amounts of all of our varieties and especially the really hard to find ones, the heirloom ones. in our seed banks so that if we do find a grower, which we did, we connected with one last week that's a local grower and he's gonna grow out a type of radish that we can't get anywhere anymore. And any of those imported radishes now are being treated. So our seeds are all untreated, which means no coating on them, no chemical treatments, no fungicide, nothing. It's a pure seed the way it came from the plant. It's been cleaned and that's about where it ends. you know, it's really nice to find these people who are gonna, you know, dedicate a crop to that particular variety and then we'll buy the seeds back from them. You know, that's the dream is to get more and more people in our seed grower kind of bank. And an important role being the gatekeeper for some of these seeds. I mean, I, Avril and I have often said before, if there was a fire at my place, I'd grab my seed collection. I can't imagine. what you're dealing with there. And it must be a whole different world for you to get your head around how to store them and look after them and everything like that. That's probably a good question. I did wanna ask you that, is how do our listeners save their beautiful seeds, properly? Store them. Store them, yeah. Yeah, well, we recommend for most home growers, the crisper of their fridge is the best place for them. You don't want to completely take away their humidity. Yes, humidity. is a bad thing, but only to a certain degree. So a cool and somewhat humid place is okay, not completely dry, because that's the life force of the seed. If you dry it out completely, you're actually sucking out the life force that will create the plant. We have four really big cool rooms, walk-in cool rooms, where we keep all our seeds. It's not... quite as cold as a fridge in there, but the crisper seems to be a good spot before I was here. And actually I do have an old fridge that still has the full crisper full of my own personal seed collection. And things, you know, like there's just seeds. I've got packets of seeds. There's packets of seeds like everywhere. Yeah, that's gonna be it. There's seeds in your pocket. You know, there's seeds just everywhere. I don't know if you've ever heard, there's an experiment that was done in the US and I think it's called the Beale experiment. But if it's not. We'll just refer to it as the seed experiment. And I don't know if you've ever heard of it, but it was a professor over in the US. And about 160 years ago, he buried all these glass vials of seeds. And he was testing if they would germinate after certain periods of time and how long they might last. And I think they were opening, you know, digging up. There were only certain people at the university knew and every 20 or 10 years or something. you know, someone would go in the darkness of night, and they would dig and uncover one of these vials, and they would do a germination test and see what came up. And I think it's the 160th year or something like that of the experiment, he's passed, the guy that started it, and it's passed on to other professors. No way, I've never heard of this. And they've started extending it now, I think they were opening them like every five or 10 years, but they keep germinating, so I think the next one, I think the last one opened a few years ago, and maybe another one's due in... another 10 or 20 years, but every time they've grown those seeds since they've germinated. In fact, my dad was telling me they've found seeds in remains of ancient tombs and ages that have still germinated all these thousands of years later. Don't you think that's remarkable? It is remarkable. Yeah, I have read those as well. Amazing, isn't it? Yeah. We have some very old seeds in our seed bank and we germ test. We're germ testing something all the time. There's a little kind of like an incubator fridge that has certain, you can set the humidity levels and the temperature and we germinate in there. And it's amazing what some, what things will grow after decades. And that's just decades, but yeah, these thousands of years just. And it's a really good point that you make for our people, for people listening at home. If your seeds aren't in the perfect conditions, it doesn't mean... that they won't grow. It just means that your germination rate, if you plant 10 seeds and they're in perfect conditions, hopefully you'll get about eight or nine. If you've got them, if they get a bit hot or a bit old, next year you might get about six or seven come up and so on. So don't ever throw out an old packet of seeds, just see what happens. Absolutely, I'm always doing that with seeds. Like I never, Bernadette seed collection is pretty much perfect. They're like beautiful little containers and like mine, mine are all in a basket that I rummage through and I never tied to them. And Bernadette's always. I'm horrified at the thought of that, but I'm always trying mine out and something always grows as you say. The germination may not be spot on, but something always grows. Yeah. And even still, don't ever throw them out, just sprinkle them in the yard. And if they don't grow, something will eat them. Yeah, that's right. Giving them back