Shop

This melon is related to the mythical green-fleshed melon from Montreal and the Banana cantaloupe from the United States. Its orange flesh is very fragrant and its taste exquisite. It was designed in 1910 by the Trappist father Athanase of the Cistercians of Oka, formerly director of the Agricultural Institute of Oka. When the school closed in 1962, the melon disappeared... then was found on Île Bizard, where we grow it!

MAINTENANCE AND OTHER CONSIDERATIONS
Melons require heat to develop well.

An annual vegetable plant grown for its leaves, orache was once very popular. Its leaves, which are harvested before flowering, are eaten like spinach, hence its name false spinach. However, its cultivation is easier than the latter and it produces over a longer period. Orach tolerates cold spring and fall temperatures very well and if you let a plant go to seed, it will reseed itself in the garden.

MAINTENANCE AND OTHER CONSIDERATIONS
Sow successively to extend harvest time. Cutting the flower stalk as soon as it appears will also prolong the harvest.

Two-tone tomato with large, very sweet marbled fruits. Its firm, rosy, acid-free flesh has won several gastronomic competitions in the United States. The yellow fruit takes on a red and orange color as it ripens. This old variety was introduced in 1921, in New York, under the name of Ruby Gold. It was renamed Gold Medal by the American seed company Ben Quisenberry in 1976.

MAINTENANCE AND OTHER CONSIDERATIONS
Gradually acclimate to outdoor conditions about 10 days before planting by taking them out during the day. Lay the plants horizontally, slightly arching the plant to bring the leaves out.

This currant tomato was discovered in the Châteauguay region in the 1940s. It is a family favorite because its many small red fruits are a delight for children. Make no mistake about it, the real Petit Moineau tomato bears 7 fruits on its bunches, otherwise it is an imitation!

MAINTENANCE AND OTHER CONSIDERATIONS
Gradually acclimate to outdoor conditions about 10 days before planting by taking them out during the day. Lay the plants horizontally, slightly arching the plant to bring the leaves out.

Heritage variety brought to New France in the 17th century by European settlers. It is still eaten today in soups. Very productive, the plants can reach 1 meter in height and require stakes. According to the blog Le Potager d'Antan "an old European tradition dating back to the 15th century mentions that a pea soup would be associated with Saint-Hubert, patron saint of hunters and foresters. In summary, in the 7th century, after having moved away from God and having hunted on a Friday, Saint-Hubert would have encountered a deer carrying a scintillating cross which would have enjoined him to propagate the word of the divine. After many exploits including miracles, he brought the gospel to distant lands and built many places of prayer dedicated to the Lord. He died on May 30, 727 and was consecrated Saint on November 3, 743. This is one of the reasons why he is celebrated on November 3 in Belgium and May 30 in France. Europe would have perpetuated, here in Quebec, the name of this variety used in the famous hunting soup, in honor of Saint-Hubert. For the full story, visit the Potager d'Antan. This variety is considered very rare and in danger of extinction.

MAINTENANCE AND OTHER CONSIDERATIONS
Requires net or other support to be able to hang on. Peas do not like lack of water.

Curly mallow is a medicinal plant also called curly mallow or Chinese mallow. It was already cultivated in Asia more than two millennia ago. It has emollient, laxative and depurative properties. Its leaves, with their sweet flavor, are eaten raw or cooked. Still young, they can replace lettuce in salads. The stems of the plant can rise almost 2 meters in height.

MAINTENANCE AND OTHER CONSIDERATIONS
Reseeds itself.

Because we all had a grandmother who made rhubarb jam for us... An easy-to-grow perennial, this plant is perfect for lovers of "Guerilla Gardening". You wait for nightfall, then you discreetly plant a rhubarb seedling in a flower bed in plain view of the city. Small insignificant growth, it will go unnoticed. Then within a year or two, it will keep producing everlasting leaves with delicious stems and will be too healthy (you'll see to that) for the city to eliminate. Then you will then provide your grandmother with a stem that she will then return to you in a Mason jar, in the form of jam. Isn't it beautiful, the eternal cycle of nature?

