When will an out of stock variety be available again?
- We estimate our starting website inventories in January for seeds and spring live plants – that is the best time pre-order. Sometimes we are able to release more stock in April, when we have reassessed our inventory, so that is a good time to check back.
- When a seed variety is listed as out of stock in the summer/fall, that may indicate that we’re out of packaged packets for now. If you have any questions about a certain variety, feel free to reach out!
- Live plants are available during their respective seasons – if we are sold out or don’t have it on offer during the typical ordering window, it will be listed as out of stock.
Do you have a waiting list?
We don’t have the capacity to maintain a waiting list for specific seed or garlic varieties. We update seed inventories in early January each year and garlic inventories in August, so those are the best times to check for availability. You can also join our email newsletter community for the latest updates!
We do maintain waiting lists for spring shipped live plants! This is because initial inventories are conservative estimates and we often have extra to offer once April rolls around. So feel free to reach out to get on the wait list for a spring live plant.
Do you have heirloom varieties? Are your seeds organic?
- About 75% of our offerings are indeed heirloom/heritage varieties! To view our full selection, click here.
- Un-Certified Organic: Our growing practices follow organic principles but we’ve not gone through the expense/effort to become certified yet. We use only natural soil amendments/fertilizers like manure and seaweed, and ecological practices like cover crops and mulch. We don’t use any sprays of any kind, preferring cultural methods of pest management like insect netting, timing of planting, ranging our poultry, and good ol’ hand picking of bugs.
what does heirloom/open-pollinated/non-gmo/untreated mean?
- Heirloom (a.k.a. Heritage) varieties are « open-pollinated » varieties that emerged at least 50 years ago.
- Open-pollinated is a clunky term that means bred the old fashioned way, with the seeds growing true-to-type generation after generation, unlike modern hybrid (and often patented) varieties. All of our offerings are open-pollinated. About 3/4 of our offerings are indeed heirloom/heritage and the rest of our varieties are the heirlooms of tomorrow! You can find all of our officially heirloom varieties here.
- Non-GMO: We make every reasonable effort as a small family farm to ensure that our seed offerings are non-GMO. Genetically Modified Organisms (GMOs) have had their genes edited in a lab and subsequently patented by corporations – these genes can then replicate through natural pollination. Our farm is very isolated from commercial agriculture (the only current possible source of GMO contamination). When we bring new seed varieties to our farm, we are careful to get them from another non-GMO source. In this way, we can ensure that our seeds are all non-GMO.
- Our seeds are all untreated – this means they are not treated with chemicals at any point.
How many seeds are in a packet?
- Each variety’s description lists the approximate number of seeds per packet. We base our packet size on enough seeds for at least an 8 ft garden row and also take into consideration how much work goes into producing the seeds.
- Bulk seed packets contain 10 times the seed count of the same variety’s regular sized packet.
- We do our very best to meet or exceed our approximate seed count per packet.
Why don’t you list days to maturity?
- While “days to maturity” are often relied upon to understand short vs long season varieties, they can also be misleading. Plants don’t grow according to a clock – the days it takes for a given crop to mature depends on soil fertility, sunlight, warmth (often called “degree days”), watering, and even time of year planted. The same seeds can take longer or shorter in different circumstances. Also, because we are seed breeders, many of our varieties are becoming earlier to mature than their commercial counterparts and even from year to year there can be big differences.
- Rather than listing a number of days to maturity, read each variety’s description where we’ll indicate if it’s especially suited to short seasons. Also check out our Planting Tips for more about our usual seeding schedules. Feel free to reach out if you have any questions about especially short season varieties!
Where are your seeds produced?
- We produce 100% of what we sell – and we maintain all our own stock seed breeding lines. This means our seeds are 100% Canadian grown and adapted!
When will my order ship/be ready for pickup?
- You will receive an email that your order has been completed when your order has shipped or is ready for pickup. We fill and ship orders on Mondays or Tuesdays – please keep in mind that if you place your order late on Sunday or on Monday it may not make that week’s order fulfillment. March through December, seed orders are filled and shipped/ready to pick up weekly. Please read below for information about pre-orders.
