The best I've come across, and I do like Johnny's, Territorial and others, is Fedco.. this is their discription of themselves: "We are a cooperative, one of the few seed companies so organized in the United States. Because we do not have an individual owner or beneficiary, profit is not our primary goal. Consumers own 60% of the cooperative and worker members 40%. Consumer and worker members share proportionately in the cooperativeÂs profits through our annual patronage dividends." They have a very wide selection of seeds which have done wonderfully for me and though Western Washington is somewhat similar to Maine, their home state, we do have many differences, especially heat hours. They, also, are phasing out Seminis varieties because of the issues already touched upon..

I saw a show where a farmer saved his seeds for years and years. Then, his crop was pollenated by a neighbouring GM'ed crop, and long story short, he was taken to court and told that his saved seed was too closely related to the patented seed and he had to distroy it all! Now, he has to buy new seed every year instead of saving it and using his own! (Because the GM seed is so prolific in the area, his crop will ALWAYS produce GM influenced seed. Soo... a dirt poor farmer in Africa say, that is given seed that is GM'ified to grow great in his area.... produces a bumper crop! Great, wow, outstanding! Wow the Problem is, he can't save the seed and grow a new crop next year. He does not receive more seed, afterall, he is now a "sucessful farmer" right? Or maybe the funding for the program dried up, or any number of things. As good as his crop was, he can't afford to buy the expensive GM'ified seed on his own. How exactly does this work to solve world hunger / poverty? The idea that GM seed is going to save the world is the biggest pile of horse poop we have ever been sold! Dear god, could you imagine what would happen if a terminator seed was possible? It cross polinates with wild varieties, and now wild crops don't grow. but even with out a terminator gene, Famers who choose not to use GM seed can no longer save theirs, they have to buy seed, (from guess who?) The whole worlds food supply becomes dependant on a handful of companies that hold the patents to the seeds!!

This is an old post, but there may still be some interest in it, seeing where the prices have gone on the commodities market and the fall of the dollar. Many seed companies in addition to those listed offer small quatities of grains--Johnny's and Peaceful Valley (groworganic.com) both offer a number of varieties. As usual, Brendan was wrong about Monsanto--the Terminator gene has shown some ability to spread by pollen, making seeds in adjacent or nearby fields sterile. He is right when he implies that they will probably sue you for "stealing" their genetic property. The government is trying to control the food supply, so don't expect assistance from them in being self-sufficient. That is the last thing they really want, despite what is on ready.gov or whatever the website is now. Good luck on you grain projects, and try some unusual grain like Amaranth, Quinoa, and Spelt.

Seedboy, I see that you have resurrected a rather old and controversial message thread. I agree with a lot of what you say, and since hybridization in nature is very common, because bees do an awful lot of it, I think the answer to the original question of whether hybridizing is "wrong" would be a resounding "NO!". "People tend to fear what they don't understand, so genetic engineering and even hybridization seem scary to many people. But the truth is, those things have the potential to make our lives more productive and healthy." I don't disagree with that. "So the question isn't, "is this natural?" It's "is this safe enough to consume?" " Safety is a legitimate concern. Plutonium may be natural, but it can be very "unsafe". Tomatoes and Black Nightshade are closely related and it might be possible to cross them and get a very poisonous tomato. Something like that could even be done by a bee, to produce a "natural" hybrid that was unsafe for human consumption. I would hope that the growers producing tomato seed don't have a bunch of nightshades growing nearby. The techniques of genetic engineering are growing ever more capable. Glow-in-the-dark aquarium fish are probably safe. But how much testing do you suppose was actually done to guarantee that? And if people flush them, use them as bait, or release them into a stream, can we expect to see glow-in-the-dark minnows appear in our lakes? That would probably be OK, but I would be very surprised if any tests have actually been made to determine what unintended consequences might result from glow-in-the-dark fishes escaping into our lakes. Drugs that have been approved by the FDA regularly turn out to be dangerous enough to justify recalling them. Some dangerous cars have been "recalled". But the problem with genetically modified life forms is that you can't recall them, if you need to. I think the vast majority of us Americans have already eaten genetically modified foods without even knowing it. And I'm not just talking about that famous case when some GMO corn intended for animal food got used for corn chips instead. I'm talking about genetically modified tomatoes in the grocery store produce section that aren't labeled as GMO. Like it or not, we are all now guinea pigs in the brave new genetically modified world. So far, it has apparently been safe. Genetically modified organisms are becoming increasingly useful to mankind and profiteering corporations. But in my opinion, it isn't a question of whether something can go wrong, but when, and how bad it might be. That said, I am an amateur zinnia breeder, purely as a hobby. But if the genetic engineers can produce a glow-in-the-dark fish, they can surely produce a blue zinnia that we could use in our breeding programs. For that matter, it might look kind of neat if my zinnia patch was glowing brightly in all different colors at night. MM