MAINTENANCE AND OTHER CONSIDERATIONS:
Requires little care once implanted. Consider cutting the flower stalk to encourage leaf development. Direct seeding offers a lower germination rate than indoor seeding.

CAUTION Rhubarb leaves are poisonous, consume only the stalk.

In the 1960s, Mr. Q Réginald Lefebvre owned a farm in St-Rémi, Quebec. One day, some Spaniards ask him for a few acres to grow their tomatoes. He accepts and discovers by rubbing shoulders with them the potential of one of their variety of tomatoes. He cultivates it in turn. In 1981, for lack of succession, the farm was sold, but the tomato went down in history!

BOTANICAL INFORMATION
Latin name: Solanum lycopersicum 'Spanish Lefebvre'
Common name(s): 'Spanish Lefebvre' tomato, Italian type
English: Tomato Spanish Lefebvre
Family: Solanaceae

MAINTENANCE AND OTHER CONSIDERATIONS
Gradually acclimate to outdoor conditions about 10 days before planting by taking them out during the day. When planting, lay the plants horizontally, slightly arching the plant to bring out the leaves upwards.

The seed company has mixed everything together, and created for you an envelope of the different varieties of tomatoes that have grown on our farm. Includes Mémé de Beauce, Uncle Tom, Petit Moineau, Sun Drop, Téton de Vénus, Poil Blanc, Savignac, Plourde, Black Cherry and Black Ruffle. For lovers of diversity

BOTANICAL INFORMATION
Latin name: Lycopersicon esculentum and/or Lycopersicon pimpinellifolium
Common name(s): Tomato
English: Tomato
Family: Solenaceae

MAINTENANCE AND OTHER CONSIDERATIONS:
Gradually acclimate to outdoor conditions about 10 days before planting by taking them out during the day. When planting, lay the plants horizontally, slightly arching the plant to bring out the leaves upwards.

AmaranthAmaranthus sp.AmaranthaceaeAmaranth is a plant with many advantages. When the plant is still young, the leaves are used like spinach. The seeds, on the other hand, are used like cereals, raw, germinated, roasted or even to make flour. Some also cultivate it in the vegetable garden for the consumption of its foliage (like spinach). It is rich in vitamins A, B, and C but also in calcium, iron and magnesium, but we especially like amaranth for its haughty bearing and its bright red color in the garden.

BOTANICAL INFORMATION
Latin name: Amaranthus sp.
Common names: Amaranth
English: Pigweed
Family: Amaranthaceae

MAINTENANCE AND OTHER CONSIDERATIONS
Can become easily invasive, cut back once flowering is finished. If you want to collect seeds, cut the flower stalks when the seeds are almost dry and leave to dry on a tray. The flowers are decorative, cut off spent flowers to stimulate flowering.

HARVEST TIME:
Young stems and leaves before flowering (4-6 weeks) and seeds in the fall.

Courgette Cocozelle;Cucurbita pepo;50-60 days to maturity.;Appreciated by gardeners, who have been growing it for a long time, this ancient variety comes to us from Naples, hence its name Cocozella di Napoli.;Bushy type, it produces fruit tasty in quantity. To stimulate fruiting, be sure to harvest young zucchini. This will extend the harvest season and you will be feasting on little zucchini.;When ripe, this zucchini is 30cm in length. It is at its best if harvested when it measures between 15 and 20 cm. The dark green fruits are streaked with light green. The flesh is a delicate color between white and green.;Succulent cooked, fried, steamed or stored in the freezer.;Italian heritage variety.

BOTANICAL INFORMATION
Latin name: Cucurbita pepo
Common names: Zucchini, zucchini
English: Zucchini, zucchini
Family: Cucurbitaceae

MAINTENANCE AND OTHER CONSIDERATIONS:
Harvest regularly throughout the season to boost production.