to the land. That's right. Everyone sort of looks at this time of year, winter is a quiet time of year, but there's still plenty of things that people can grow. Are there some seeds that people could be planting and sowing right now to be growing at home? Yeah, of course, always. There's always something you can grow or get started for the incoming season, which right now we're really in fully fledged prepare for spring mode, which is strange. Gives me anxiety. Middle of winter, but. It's just right around the corner. And especially for you guys are in a cooler climate than us, but you know, our gardens will get pumping really soon. So I am thinking this weekend, I'm gonna get a bunch of seeds started, you know, for the upcoming spring season. But yes, we do have a what to sow now chart on our website that kind of breaks it down for regions, being that it's different everywhere. But you know, still a lot of Australia can, you know, beyond the snowy regions where it's, you know, under a blanket of ice right now. But for most places, there's some things that you can grow, you know, and there's things that...silverbeet, for example, you know, like you can almost grow that every month of the year. Spiddich, lettuces, yes. Lettuces, you know, your greens, you're not going to go wrong with those, they'll grow. You know, for us here, we can grow tomatoes right through winter. You know, you're not going to get as many, but I know a few people. And actually, we've got some wild ones outside that are still popping some off. No problem. But I know a few people locally as well that have got still some tomatoes coming. Isn't that fantastic? Yeah. Yeah, just depends on where you are, really. Yeah. I've got a packet of turnip seeds here from you. White Globe, I didn't actually get them in, but I'm hoping I might get them in. They probably won't grow very big, but a lot of tone-ups. Oh, I think it's still good. Yeah, I still think I got those in Anticus Botanicus. Isn't the packaging awesome? Beautiful artwork. Yeah. Isn't it? That's the Select Organic line. So that's a brand under the Eden umbrella that is certified organic. So I like to think that all of our seed is... really almost just as good as organic because it is untreated, you know, non-GM open pollinated seeds. However, some of our suppliers aren't going to bother going to or don't want to have the expense of going to the certification process. Yes, we've talked to a few people previously who have said the same thing that it's they meet the criteria, but it hasn't been worthwhile for them to officially get the certification. Yeah, it's, you know, even for us to have to for us to be certified and have that like it's a... When I first started, it was one of my very first tasks in stepping into this role was getting ready for an organic audit with the ACO, which is the Australian certified organic brand or organization. And it's intense. It's a really, it's an expensive and it's a lengthy process to go through an audit. It was great learning. I'm kind of glad that I did that right off the bat because it was just this opened up my eyes to so much of... is taken into account with certification. But yeah, a lot of the smaller producers just yeah out of their reach. So that's our organic line and so the colour packets are all the organic seeds which it is, it's beautiful artwork. And it's good to know because it is, it's good to know that the process is a little bit arduous because it means people can have assurance that when they see you know, that ACO certified organic stamp that you've got on there that they are, you know, 100% getting what they're paying for. Yeah, that's right. Yeah, yeah. You know, it doesn't mean to discount the other seeds, though I always go back to, look, if you want to have an organic garden, you don't have to start with certified organic seeds, starting with the untreated, you know, clean, pure seeds that are just not certified. You can still grow a beautiful organic garden that at the end of the day, And this is a question that I posed to the ACO. If you can only get something in a regular seed, can that grower still have an organic product at the end? And the answer is if it's not available in an organic seed, yes, if you've used organic methods for the growing, then you can call that organic. Obviously, they'd still need to go through their own certification processes. But yes, at the end of the day, you can plant. a non-organic seed and grow an organic product if all of your other methods are, you know, following the organic standards. And along this process, have you fallen in love with seeds? Yeah, I mean, seeds were always, seeds were always a love. I've got this huge collection of my own. My background is, well, in plants, always in plants, there was always something about plants. So tell our listeners, yeah, I think you're going to go there, but tell our listeners about your background because you've got a lot of natural medicine background, don't you? Yes, yes. So I did my degree in Bachelor of Health Science, Naturopathy and Herbal Medicine and I always said during my years of uni that I was not really drawn to clinical practice. I wanted to work with the plants and I wanted to bring the people back to the