Seedy Saturday (Virtual for 2022!)
This year, we’re bringing Seedy Saturday online!
What’s Seedy Saturday?
This event promotes education around seed saving, environmentally responsible gardening, and heirloom and open pollinated seeds!
What can I expect each week?
Join us virtually each Saturday (March 5, 12, 19, and 26) for a nature-themed children’s storytime at 10:30 a.m., followed by an incredible guest speaker series at 1 p.m., with topics such as Indigenous perspectives on relationship to creation, the history of gardening in western Elgin County, and sustainable vegetable gardening.
We also have a great roster of local vendors, master gardeners, CSA farmers, artists, and more.
Drop in to the library throughout March to pick up a FREE Take and Make craft for kids and packet of seeds for the gardeners in the house!
All My Relations: Indigenous Perspectives About Being in Relationship with All of Creation
Saturday, March 5, 2022 | 1 p.m.
Speaker: Carolynne Crawley from Miinikaan Innovation and Design
Join us as we learn about the importance of cultivating relationships between people, plants, the elements, and all beings who are part of the ecology we inhabit. Carolynne Crawley from Miinikaan Innovation and Design will share Indigenous teachings and learnings about stewardship and the land. Experience a new outlook on the plants and other beings who share your garden space and live around us, even in the most urban of spaces.
About Carolynne:
Carolynne brings a wealth of experience about the food and medicine plants, and Indigenous teachings about the land. Carolynne has Mi’kmaw, Black and Irish ancestry and is from the East Coast, known today as Nova Scotia. She is dedicated to social and environmental justice and supporting Indigenous led community work related to food sovereignty and food security. Carolynne is passionate about reconnecting people with the land, waters, and all beings as there is no separation between us. Carolynne is founder of Msit No’kmaq, which means “All My Relations” in Mi’kmaw. Msit No’kmaq aims to support people in reconnecting with themselves, each other, and the land, waters, and all beings through land-based workshops, talks, walks and retreats. Her expertise includes certified Forest Therapy Guide, Mentor and Trainer of the practice, Blanket Exercise Facilitator, and member of the Indigenous Land Stewardship Circle. Previously, Carolynne worked with one of Canada’s largest food security organizations for the past decade. She has worked with Indigenous community members within the city of Toronto and with Cree communities along the James Bay area. She is a Co-Producer of an upcoming documentary, Reckoning with the Wendigo, that focusing upon the resiliency of the Cree People along the James Bay who are impacted by continual threats from colonial systems.
Carolynne is also a Holistic Nutritionist, and has worked as a Child & Youth Worker for more than twenty years. She applies this knowledge in all of her current work.
Seasonal Cut Flower Gardening
Saturday, March 12 | 1 p.m.
Speaker: Janis Harris of Harris Flower Farms
This workshop will cover what you can plant and what works well as a cut flower.
This will include annuals, perennials and some native plants.
About Janis:
Janis Smith Harris is a flower farmer and florist based out of St. Thomas, Ontario. As owner of Harris Flower Farm & Pastured Pork, Janis runs a multi-generation family farm specializing in bulbs, annuals, perennials and flower branches. Janis and her partner, Mark, purchased Janis’ Grandparents former dairy farm. There are many established flower gardens filled with collections of lillies, irises, peonies and lilacs. In total there is approximately 3 acres in flower production. Corn/soyabean fields have been turned into sunflower fields. Lawn has been turned over for perennial beds. The farm is being revitalized and beautified with every growing season. Janis was named 2020 “Favourite Florist St Thomas” and was named 2021 “MyFM Kubota woman farmer of the year”.
Gardening in the Early Talbot Settlement
Saturday, March 19 | 1 p.m.
Speaker: Angela Bobier of Backus-Page House
About Angela:
Angela grew up in Wallacetown, within the heart of the Talbot Settlement and has a Diploma in Cultural Resource Management from the University of Victoria. Angela’s work background is in retail and direct sales, team building, customer service, and marketing. Her hobbies include genealogy and reading historical fiction. In 2009, Angela was elected to the Tyrconnell Heritage Society Board of Directors and held the volunteer positions of Membership and Marketing Chairperson, Education Day Chairperson, Vice President and President before taking on the staff role of Cultural Manager in June, 2012. Angela’s largest project as just been completed in 2021. A new 3000 square foot Agricultural History Centre was opened to visitors during the annual Heritage Farm Show and is full of Talbot Settlement farming history.
Extending your Vegetable Garden Season
Saturday, March 26 | 1 p.m.
Speaker: Chris DeVries of Common Ground Farms
A vegetable garden is not just all planted on Victoria Day weekend! In this talk we will go over the range of seasons and what you can plant when. As well, we will talk about ways that you can extend your growing season even further and get the most out of your garden space. Timing and succession planting as well as coming up with an overall garden plan will amplify the output of your home garden!
About Chris:
Chris grew up just outside St.Thomas. After moving away for University and work, he returned with his family in 2009 to start a farm close to where he grew up. Following in his ancestors calling, his farm grows a wide range of vegetables and sells them locally all year round. At Common Ground Farm (commongroundfarm.ca) they grow through the winter and store vegetables in their on-farm cooler. The farm runs a CSA (Community Supported Agriculture) program that supplies local families with vegetables through a subscription program.
Anything Grows Seed Co.
Visit our shop at The Market At Western Fair District and get a 10% discount for saying “St.Thomas Seedy Saturday!”
We have hundreds of varieties of seed in and more on the way! We carry many Rare & Heirloom veggies as well as hybrid varieties as many of those have better disease resistance. We carry many items for flower gardeners as well as many varieties that are great for pollinators. We also carry seasonal items like Asparagus crowns, seed potato & onions and more later in March!
