I buy from multiple seed companies because the various seeds all serve different purposes in my garden. I love open-pollinated/heirloom and hybrid seeds for different reasons. I love trying different varieties of seeds to see which grow best in my garden. I love different colors and tastes of different varieties of the same vegetables. Therefore, I buy from many seed companies. The following seed companies are the ones I buy from most frequently but are not listed in order of preference, I purchase from them depending on my needs at that time. I also try to order from companies that are based further north in the United States (my one exception is Baker Creek). I do this because the colder climate companies tend to have a greater seed selection that will perform well in my shorter growing season in central Wisconsin. If you are a Southern gardener, I would still recommend checking out the companies I like (most companies try to get a selection of seeds that perform well in different climates) but also look for some great seed companies that are further south and maybe even local to you. Lastly, I have generally had great germination with all of these seed companies, so I highly recommend them.

​I like Baker Creek because they only sell heirloom and open-pollinated varieties. These types of varieties are essential for anyone who wants to save seeds as they will always grow true if they do not cross-pollinate in your garden. I love saving tomato and pepper seeds, so Baker Creek is one of the main companies I buy them from. I also love trying different varieties of tomatoes and peppers and Baker Creek always has new and unusual varieties available. Baker Creek is also the last seed company I purchase from that still sends one or more free seed packets out with orders over a specific amount (3 free packets on a $65 order, 2 free packets on a $35 order, and 1 free pack on a $10 order) and they have free shipping on all seed orders. Also, their free catalog is pretty great but the larger one you can purchase is amazing!

​Fedco is based out of Maine and so fits my criteria for a Northern climate seed company. They always have a large selection of shorter-season seed varieties which are perfect for my gardening zone. They also have a tree division from which I have purchased many bare-root fruit trees and bushes. Although Fedco offers heirloom and open-pollinated varieties they also offer hybrid seeds which I prefer when I am looking for disease resistance, bolt resistance, or another trait that can be harder to find in heirloom seeds. Although hybrid seeds can be expensive Fedco’s prices are reasonable, and they do have free shipping on orders over $50. Fedco also offers organic versions of many seeds if that is important. One last note about Fedco is that they are very open about where their seeds come from. They utilize a numbering system to show where their seeds are coming from such as small seed farmers (which includes Fedco staff), family-owned companies, companies not part of a larger conglomerate, and multinational companies that are or are not engaged in genetic engineering. This allows you to purchase seeds openly based on personal ethics. Fecdo has also recently decided to drop all Syngenta-owned seeds, even though many of them are popular hybrids, because Syngenta manufactures neonicotinoid insecticides which are known to negatively affect bees and other beneficial insect populations. In 2006 they also dropped all seeds from Seminis/Monsanto for similar ethical reasons relating to sustainability. This open-business practice is rare among seed companies, and probably most non-seed companies as well. 

I like Rohrer Seeds for a variety of reasons, one of which is that they are based out of my home state of Pennsylvania and my family purchased their seeds when I was growing up. They have very reasonably priced seeds, you do have to pay for shipping, but their shipping is also very reasonably priced. Rohrer used to have a good selection of their branded seeds for 99 cents a packet. Those seeds have mostly increased to $1.99 a packet but that is still the cheapest per pack of all my favorite seed companies. Another reason I like Rohrer is that they sell seeds from other companies as well. So, I can get seeds from Lake Valley, Rene’s Garden, Livingston, Seed Savers Exchange, Baker Creek, and more, all in one location. The last reason I like Rohrer Seeds is that they have great customer service. I used to put in two separate orders, one for my vegetable seeds for my family garden and one for flower seeds that I would grow to sell on Etsy (back when I sold online). The workers at Rohrer would realize that the two orders were being shipped to the same place and ship them together and either refund me the shipping cost for one order or send free seed packets as an apology if they could not refund the shipping. I never expected to be refunded or given free seeds since I had to order separately due to my orders being personal versus business purchases. Although I no longer buy from them for business use, I still get many of my staple vegetable seeds from Rohrer.

Johnny’s is another Maine-based company and probably the most expensive seed company I order from for both the cost of the seed packs as well as for shipping costs. So why do I still list Johnny’s as one of my favorite seed companies? Their seeds are of great quality and although they have some heirloom seeds available their hybrid selection is fantastic. If I have a problem with a disease in my garden (for example, one year I lost all my cucumber plants to downy mildew), Johhny’s is the first place I will look to see if disease-resistant varieties are available. Johnny’s also has a great selection of other gardening supplies including plant stakes, frost and shade covers, gardening tools, soil blockers, and more. They also occasionally hold informational webinars about gardening, usually about their specific varieties, which is a great opportunity to learn more about the growing conditions and properties of their seeds.

MIgardener is based out of Michigan, another northern climate state. They are very similar to Baker Creek in that they only sell heirloom and open-pollinated seeds, but they are a smaller company with (maybe?) less selection although they have been growing steadily. Their seeds are very reasonably priced, and the company seems dedicated to keeping costs down for customers. All their seed packs are $2, and they have free shipping on orders $20 and more. They do not have a paper seed catalog which is one of the ways they can keep costs down and provide great prices for their companies. I buy many of my tomato and pepper seeds from MIgardener since I know they are open-pollinated, and I can easily save seeds from their varieties.

​If you have a seed company you love, please let me know in the comments below or send me an email. I always love trying out new seed companies!

​I see a lot of confusion online about the different types of seeds that are available for purchase. Here I will attempt to clarify the differences between them, allowing you to make the best-informed decision about what types of seeds are best for your garden.