plants. or bring the plants to the people. But I wanted that as, you know, that was the work I wanted to do. And this fulfills that kind of perfectly, doesn't it? And I love that the seed is the beginning. It's the, it all starts with the seed. So it's got this beautiful kind of philosophical kind of, you know, feel to it where I got what I wanted in being able to work with the plants. and bringing them to the people, getting people growing their own medicine. So, another one of my tasks since starting is building our repertoire of the medicinal seeds, which we had a few of, but there's so many more. And so I'm just like, ordering. I've just dipped my toe in this medicinal world and I've sort of ordered a bunch of things, but what would you grow every season from for a medicinal application specifically? What are those sort of top? What are the best seeds for you to have at home? Definitely lemon balm, melissa officinalis, nettle, stinging nettle, vertica. Yeah, oh, those, I mean, there's so many. What are you using those for? How are you using those? Mostly in teas. I do make, you know, further things with the plants as well. Tinctures, which is, you know, you're nodding your head so you know. Yeah. We have had a herbalist on and Bernadette, we learned a little bit didn't we from Cheryl and she would make tinkerts and she educated us just a little bit and yeah it took it to another level for us. I basically learned don't muck around unless you know what you're doing. You know they're powerful medicine, they really are and people don't give them that credit I think enough that you know yes they actually do something, they can have effects in your body. And a lot of our medication that that they use for even heart issues. They all stemmed from those. Oh, that's right, yes. Yeah, what was it, digitalis and, you know, the. Yeah, silenced oranges and. From, yeah. And you were saying to me also that there's some medicinals that you've worked into your everyday life with your children and family. What are you using at home? So it's funny because they kind of just have go-tos, but I know my daughter's go-to is a chamomile tincture that I always make homemade. And it's been around, like I've been making that for years and years and years, even, I think even before. my studies because I had done before I went to uni, I had done a few just workshops, weekend workshops in herbalism and stuff. And that's where I was like, okay, I want to I want to dig deeper. I want to get into the nitty gritty of this and learn more of the science and you know, but yeah, the chamomile tincture is if she's got anything, headaches, stomachache, you know, nerves, not sleeping, you know where it is on the kitchen bench, go and get some chamomile and she does and right away, like she tells me right, her headaches gone, it's gone, like it's just gone. which is beautiful, I love that. There's, you know, in homeopathy, they say there's constitutional remedies, remedies that work specific to your specific constitution, and that will be your remedy in life. And whatever your ailment is, you can take that remedy, and that will be your remedy, your go-to, you know? And I have found a similar thing with herbs and stuff, and some people just have a go-to. I love Mother Wart, which is Leonorous Cardiaca, which is, you know, that cardiac is heart thing. So it's this real heart affinity. And if I'm ever feeling nervous or heightened in some sort of, you know, anything, anxiety or stress or, you know, adrenaline, I just take a drop of all of Mother Wart and I- Sounds like I could use a picture of that. We all could. You guys have got kiddos, don't you? We do, yes. All mothers need mother ward. Yeah, right. So what does it look like when, I've never heard of it. I've never, no, I have. It sounds ugly. Yeah, what does it visually look like? Tell us what it looks like. It's a pretty, it is a pretty kind of, it's not an ugly plant, but it's a bit scrappy. It does kind of grow every which way. It's got a kind of lovely, you know, serrated leaf and the flowers grow, it's in the Lamiaeci family, so it's got a square stem and the flowers grow kind of right off the stem and they're a little bit like, movey, a little bit pinky, whitey, would depend on your actual plant, but they're that pinky, whitey, purpley flower, small and kind of along the stem. That's the same family as sage and things like that. Is it aromatic? It is a little bit, yes, it is a little bit aromatic. I don't think there's any herbal, I mean, essential oil made from it. I don't think it's got volatile oils in that way. It's not a showy plant, but it's powerful, it's beautiful. Wow. And are you harvesting the leaves or are you harvesting the flowers? Yeah, all the aerial parts. So anything above the ground is usable in your herbal medicine and you can have that in tea, you can tincture it, you know. lots of different things. And stems, you can use the stems as well? Yeah, you can. Yeah, right. I mean, you're going to have less. Adds to cart. I'll have to get some after this. It's very interesting, yeah. Yeah, they... Do you make a tinkertje, sorry? Do you make a tinkertje from it? Absolutely. Yeah, right. That's what I like to take the most, yeah. Because then it's just a