While it is true that i personally ordered in my main seeds (from OSC) a company that has been in my province for 125 years. They have proven to be a good company to work with, including during the pandemic when things seed wise got wonky!

I do have a good amount of older seed and lots of homegrown and saved seeds, but the simple truth is that the cost of seeds in the seed catalogs coming in is shockingly high and the amount of seeds in per package has in some cases shockingly shrunk

Case in point, a new catalog came in, its a good company, its a Canadian Company that has been around for 75ish years, not small, not the biggest either, good seeds, good service.. I ordered these same seeds four years ago and that package of seeds was 3.95 for 50 seeds, which had risen from 2.99 for x weight in the package, not seeds at that time but by weight

Today when i went to order that same package, today it is a 5.85 for 8 to 10 seeds. Yes the seed package in the catalog clearly states 8 to 10 seeds.. I am in a bit of shock to be honest!

Now, i know that there is a rising pressure costs, i get that, overhead costs and rise of living costs but this kind of price point increase for home gardeners is just wild! wow!

I will admit i am not ordering it, i will be carefully starting the few remaining seeds i have, growing it only for seed saving and restocking both my own needs for the next three to five years and also having extra for offer at much better price points to my local community food shed!

Its not just the price point (which is huge) its the fact that climate change is such that things can be wiped out in a storm, new gardeners can struggle to get seedlings to grow, what if they are learning and damping off takes out that row in the tray, investment gone.. what if they are growing nicely and a mouse comes along, gone.. or they grow just lovely and you plant them out in the just right, its a mild day, they have been hardened off, they look amazing its a overcast day and you did everything right and the next morning the cutworms had a party and gone!

Do you know how easy it is for so many things that could cause losses of 8 to 10 plants in a big garden?

We used to talk about help cut costs and seed share packages, and that is an can be very helpful indeed, buy a package with 50 seeds and share it out with garden friends, they do the same an everyone has a year or two worth of seeds and can do seed saving and cost savings..

at three dollars for 4 to 5 seeds split only two ways its still just plain highway robbery! At a time when being able to tuck a bit of extra plants to help feed your family in a spare pot, flower garden, kitchen garden or main garden counts, this is very unwelcome.

So i can see this is happening across the seed catalogs arriving for Canadian company’s to different degrees. How will this be effecting your garden seed buying this year? How will seed cost effect your style of gardening? Will it effect your seed saving efforts?

If you live outside Canada, be it USA or EU or elsewhere in the world, i know from my daily stats that folks from many different countries around the world are reading here daily, what is it like your area? Are seed prices doubles or more, have the number of seeds in your packages had such bad reductions?

I would love to hear what you are seeing your local stores, your seed catalogs?

Ps, i also noticed that a couple catalogs that always offered free shipping if spend over $75 didn’t offer anything like that this year.. hmmm