​Open-pollinated and heirloom seeds are similar in that both types of seeds can be saved year after year as long as they are grown distanced from different varieties of the same species to prevent cross-pollination (1). These seeds are genetically stable and manifest similar phenotypes (physical characteristics) when grown (1). Open-pollinated seeds arise from cross-pollination of separate plants of the same species AND variety or self-pollination from the same flower or separate flowers on the same plant (1). Self-pollinating varieties can generally be grown closer together with less risk of cross-pollination but unless you isolate the flower and hand-pollinate there is always the risk that the wind or an insect cross-pollinated for you if another variety of the same species is growing nearby (1). Tomatoes and peppers are probably the most saved seed by home gardeners, and I found that peppers are more likely to cross than tomatoes. I do not attempt to isolate my plants because I am only saving seeds for my use, and I do not mind the uncertainty of growing a possible hybrid the following year.

​Heirloom seeds are an older variety of open-pollinated seeds (1). Generally, any seed older than 50 years is considered an heirloom but that is not universally agreed upon (2). Heirloom seeds must be open-pollinated but open-pollinated seeds are not necessarily heirlooms. If you are interested in saving seeds and want to make sure the seeds you collect will grow to be the same as their parents, then you must use open-pollinated or heirloom seeds. New varieties of open-pollinated plants can be made using labor-intensive traditional plant breeding methods that involve crossing 2 varieties, collecting the seeds from plants manifesting the characteristics you are looking for, growing new plants from those seeds, and repeating for many years until you have a stable seed that produces the same type of plant year after year. Although new open-pollinated plants can take years to develop, once you have stable seeds, they can be propagated easily via saving seeds (assuming no other varieties were nearby to cross-pollinate).

​Hybrid seeds (also known as F1, or first generation after the cross seeds) are from cross-pollination of two genetically different varieties of the same species of parent plants (1). The usual way to create these can take years and lots of testing to determine that the phenotypes you want (characteristics such as color, disease resistance, size, etc.) are present and stable in the offspring. Because of the time it takes to generate new varieties of hybrid plants and because to make seed a grower needs to perform this cross-pollination each year (1), which is labor-intensive, is why hybrid seeds cost so much more than open-pollinated or heirloom seeds. Hybrid vigor is a phenomenon that often arises when two different plants are crossed and is one of the reasons why hybrids are so popular (1). You can save seeds from hybrid plants but there is no guarantee that the plant that grows from the saved seed will be the same as the parent. I have successfully re-grown some hybrids (but not most) from seeds that looked just like the parents so if you are willing to experiment there is no reason you cannot save hybrids. If you are not interested in experimentation, simply stick to saving open-pollinated or heirloom seeds. Importantly, hybrid seeds are NOT GMO (genetically modified organism) seeds.

​GMO seeds are developed by genetically engineering the genes from one species into another (2). This is done for a variety of reasons such as disease resistance, pesticide resistance, or increasing a desirable trait such as more nutrition. Most gardeners appear to be vehemently opposed to GMO seeds, but they may not be aware that 70% of the processed foods in the United States come from GMO ingredients (2). However, although you may be unwittingly eating GMO crops, GMO seeds are generally NOT available to the average home gardener (see update below!), they are primarily used by commercial farmers to grow corn, soybeans, canola, sugar beets, and cotton (FDA). Other non-processed foods that may be GMO in the United States include certain varieties of potatoes, apples, summer squash, papaya, and pink pineapples (FDA). Many people want to avoid every GMO crop which although extremely difficult is certainly an option. I think GMO crops and seeds need to be taken case by case. As an example, the Hawaiian papaya would likely have gone extinct due to a ringspot virus but was saved by genetically engineering a resistance gene into the plant. On the other hand, the practice of engineering pesticide-resistance genes into our commercial crops so that we can spray more herbicides on our crops without killing the crop itself is not a practice I am in favor of.

UPDATE on 02/07/24: As of February 2024, the first bioengineered seeds are available to home gardeners from the Norfolk Healthy Produce company. They inserted a purple color gene from an edible snapdragon plant into a tomato genome. This makes a very purple tomato with increased anthrocyanin, an antioxidant that gives purple vegetables their color. This tomato has been vigoroursly tested and is deemed safe by both the USDA and FDA. Because these seeds are under patent the fruit, seeds, or plants cannot be sold by anyone other than the company that developed them, they are also very expensive! If you want a very purple tomato that is non-GMO Baker Creek Heirloom Seeds is trying to bring the Purple Galaxy Tomato to market. They were supposed to be available early this year but due to production issues will no longer be available to purchase (they even featured it on the cover of their 2024 seed catalog, oops!) Hopefully seeds will be available soon! In the meantime, there are lots of other heirloom and open-pollinated purple and black tomato varieties available, try them all!

​I grow mostly open-pollinated and heirloom seeds (especially my tomatoes and peppers), but I will occasionally grow hybrids usually for specific reasons such as disease resistance, reduced bolting, or easier growth. I lost all my cucumber crop one year to downy mildew so ever since then I have grown at least one type of downy mildew-resistant cucumber variety along with my open-pollinated varieties. It is also possible that you can find open-pollinated disease-resistant varieties if you do not wish to grow any hybrids however in many cases disease resistance may not be as well documented, so it may take some trial and error with different varieties to find one that works. The other type of crop I generally grow from hybrid seed is broccoli and cauliflower. We tend to have large temperature fluctuations in the spring, and I grow much more consistent heads of broccoli and cauliflower with hybrid seeds than open-pollinated ones.
One last note on the “organic” seed label. Organic simply means a seed was grown under organic conditions as defined by the USDA’s National Organic Program (1) This means that any fertilizer, pesticides, or any other treatment used to grow the plants must all be labeled organic, and the seeds cannot contain any genetically modified genes. There is no difference genetically between a seed of the same species and variety that was grown organically versus one that was not. You can purchase organic hybrid seeds just like you can purchase non-organic heirloom seeds.