drop of oil, it's easy. It's, you know, put it in some warm water or, you know, a bit of whatever you want, juice or something. But, you know, yeah. that and it's just immediate like I will feel my heart rate slow down a little bit. I will feel this kind of veil of calm grinding like a yes. That's right. Just come over me and yeah. So yeah over the years, there's been you know different specific plants that I've felt have resonated with different you know family members and for different things and I have a few base ones in stock all of the time such as. Well, the chamomile and the motherwort and yeah, I mean, those are the chamomile is an all purpose. Like that is a plant that should not be overlooking because most places can grow that. It's not terribly difficult to grow. It's a beautiful little thing in your garden. It is a beautiful flower. I've grown it. Yeah. And I just cleared my garden bed and I'm just worried now about it. because it was growing underneath one of my artichokes, which was protecting it. And I'm wondering, I kind of cleared my artichokes back and I'm thinking, I wonder, is it frost tolerant? Yes, it is, because I'm growing it at the moment. Oh, okay, so I don't have to worry about it. And it's looking okay, is it? Oh yes, actually, I only planted it right at the end of summer here in our region. That's when it said to do so. and it's set because I remember I did the herbal tea bed. Yes. So I did the spear mint and the chamomile and the butterfly tea. The butterfly peas that was not frosted or they're dead. Yeah right. But the spear mint and the chamomile are doing very well and it's so true what you say. It ticks so many boxes and it's actually just an attractive looking little thing to have even from an aesthetic. Yeah just to have it in your garden. And it's got this practical application too. Yeah yeah that's right. Yeah. So that one's here, that one you just can't, can't go past that one. Actually what I have put in already that I also won't go ever go without is Yarrow. I love Yarrow. I hear about Yarrow all the time. That's got, what's Yarrow used for? So it is, it has an affinity to blood. So it is a styptic, which means it will stop bleeding. So if you have a cut or a wound, you can. pack it with either fresh yarrow leaves and flowers, or what I carry in my hiking pack when we go, my husband and I go backwards is a little package of dried ground yarrow. And so if we have an injury out on the trail, you can just sprinkle some of that dried and it will stop the bleeding. And I have used it and it works a charm. So yarrow, it was called wound wart back in. you know, and it was used on the fields. Wait, what is all these warts? What's all this wart coming from? Yeah, wart. Wart is an old word for herb. Oh, okay. There you go, Brenna. Yeah. Sorry, so, yeah, so your knee sprinkled. Yeah, okay, fantastic. Yeah, and it's gorgeous. And it's botanical name is Achillea, like Achilles and the wounded warrior, you know? And it was used back in, you know, Roman times and such for. know people are warriors on the battlefield. Wow. And it grows wild in so many places all over the world and I every time I see it in the wild I'm like oh yeah it's one of those things that just gets me you know. Yeah well we all by the same event with children as well and bleeding and cuts and abrasions. Absolutely. It's something we all should really grow. It's a fantastic one for children because it's also a key component in a very old-fashioned tea called the Yep tea. Have But that's yarrow, elderflower and peppermint. And that is your fever to when your kids are fevering. And it's not going to bring down the fever per se, it's going to support the body's fevering process. So yarrow and elderflower both actually are diaphoretics which they support that fevering and the body's ability to regulate its temperature through the hypothalamus. And so... Yeah, it's a great one to make and give them as hot as they can stand when they're fevering to keep that fever doing what it should be doing and that's, you know, eliminating, fighting, that's it, fighting the pathogens and eliminating it. So it's giving it some support and yeah, so Yarrow, Elderflower, Peppermint Tea. And so would you just grow all three of those, dry them and then have them with, you know, hot water over the top? Yeah. I feel like, yep, I feel like, yep, that's gonna be one of those amazing things that a lot of people are gonna listen to and it might change. Yeah, well I grow elderflower, because I love a bit of elderflower cordial. Well I've got the peppermint, we just need the yarrow. We just need the yarrow. I'm just thinking why have I never grown a yarrow. And the easy yarrow is easy to grow. Is it? And it's got a little spread and... Excuse me, I wonder if it is frost tolerant. That's the one thing straight away we're growing here at the moment. Let me tell you, I was just in Queenstown, New Zealand last week and I was seeing yarrow everywhere and there was frosts. Yeah right, okay. Some of them were covered, some beautiful, I made my husband take photos of me posing with the yarrow because it was the tallest yarrow I've ever seen. It came up to my torso. No way. The yarrow that I grow in my garden is, you know, 30 