Rare, resistant and very productive variety, formerly cultivated by the Iroquois. The plant can climb up to 2 meters in height and produces white and purple flowers. Young, the beans can be eaten as small green beans. Its name means skunk in English. Indeed, its magnificent beans are speckled with black and white spots, or sometimes entirely black. Their flat shape is reminiscent of lima beans. When ripe, they are ideal for making soups. Personally, we have tested them in baked beans, and they are delicious mixed with Kahnawake Mohawk. This bean was rediscovered in Chester, Vermont and saved by Gail Flagg of Fort Kent, Maine (USA). Perfect for the three sisters, to grow with Canada Croockneck squash.

BOTANICAL INFORMATION
Latin name: Phaseolus vulgaris var. 'skunk'
Common names: Climbing bean, skunk bean.
English: Skunk Bean, Chester Bean, Flagg Bean
Family: Fabaceae

MAINTENANCE AND OTHER CONSIDERATIONS:
Avoid handling or removing weeds when the beans are wet to prevent the spread of disease.

Also called "little red tobacco", this annual variety, with pink flowers, grows easily in all types of soil. Rustic, early and small in size, it matures in six weeks and produces a full-bodied tobacco.;Considered a sacred plant, tobacco occupies an important place in the Amerindian pharmacopoeia and is used in various rituals.;This tobacco, also called "petit tabac rouge" or "small red canadian" is mentioned as far back as 1807 by the W.M Ewing & cie in their catalog of 1897. In Quebec, the Petit Canadien has been cultivated for more than a hundred years. From 1884, it was marketed by the J. O. Forest factory in Saint-Roch-de-L'Achigan. Considered rare.

BOTANICAL INFORMATION
Latin name: Nicotiana tabacum
Common names: Petum, small red tobacco
English: Small Red Canadian tobacco
Family: Solanaceae

MAINTENANCE AND OTHER CONSIDERATIONS:
If you are planting tobacco for leaf harvest, remove the flowers. The leaves are picked when yellow or brown. If you want to collect seeds and leave food for pollinators, let the flowers bloom. You can also harvest the leaves, but there will be fewer of them.

Lettuce Grosse Blonde Paresseuse. Mentioned by Vilmorin, a French seed company, in 1904, this old variety produces a beautiful large head of a beautiful blond green. It is hardy, and does not go to seed easily. It's crunchy to the bite, and has given us a great harvest this summer.

BOTANICAL INFORMATION
Latin name: Lactuca sativa
Common names: Big summer blonde, Blonde cuirassier, Nonpareille, St-Omer summer blonde
Family: AsteraceaeI

Very crunchy lettuce, which a friend from France sent me as a gift a few years ago. Very easy to grow, it seems to like the Quebec terroir. On the Internet, here is what we found about it "This lettuce has certainly been born in the Champagne region since the beginning of the 19th century. Then over the decades, like many varieties it lost its real name.However, it survived time thanks to its undeniable qualities and was kept by a woman named Angèle and continued on its merry way and its propagation under this last name.Luckily, Gilbert Vincent, great collector of beans, was able to carry out after many years of research to find the surname of this old variety, a joint culture with another very old variety also from the Champagne region, the Alphange à graine noire, and was able to observe that it it was the same variety. Angèle was thus able to find her surname." There is also a mention of the variety under its English names in an 1870s London publication, The Garden by William Robinson.

BOTANICAL INFORMATION
Latin name: Lactuca sativa L. var. longifolia
Common names: Angela lettuce
English: Magnum Bonum or Florence black-seeded cos lettuce
Family: Asteraceae

