Kitchen Garden Forum

Most of you are now aware of my opposition to F1 hybrid veg seed. Just noticed the following."Arena F1 Tom seed. £2.99 for 8 seeds , plus P&P comes too £4.98. Might as well say a fiver and be done with it. That is over 62p each. And you can only use them for one year. I will keep to my faithful " Ailsa Craig", who I have been distributing my own seed to all and sundry on the Lotty.

I know what you mean shallot man they must think we are all millionaires

It's not too bad if they all germinate and as I found with some chillie seeds, they don't.

Yep Shallot Man! Another opportunistic money scheme for the seed companies preying on the new growers who will then just give up or will have success in the first year & try to keep some seeds - or pay double next year. It is becoming more & more expensive - mainly thanks to the P & P!

Glad I am not alone. Feel much better now.

I have no experience of working in the seed industry but I do have experience of working in research and development of aquatic treatment products for garden use so I do know how much it costs in time and money for research and development and field trials.

Personally I think some of you are being rather harsh on the seed companies.
One example of what is at stake is during 2015/2016 the Italian seed ground for Kelsae onions got wiped out, as yet the grounds have still not fully recovered and the variety is still in limited supply.
That is investment lost. Probability is that when (if) Kelsae comes back on the market the price will have increased or the seed quantity reduced

There are so many seed varieties available you can choose to use F1 varieties or not. I have no problem with seed companies who supply small quantity at what seems to me a high price, I just don't buy them.
If you think about it logically seed companies have to pitch their pricing right otherwise sales will not support further investment in research.

That's all and well pa snip but the problem as I see it is , you go out and buy a packet of seeds ,pay up to or more than £5 for it then when you open it you find very few seeds in it there is nowhere on the packets listening the contents otherwise we would leave them on the shelf then again I don't think their is one person who buys just one packet I think we all buy a lot more

When it comes to the major seed brands that are available through garden centre and other retail outlets I cant think of any that do not have the quantity of seed content marked on them.

I do not however find that to be the case with certain companies who deal primarily through mail or online order. Using their catalogue is almost pre-requisite to establish average content or volume.

I buy both F1 and non F1, what I won't buy is seed that will not germinate, I'm a half decent gardener and am fed up with some of the chillie seeds that will not germinate however hard I tried and using several different methods(pre soaking etc). I shall not be buying any this year and will stick to varieties that have a proven track record, rather than what seems like a gimmicky sales pitch of trying to make some seeds a sort of "cult culture".