Hello and welcome to Environmental Minute! This segment is brought to you by WDIY, in part by the Estate of Don Miles, and I am your host, Maddie Yang, a sophomore in high school at Moravian Academy in Bethlehem, Pennsylvania.
With the gardening season around the corner and seed starting upon us, in this episode, we are going to be discussing seed saving. For those unfamiliar, seed saving is the process of saving seeds or other reproductive parts of the plant to dry and use the next year. Some of the most popular plants to seed save with are tomatoes, peppers, cucumbers, beans, and pumpkins, but you can save seeds from much more. Personally, I always let my dill plants flower and go to seed, so I can collect those seeds to plant the following year, and am looking forward to experimenting with more plants this year.
However, seed saving is not something that people just casually do at home in their gardens. Seed saving is actually super critical to keeping biodiversity, allows plants to become more dependable as they are already biologically familiar with their surroundings, and is key to food security.
Svalbard Seed Bank
One of the most famous instances of seed saving can be found all the way in Norway’s Svalbard archipelago, far north of the Arctic Circle. It’s called the Svalbard Seed Vault and contains 1,301,397 duplicates of seed samples from nearly every country across the globe. Opened in 2008 and named the sixth best invention of 2008 by Times Magazine, the Svalbard Seed Vault is designed to ensure a reliable food supply in the future in case disaster strikes. The seed vault stores seeds at -18°C, or about 0°F, which is the optimal temperature for ensuring low metabolic activity, keeping the seeds viable for long periods of time. The seed vault can store up to 2.5 billion seeds and currently has unique varieties of sorghum, cowpea, maize, rice, wheat, lettuce, eggplant, potato, and barley. Unfortunately, the Svalbard Seed Vault is not open to the public, but you can visit on organized tours.
International Rice Genebank
Similar to the Svalbard Seed Bank, the International Rice Research Institute, or IRRI in the Philippines, exists for a similar purpose, except the facility exclusively stores rice for safekeeping. The IRRI holds over 132,000 kinds of rice as of 2019 and is deemed the biggest collection of rice genetic diversity in the world, with countries all over the world sending their rice for safekeeping. The efforts of the IRRI are crucial because traditional and wild kinds of rice are being lost due to genetic erosion, which is the loss of genetic diversity within and between populations of the same species.
In more recent news, with the containment of the deadly Eaton and Palisades fires, Altadena residents, such as Nina Raj came together. Nina is a University of California naturalist and master gardener who has been aiming to develop a seed bank at the Eaton Canyon Nature Center and has created seed libraries around her home in Altadena where people can donate and share seeds. Amid the devastating wildfires, she sent out a call for seed donations, knowing it would be critical for the rehabilitation of the area, and luckily, she received an overwhelming influx of support. With fire being a natural part of the ecosystem in Southern California, it was crucial to establish more native plants since some of these plants have defensive properties when threatened by fire. For instance, some of them can germinate in ashes, and others can clean scorched soil in preparation for new growth. This story is just one of many examples of the importance of seeds and how they are more than just the starting point for more plants and crops, but a source of connection for people, especially when home is shaped by unique plants of their area. Nina’s story emphasizes how seeds connect people and ecosystems, ensuring the survival and regeneration of plants essential to local environments.
As we wrap up today’s episode, I encourage you to take a moment to reflect on the significance of seed saving—not just as a gardening practice, but as a powerful tool for preserving biodiversity, strengthening food security, and fostering community resilience. Whether you're planting a garden at home or simply appreciating the natural world around you, remember that every seed has the potential to create a lasting impact. How can you incorporate seed saving into your own life, and what role can you play in ensuring that the plants we rely on continue to thrive for generations to come? Let’s all take action, no matter how small, and be mindful of the ways we can protect and nurture the planet we share.
Thank you so much for tuning into this episode of Environmental Minute, and I hope this conversation has inspired you to think more critically about the importance that something even as small as a seed can have on the future of our planet. Until next time, I’m Maddie Yang, and this has been Environmental Minute.
(Original air-date: 3/3/25)