centimetres, which is about standard, probably 30-40 centimetres tall. But this yarrow was like... It was on steroids over there. Beautiful, wild yarrow. And yeah, there was frost and snow and ice everywhere. And it was, some of it was dried, but some of it was still growing. You know, it's probably, you know, it's been growing there for years and years. It's acclimatized. So we just keep trying it. It'll just eventually grow here. We'll just keep on at it. Can you talk to our audience a little bit about when they're saving those seeds? There's a process, right, where they're picking the most ideal candidates for seed saving. It's not just the same as me grabbing a tomato that's fallen on the ground and making seeds out of it, isn't there? There's a bit of a process to how these seeds are selected to give people a best chance of having a good quality product. Yeah, that's right. Well, you know, and there are some regulations around that germination. And there's no final answer, but we're not gonna sell anything that's under 70, 75%. And most of our stuff is in the 90s percent when we test it. So, there are different things with different seeds on, if it's floating, it's an empty seed, but it's not gonna be across the board for every seed variety. Some seeds you can kind of test in different ways. But we look for really clean seed with no, you know, no contamination of you know bugs or critters in there And and there is a process with even you know cleaning them Tomatoes are a good example because they you know, they have so much pulp on them. You kind of have to kind of them almost like Mucilator ferment off a little bit You say to get them really dry and have that kind of soft fluffy furry little tomato seed That's actually on the inside of all that So they are washed and dried and we know in, different people use different machines. We have some bigger growers who will use a big kind of seed sorting machine to get rid of the husk and all that stuff. And then some people just have these little trays where they will. and then blow off, you know, shake it and blow off the... That's what we do at the time. I'm doing movements and then realising actually, we're not visual so I've got to explain what my... That's right, yeah, yeah. But you know, there's different processes for each of them but we check them all when they come in. We do ask our growers to do a germ test but we also do germ testing when we get it. So... Oh, okay. Yeah, so there's a multi-step, you know, kind of checkpoints there. You do your germ test, see what you get and it's usually... strike 20 seeds and go from there. Like that's how many you need to do, just 20 seeds. And then you see how many sprout from that. And that's where you get your percentage. And so then we'll do the same thing when they arrive. And something that always gets me is days to maturity. So this is always, this is on seed packets that talk to you. So for example, the turnip that Avril's brought in, it's got 45 to 65 days to maturity. But I've found often I can put beetroot and things like that in the ground. and they're really a lot slower. Does that mean that maybe I don't have them in ideal conditions, they're not getting enough sunlight? What's that days to maturity indicating? Yeah, that's in ideal conditions. That's what it takes to get from planting to harvesting. Okay. So yeah, you've answered it. If there is one that's taking a lot longer, then it's just missing something. And I'm thinking it would all come back to as well, soil health. So how you're feeding that plant, obviously the amount of light that they're meant to get, watering as well. That's great. So it all, it's kind of... You're speaking to those seeds, you know. Have a little song, you know, singing to them. But yeah, the sun, moon and stars kind of getting it all aligned, isn't it? That's right. Which, you know, hitting this, honestly, you know, and different seeds, you know, it's the same, it's, you know, the pH and all that. You can have the one garden bed and one thing's, you know, going gangbusters and the other thing's just struggling along. And it may be it specifically just doesn't like that, you know, pH level of the soil. And some things aren't quite so picky. Get your soil testing kit out, Avril. Yes, it's all trial and error. We know that, don't we? We definitely know that. I personally garden by a bit of a survival of the fittest mentality. That's me. That's it. If you're not, yep. That's it. If it grows well in my garden, then it's meant to be there. And if it doesn't, then well, I might try again in a different part of the yard or whatever. But generally, that's kind of the way I roll. Yes. Yeah, exactly. We tend to do that a lot as well. Brenda, Brenda's a little bit more particular. She kind of gets her soil testing out. It doesn't necessarily end up with better results. I'm like, check it in and yeah, if it's a survivor, it'll survive. And if I have to spend too much time around it, I'm like, move on to the next one. But yeah, it's good for people to know that it is just trial and error. And all your seeds at Eden Seeds, are they predominantly, do you source locally from around you or is it all over Australia? Where are those coming from? It's actually all over the