To order, please email rickallan@quadro.net or call 519-276-0536
Backus-Page House Museum
Backus-Page House Museum is operated by the Tyrconnell Heritage Society, situated in picturesque John E. Pearce Provincial Park, just south of Wallacetown, Ontario. We are in the heart of the Talbot Settlement, on the shores of Lake Erie. Enjoy the Spicer Trail, heritage gardens, historic barn, outbuildings, and our 1850’s Georgian style house museum. Discover period room settings that tell the story of the Backus family and changing exhibits showcasing the rural communities of western Elgin County. Discover more through our podcast on Anchor.fm: Life in the Talbot Settlement
Backyard Seed Savers
Backyard Seed Savers is a local Guelph business offering rare, organic garden seeds, seed gifts, and sustainable landscaping services. Our garden seeds are all grown and processed by hand–with love–in backyards and community gardens. Beyond seeds, we want you to have the garden of your dreams. We offer consulting, installation and maintenance of gardens, as well landscaping, including edible landscapes and farmscape services.
Bluegroves Farm
Our story began in 1983 when the Hatch’s acquired a 62-acre farm in Eagle, Ontario with plans to grow the best local blueberries. The farm started with the planting of just a few acres with three varieties and kept growing to its current thirteen-acres of seven different varieties of blueberry bushes.
Common Ground Farm
We are an organic vegetable farm just outside St. Thomas, a short drive from London.
We grow delicious produce free of synthetic fertilizers and pesticides throughout the year, so that you get sparkling fresh, just-picked vegetables at the peak of flavour. We have a Community Supported Agriculture program (CSA or vegetable box or food box program, delivered!) and sell our vegetables at Western Fair market in London all year round.
Forest City Microgreens
We are a locally family-owned Artisan microgreen farm operating in London Ontario, since June of 2020. Our mission is to produce a highly nutritious and tasty product that is fresh and 100% natural all year round. We believe that the key to a good immune system and overall health starts with a good diet. The advantage of our microgreens is that we grow them all year round, so our customers can have fresh produce that is sustainable, produces less carbon footprint, and is delicious! We sell our product at a booth at the Western Fair Market, Unger’s Market, Rebel Remedy and we are now open here downtown at 71 King Street, Unit 102A across from the Budweiser Gardens.
Harris Flower Farm
Harris Flower Farm, founded in 2011 by Janis & Mark Harris, is a small family operation specializing in growing a large assortment of bulb, annual, perennial and flowering branches. Located in the fertile soil of Elgin County in southwestern Ontario, Harris Flower Farm grows fresh seasonal cut flowers for
farmers’ markets, weddings and events in St. Thomas, London and surrounding areas.
Matchbox Garden Seed Co.
We are a small farm and seed company located along the Grand River in Haldimand County. Our roots began over 15 years ago as an urban backyard garden in downtown Toronto, Matchbox has experienced growing in gardens as small as 500sqft, all the way up to 4 acres. We produce over 140 varieties of open pollinated, heirloom and rare vegetables, herbs, flowers, seed varieties, seedlings, as well as online educational opportunities.
Miinikaan Innovation & Design
Miinikaan (‘the SEED’ in Ojibwe) offers consulting, landscape design and garden installation. We grow Indigenous gardens that feed people and pollinators, and beautify the urban landscape.
Miinikaan gardens demonstrate Indigenous Agroecology teachings and improve the local ecology.
Return the Landscape
Return the Landscape is a non-profit organization based in Sarnia, Ontario that specializes in growing native plants, ecological restoration and landscape design, and environmental education. As a landscape company, we strive to combine aesthetics with natural features to create a beautiful and unique space. We work on projects throughout Lambton County in an effort to restore biodiversity in a greatly altered landscape. Our mission statement: Return the Landscape will work to preserve and enhance our local natural heritage through plant rescue and restoration opportunities.
Seeds of Diversity
We are a group of seed savers from coast to coast who protect Canada’s seed biodiversity by growing it ourselves and sharing it with others. Every year, we multiply the most vulnerable seed varieties that we can, exchange seeds with each other, and keep those varieties alive and in cultivation for future gardeners to enjoy.
We are a membership organization with over 1000 members across Canada that make Seeds of Diversity a vibrant and visible part of the gardening and food security scene. Our funding primarily comes from charitable donations made by both members and non-members.
Besides multiplying rare seeds, we volunteer at over 150 Seedy Saturday and Seedy Sunday events across Canada, write articles for our popular magazine and monthly email bulletin, package seeds for community seed libraries, and help beginner seed savers learn the easy techniques for growing good seeds.
St. Thomas and District Horticultural Society
Horticultural Society
The St. Thomas and District Horticultural Society has the distinction of being the oldest, continous running society in Elgin County. New members are welcomed! You can be sure of a warm welcome, no experience necessary just a love of gardening and plants.
The Succulent Shed
We are urban farmers in the heart of St Thomas ON! You can find me in my backyard, growing a wide range of perennials, shrubs, fruit bushes seasonally as well as tropical, house plants, succulents, and cacti year-round! We open our backyard to our customers spring through fall, and operate through porch pickups in the winter.
Thames Talbot Land Trust
Thames Talbot Land Trust (TTLT) is a not-for-profit, environmental charity. Our mission is to protect, conserve, and restore nature within Elgin, Middlesex, Oxford and Perth counties, contributing to a stable climate, human wellbeing, and healthy habitats for all species. We protect nature mainly through land ownership (by donation or purchase) and conservation easements. We currently protect 21 nature reserves. We take care of these lands through a variety of restorative stewardship practices, such as invasive species removal, native habitat creation, and Species at Risk monitoring and protection. We also provide many opportunities for the community to engage with nature!
Pick up a special garden-themed Take and Make craft from the library!