You bet. 2007. So glad I found this thread. I had sent all my information and date I needed product by, for my pickles. Not even notification that it would not be ready then. When I grew garlic, mine was always ready for pickle season. When I called, he said that it had not been harvested when it should have been, because of rain. I made a trip of several miles and took time off from to work to pick up 7 pounds from him. I paid cash for bad stuff. Most of it was bad, except for a large cloved variety. I even UPS's it back to him so he could see how bad it was. When I tried to use it I saw the wrappers were very thin and a lot of them open. Open invite for disease when compounded with rain during harvest. When I grew I always bought my seed stock from Filaree Farm in Eastern Washington, too. I will either need to get my eating/pickle stock there again (Filaree) or go to the farmers market again, like I had to do last year. I never got a refund for the bad garlic or return shipping or trouble. It only costs a little more to go second best. I am so done with this.

:O) Wendy, Those should be Lynchnis Viscaria Splendens Fever. To all, There is no doubt that I will be requiring seeds in the future and definitely will be asking for some of my plants back in seed form from good friends. I've been taking a few trips down to my parents place more often. They have a wonderful home on good acreage and this coming winter I may winter sow with my mother who still enjoys gardening at the prime age of 84. We will be 'cleaning' some of her gardens this summer as some have gotten out of control and she loves the help. Even though the property is only 3 hours away, the zone is one up and her gardens are always ahead of mine. So Neil, yes, I will defnitely be asking for Inula seeds, morz8, start collecting poppy seeds, and Wendy, my mom would fall in love with Flo-Jovis. :O) Having a good day today... Can you tell??

Christina, Different types of seeds are viable for different periods of time. Properly-dried broccoli and cauliflower seeds are generally highly viable for about 5 years whereas carrot seed is generally only highly viable for about three years. The two main enemies of seed viability when storing seeds are high humidity and high temperature. One way to store them is in freezers. They need to be inside airtight containers. All the major seed banks in the world store their seeds in cold storage units. You also can store seeds in foil pouches, paper packets, zip-lock bags (you can get tiny ones in the bead/craft aisle at wal-Mart), plastic lids with tight containers, etc. If not stored in a freezer, they should be stored in a room or closet where they are exposed to fairly constant temperatures. You don't want to store them in an uninsulated garage, garden shed, attic, etc. where they'll be very hot in summer and very cold in winter. If storing them inside, an interior closet or pantry is often a good storage area. If you have a dry cellar or root cellar, it would be an ideal place for seed storage but make sure the seeds are in airtight and roden-proof containers. You also can place packets of silica in your seed containers to absorb moisture and help protect the seeds from excess humidity. Seeds are not good today but then suddenly bad tomorrow. Instead, the seeds lose their vigor slowly over a period of time If your seeds are dried down to 8% moisture content and then sealed into airtight containers and stored in a freezer, they will maintain their normal or typical viability for ten times as long as seeds not stored long-term in a freezer. I don't keep my seeds in the freezer. I just keep them in paper envelopes placed inside zip-lock bags and stored in a plasic storage crate with a locking lid. Most of the time, the storage crate is in my root cellar with my stored veggies and home-preserved food. If you don't have room in the freezer or don't want to store your seeds there, a refrigerator works too. When removing seeds from a freezer or refrigerator so that you can open the container and use some of them, first remove the container from cold storage and let it sit all day long or overnight so the seeds can completely reach room termperature before you open the airtight seed packet. This lessens the likelihood that moisture will condense on the seeds as they thaw which can cause them to germinate prematurely. I generally try to use seeds before they are six years old or older but sometimes you can get seeds that are 6-10 years old to germinate fairly easily, and real seed pros can often germinate older ones. I don't think I've ever tried to germinate seeds older than 8 or 10 years in age. One thing you need to consider with seed packets is that they have to meet federal germination standards because every seed likely will not germinate. The germination rate is expressed as a percentage and varies from variety to variety. For example, the minimal federal germination rate for commercially-sold carrot seed is 55%, so you're unlikely to get 1500 carrots even if you plant 1500 seeds. The worst germination you can expect from fresh seed packed for the current year's use is, therefore, 55% for carrots, although often you'll find a particular batch of seeds has a much higher germinationrate than that---it is just the 55% is the minimum allowed. For cucumbers, the Federal Germination Standard for seed sold commercially is 80%. When planting, you can use the Fenderal Germination Standard for any given variety as an aid in figuring out how many seeds to plant in order to get X number of plants. You also can choose smaller packets of seed. One retailer who specializes in smaller quantities of seed is Pinetree Garden Seeds (www.superseeds.com) and some other seed companies sell 'mini' or 'sampler' packs that contain smaller quantities of seeds. If you collect and save your own seed from open-pollinated varieties, the most important thing is to make sure it has reached the proper degree of dryness before storing it. Otherwise you may end up with moldy, ruint seed. Dawn

Hi, Steve/digit, Thanks for your response! I had to double check, but I read your responses/complaints about Evergreen. I decided to do a search about them over the weekend when I didn't get the email confirmation. Your past experience with them (from several years ago) was similar to the experience I had with them (many years ago). I received email confirmation of my order. Fast forward to present day... I didn't think twice about placing my order with them this season... until no email confirmation ever showed up in my email box. Then I started to worry and wonder. Having said that, I received my afternoon mail and found a yellow envelope from Evergreen! I was surprised to find it in my mailbox, but I do live in Los Angeles. I'm with you and wonder if they're just a little overwhelmed with business? I even asked for an email when they shipped but didn't get that, either. I really don't know if I'll order from them again especially if I can find the seeds elsewhere. I like communication/notification. Thank you all for your responses. Happy Growing, everyone! Barbara aka pintsizekid