globe. So we do. Prioritise Australian growers, of course, and all we want more than anything is more Australian growers. So please Australian growers get in touch. But Australia, it just doesn't produce everything. It just doesn't. There are some seeds that you won't find here. In any sort of a quantity, you might find a gram that, you know, granny down the road saved. Yeah, not going to supply the masses. That, you know, yeah, that's right. So we can't nothing that we can, you know. market but we do have growers all over the world. We have Germany, Italy, the Netherlands, New Zealand, India, USA, Canada. So that's the most of them I think but yes we do prioritize Australian growers and they're all over Australia as well. got growers in every state really I think. Yeah right. Yeah and locally, locally to us is fantastic this fellow that came the other day with some seeds for us was an hour away and I was like oh we love this we need more and more of our local. But you know again talking about acclimatised, well those seeds will be more acclimatised to where it's grown so it's good to have them from kind of all over. Yeah and if someone wants to grow for you What's the minimum quantity? Do you have a minimum quantity when you're looking for someone? Not really. Some seeds we would take 20 grams of. You know, like some seeds are in that high demand that we just can't find. Different varieties of, say, chilies that are very hard to get and require. If they're coming from overseas, they don't really anymore because they require extensive testing. There's different diseases and you know, fungus and mites and different things that are attracted to different seeds. And so some, the Australian government has cut off importing certain seeds, right? And so those ones are the ones we really wanna get within Australia. And yeah, there's different types of, you know, exotic little chilies that are gorgeous. You know, you don't eat many of them. We'd take small amounts and then, you know, others, we're buying them by, you know, the tens of kilos of seeds, so. So Seedy Chums, if you're gardening hobby, if you'd like to turn your gardening hobby into something a bit more than that, or if you just love growing seeds, get in touch with Eden Seeds and maybe you can be supplying the next lot of- That's right. That's pretty exciting. We've often said that we should really grow a crop, do a bit of an experimental crop and- I'd love to do that. Oh, we should do that. We need to keep an eye on that. I just love the idea of my seeds being out in the world. Thank God with the seeds. Yeah, I think it's a great idea. Maybe we'll get into, I don't know, something specific. What's something small, what's something you need that takes up a small, we won't air this, this will be private intel for Afro and I, but what's something that doesn't need a whole lot of room that you need? You know, we have a good list, we have a good list on the website. There is a Seed Savers page on the website. Oh, there we go. What we need, what is in need most, and also a bit more information about cross pollination and stuff. So you can't grow two of the same family of certain families like the cucubits. You're not going to grow those on the same block because they cross and you don't have that true seed anymore. That squashes your pumpkins. We've all had a weird pumpkin. It's actually not a pumpkin at all. It's a courgette or it's a zucchini. It's not a pumpkin at all. Yeah, yeah, okay. Yeah, but it's got a bit more of information about that kind of stuff on there. Yeah. Well, check that out. Yeah, we will, and it's good to direct people there as well because I mean, I would have thought, oh, let's talk about this offline, but hey, it's out there for the masses and. Yeah, let's get more seeds grown in Australia, people. If you've got a bit of land and you're interested and it's a fun hobby, why not get on board? Yeah, it's something, it's great the whole family can actually do as well, right? And knowing that they've been part of it. Get the kids harvesting the beans. I was going to say like that time I made my kids harvest coffee beans and then do the whole thing, just making coffee. And we got a bucket, you know, that was like a huge, big, I don't know, 10, 20 litre bucket, 20 litre probably bucket, maybe more. They're like, this is ridiculous, we said we'd get you a cup of coffee, but this has gone too far. No, it was mountain gold. It was treasured that little... It was one of the small, we ended up with one of the small mccona jars. No way. Full of brine from a massive, you know, because of all the whole process you pick, you know, you ferment, you pull off this part, and then you've got to pull off that part, and then you're left with this. Oh, it's just such a... I know, but it's a week. But the appreciation that you now have. And that they have experience through doing that. Like not many people would have that appreciation of coffee. See kids, don't take your morning cup of coffee for granted. Absolutely. It makes sense. Not that they have. They would think twice about having a cup of coffee and just tipping it down the sink. Obviously they're not drinking coffee, but you know what I mean? Like they've got... That's