- Seed pre-orders received December through February will be filled and shipped/ready, in the order they are received, starting in February.
- Spring live plants (willow/dogwood whips, sunchokes, asparagus crowns, rooted cuttings, potatoes) are available for pre-order starting in January and will ship starting in April when it is feasible.
- Garlic can be pre-ordered starting in August after the harvest is in, sorted, & inventoried. August orders go out in early September. Orders are filled and shipped/ready to pick up within one week, September through November.
- Merchandise orders are shipped/ready to pick up within one week, March through December (December through February orders will be held and fulfilled in February along with seed orders, thanks for your patience!).
What are your shipping/handling costs & methods?
- We currently ship via Canada Post. Our shipping/handling flat rates are to cover the cost of shipping as well as packaging and labour filling orders. While large orders may cost more than our shipping/handling flat rate to ship, we consider it a form of volume discount.
- Seeds
- $6 for regular shipping (lettermail if possible) without tracking/insurance
- $30 for expedited with tracking/insurance (flat rate box when possible)
- Live Plants/Seed Garlic/Merchandise
- $30 for regular shipping
- $50 for expedited with tracking/insurance
Do you ship outside of Canada?
- We accept online orders for shipping in Canada only. No US shipments at this time. Other international orders will be considered on a custom order basis – reach out to us after you have researched the customs regulations for your country.
What are your payment methods?
- E-Transfer/Cheque: Follow instructions after placing order. Please note that we change the order status manually after payment is received (so won’t happen instantaneously). Email us with any questions/issues.
- Credit/Debit Card: Secure credit/debit card processing at checkout through Stripe. Please note that your card information is never saved.
- Cash on Farm Pickup: Available at the farm/events only. Please note that you must prepay at checkout for local pickup of seed orders at Fancy Pants Café in Bridgewater.
Do you take orders over the phone?
- Phone calls are welcome during reasonable daytime hours, and feel free to leave a voicemail if we don’t pick up. As a family farm, you’ll be calling our home landline, so we’re not really set up to take orders over the phone. But Chris can help you make an order over the phone by appointment.
Do you have a paper catalog?
- As much as we have loved thumbing through and dog-earing old fashioned paper catalogs over the years, we’re not set up to create and print them ourselves at this time.
Do you have a guarantee?
- We guarantee our seeds & planting stock as viable! For our full seed guarantee, click here.
- We are also available to troubleshoot! Reach out to us, we’re here to help.
Where are you located?
158 Woodworth Road, Laconia, NS B4V 5V7
If you are interested in a farm visit/order pickup, please arrange with us beforehand (at least a few days) as we don’t keep regular business hours.
What are your business hours? Do you have a store on-site?
- We are a family farm and don’t keep regular set business hours. We are open by appointment for pre-order pickups. We don’t have a retail space set up at the farm yet.
- As a small farm operating out of our home, you’ll communicate directly with us, the seed growers, but this means that we don’t have a customer service team or corporate business structure. Please be patient when reaching out to us!
Are you a seed company?
- We are genuine Seed Producers committed to contributing to authentic seed security: we are NOT a Seed Company that buys & resells global commodity seed.
- We steward & select our seed varieties (which means we maintain/breed our own unique strains) and have been offering our seeds commercially for over 15 years.
- We only sell seeds that we’ve produced ourselves in our fields & garden, and all of the pictures you’ll see on our website were taken from plantings of our seeds, mostly at our farm, including variety profile pictures!
- The small scale of our production allows for rigorous quality control, and our homesteading way of life means that we grow varieties that perform for us in the garden and in the kitchen.
- By buying our seeds, you are not only supporting small scale sustainable seed production, you are getting high quality, spray-free, non-GMO, open-pollinated, heirloom/heritage, & rare varieties- all adapted to an organic homestead garden. We hope to become your trusted source for high quality garden seeds!
Do you donate seeds for non-profits/community groups?
- Yes, in Canada only. If you are looking for donations, please reach out! The best time of year for us to accommodate requests for donations is January/February. Sorry, we may not have the time to respond to requests from outside of Canada.