right. Exactly. They can say, do you know what? Do you know how long it took to get that cup of coffee? I grew up, I was just saying to Bernadette this morning, and thinking about our conversation and our chat today, I had so many memories of seeds, because I grew up in a garden store. And so my dad was a seed merchant in Ireland. And we sold everything loose. So we came into the shop and behind the counter, there was this amazing, because I'm just admiring all your wood behind you. We had all these little drawers. Oh, I know exactly what kind of. Like an apothecary. Yes. Yeah. So people would come in, everything was sold loose. So anything like grass seed, even potash. My dad would measure out potash for the garden and just when I think back to it and all the seeds, but the seeds when they came in from memory, some of them had to be dressed. So I'm thinking that was a chemical dressing. So they would open the packet of the seed. it would be, they dress it in just an old biscuit tin and then they would pop it. What do you mean dress it, like put a pair of ovals on it? What do you mean? Well, it was like, I suppose it would prevent the seed from... Oh, it's a coating. Like a coating, yes. Sometimes it's fungicide or... Yeah, it's like, yeah, yeah. So my dad would do that by hand. I suppose now when you're buying a seed in a, just in a store, all your packet seeds, so they are already pre... predressed a lot of them would be. Well some of them you'll notice because it'll be bright pink or bright blue or even I'm sure you've seen some seeds over time that are like bright colors. Those are. Yeah. Yeah, yeah. Yeah. So it's, it was just bringing me back to a lot of memories and then people will come in and we had the scales behind the counter and you would put like, you know, the ants and weight on one end and then you'd tip the Seedy. We had one of those. Yeah, so beautiful. Like they are beautiful memories. And then the packets were just plain brown packets and they went into the packets. I love your brand, your brand packet. And then you'd write on the outside, whatever seed it was. Like it was such, such an experience going to buy your seat. Um, but I do remember the whole dressing aspect of it. And I probably didn't ask a lot of questions. I can still ask, ask my dad exactly. There was certain seeds that never needed to be dressed. And there were ones. that always had to be dressed. Beans are always one of them. And I think carrots, they used to dress something, the carrots with something that prevented white fly or something. But yeah, it was just, it was just a great, a great, like it was bringing back a lot of good, good memories. Yeah. Everything was loose. And so my dad's special, I was a garden store, and everything that he could buy loose was always weighed out. But then he kind of specialized in animal feed as well. And dog food, it was all loose. We've moved to such a pre-packaged society. So people could come in and buy if they couldn't manage a big bag of dog food, they would buy weekly as well. Something that we don't do a lot of anymore. We buy in bulk. And like a slug pellets. It was all loose and all bird seed. Um, yeah, it was amazing. Anyway, sorry. So the background of you there is really bringing me back to. to my dad's business, beautiful. So the original owner, his other passion was woodwork and he built this room. So it's a lovely, it is actually my carrie. So those are, there's a bunch of herbs and whatnot back there. Yeah, very special, it's beautiful. Yeah. So Avril's just taken us on a walk down memory lane and something we love to ask all of our guests on the show is if you have an early gardening memory that you could share with us. It's funny because there's no, there's. there's no beginning, it's all gardening memories, there's so many. But I think it was funny, a few things that came up in my mind that stood out to me was from a very early age, and I don't know how early, but my grandmother's always lived in the same house, and my dad and all of his siblings were all born and raised in that house, and I think she's lived there for about 70 years. And her garden was one that we played in a lot. And I remember from a really young age, when realising you could interact with the plants. And you know, like the Impatience seed pods, when you touch them and they curl up, they pop and they curl up. And I was thinking about that and I was thinking, you know, I loved that. I loved getting up in there. And there was another plant as well and I can't remember what it was. And I'm seeing it in my head, but I don't actually know what it was, but it was a little red flower that you could also pop, but it would just I'll have to ask her. But just thinking about the interacting with the plants and how that I've carried that through my life. And even the other week when I was overseas and we were in the botanical gardens and I was just really just deep face into the flowers, smelling these roses and rubbing on these amazing, beautiful sequoias and. all these plants and looking around I said to my husband how come nobody else is interacting with the plants? How come nobody else is out there touching and smelling and there was a pine tree that was just dripping. We lost that connection. We have lost our connection to nature haven't we? It's terribly sad. And I just think well it has to start in childhood really. I mean yes we can find it when we're older but I just think that we've got to get our kids interacting with nature. That was just the memory that kind of kept sticking for me was the playing with the popping flowers and the seed pods and getting such delight from how they gave a reaction. And I've carried that through. I just, I always have to touch and smell and I'm always getting pine sap all over my fingers. I'm very tactile and that's one of my first memories was in my grandmother's garden with the grape hyacinths, popping the little purple flowers off, popping them all off or. But really interesting, you talking about that interaction, realising that the plants are alive and they're react, that's a very unique perspective, I love that. Yeah, it is, our memories do, they do instil something into us, don't they? We do talk about this a lot. And you're obviously giving your children beautiful memories as well. And even now on your next journey with Eden seeds, like they're getting so many amazing memories, which is fantastic. Yeah, I used to work at a community kindergarten and was their artist in residence and all of the art projects that we did together were nature-based and so I was constantly taking them on little nature journeys. Anything that we made it was, you know, there was leaves, there was seed pods, there was, you know, print making and stamping and all sorts of everything that we did was based in nature and that kind of was one of the, one of the, also one of the things that led me to then go on to study. It was just getting the plants back to the people but starting with the kids I think is really important because yes really what is instilled in us in childhood carries on and even if you don't notice that right away they'll circle back. At some stage Ava, my little girl is seven and she was out with one of her little friends and just the other day and her little friend was like oh there was blood on the tree and Ava turned around her and went that's tree sap. I was like, I've never been so proud. I was like, well, it is, it's kind of, it is the blood of the tree. But Laver had the terminology down pat and I was like, wow, my job's done. I love it. Yeah. I would like to mention, though, that you do have a beautiful website. It's lovely to, I really feel like that you can go on a journey, you know, like. We're always trying to. better the website and its accessibility and everything. And actually I'm about to release a newsletter next week and I was also putting the call out for photographs because we don't wanna use stock photographs on our website of the plants. We want to use in situ photographs of people actually have grown our seed and this is what came of it. Beautiful. And so yeah, we'd love to swap seeds for photos. Yeah. You want to send in photos of what you've grown and we don't already have a photo of it on our website because there's a lot of things that there's a lot of gaps. Yeah. Also, when we get the gardens pumping here, I endeavour to have a lot of that stuff growing so that we can get photos of it. That's great. That's a great way to kind of get people interacting with you. And also you're really active on your social media platforms too. So I encourage people to hop on, hop on over. So what's your website and your socials? So Edenseeds.com.au and on Instagram it's EdenseedsAU. We're also on Facebook, which is just Edenseeds. Well, thank you so much for your time. Yeah, we had a great chat. You did great. Yeah. Thank you. There's heaps of gold in there that everyone will love hearing about. I have learned so much. Although Brenna did always point out to me, there's no point in writing things down. I will, we are recording this. Enjoy the rest of your day, Amber. Thank you guys. Take care. Bye. Great chat, Bernadette. That was a lovely chat, wasn't it? Lovely to get to know a bit more about Amber and Eden's seeds and her journey. I'm gonna be growing yarrow. Elderflower, didn't even know you could grow that in Canberra. I can give you a cutting. It's really easy to root. I would love that. Yeah, it's in flower at the moment. I don't know whether that's the right thing for it to do, but it's in flower at the moment. And... You'd be great at making the cordial, I reckon. Have you never had elderflower cordial? I've had it, I've tasted it. I never thought it grew here. I always thought it was a UK thing, like mind blown. I can't wait. Oh, really? It's such a pretty little flower. Is it big? A big plant? It's kind of like a tree for me. Oh. Yeah, and I never really water it, so it's quite a hardy one. I gave a cutting that I rooted to my neighbour and she's growing it as well. Might pop a few out on the, out at the farm. Yeah. Yeah, yeah, yeah. If you can get a few where you can then harvest. the beautiful flowers and you make elderflower cordial, it'd be a lovely little experience. What are you growing, Seedy Chums? Why don't you send us some pictures of what you're growing on our Instagram, Seedy Chats? Brenda, have a great day. You too, Avril. Until next time, slán lath. Slán lath or nullin. Oh, grumunga? Oogar of maagga.