Antoine D'Avignon was passionate about heirloom vegetables. A pioneer in Quebec in the preservation of heritage seeds, he harvested, cultivated and shared several varieties which, today, would have been forgotten without him. For example, Louis-Marie's Crotte d'ours potato, Ice Grow tomato (from Suzanne Bourgeois), Huron wheat, and... this corn. he appeals to all Quebec corn that our grandmothers grew no longer exists. No one grows flour corn anymore. After the interview, a lady telephoned the radio station to say that she had in her possession seeds of flour corn that had been grown in her family for ages.<!--more-->And so it is that she shared with Antoine her precious treasure. Then that summer, Antoine talked about it to his friend, Mme France Bouffard, who asked him to give her some seeds. Hesitating, because he has very few, he ends up leaving him 6 seeds. She cultivates and multiplies them, then makes flour for her pancakes. The story could have ended like this, but it was without counting on the early death of Antoine, who took with him the story of corn. More recently, Mrs. Bouffard contacted me, who then worked at Semences du patrimoine . We speak. She tackles the corn, then sends it to me by post. Having had a good first harvest, we can therefore offer it to you in turn. To top it all off, Antoine had given the seeds to another of his friends, René Paquet, who has kept the corn husk to this day. And on the envelope, a name. Anita Fournier, from Nicolet. We are looking for this lady (probably deceased today) or her descendants. Please let us know if you know it. Note that some of the seeds have been sent to Seeds of Diversity for preservation. Hoping that you too will contribute to adding a new chapter to the story. Send us photos of your Canadian White Corn and we'll share them.

BOTANICAL INFORMATION
Latin name: Zea mays (possibly a Northern Flint, but resembles Narragansett Indian Flint Corn, eastern US)
Common names: Flour corn, Indian corn (Quebec)
English: Horn
Family: Poaceae

Teff is a cereal of African origin with very small grains. Its culture is ancestral, it has been shown that it was cultivated by the Egyptians at the time of the Pharaohs. It is the basic ingredient in the preparation of injera, a kind of pancake characteristic of Ethiopian cuisine, and Tella beer, a traditional Ethiopian beer. Its grains are gluten-free, which makes it an ideal cereal for people who must follow a gluten-free diet. Teff produces an abundance of tiny grains.

Old dwarf cultivar from Beauce in Quebec, this bean is eaten fresh or dried. Its green pods are streaked with purple. According to many, it makes the best baked beans, but proponents of the Famille Boucher bean disagree. The solution? Mix the two.;The Beauce was a territory formerly occupied by the St. Lawrence Iroquois Nation. It would therefore be possible that it is a descendant of the beans that these people cultivated. When the First Settlers arrived, many exchanges took place between the two populations, and the beans were passed on to the newcomers. They, on the other hand, subsequently selected several varieties over many years, which favored the appearance of new lines in the varieties. The Thibodeau bean from Beauce County was found by Mr. Marc Warsha. It was actually Mr. Martin Roy of St-Zacharie, in Beauce, who gave him seeds. the cultivation of this bean goes back 4 generations, to Mrs. Thibodeau, from Beauceville, the great-great…grandmother of Martin Roy. The name, Thibodeau from Beauce County, appears for the first time in the catalog heritage seeds in 2003.

BOTANICAL INFORMATION
Latin name: Phaseolus vulgaris
Common names: Thibodeau bean, marbled bean, heritage bean
English: Bush Bean
Family: Fabaceae

**CAN'T BE SHIPPED OUTSIDE CANADA**When the Maison des Jésuites de Sillery, Quebec, began renovations, the gardener became concerned about the loss of a clump of garlic that had been growing there for years. He saved some bulblets that he took to Seeds of Diversity Canada. During the summer, we grew it. What was our surprise to see that the bulbils gave a large bulb of white garlic the first summer, and even a flower of garlic in September! And the flower of garlic appeared with multiple small green hairs of garlic growth. In addition, this garlic can multiply with several pebbles around the white bulb. In short, unknown name, nebulous origin, Jesuit garlic is an unknown variety that we are just beginning to know. Share!Envelope 100 bulbilsThanks to Kevin Bouchard for taking the time to share these bulbils.

The Comtesse de Chambord bush bean is a very old variety (1880s) originating, as its name suggests, from the Chambord region of France. Its small pods with elongated white grains and excessively thin skin have a remarkable quality that makes it a highly esteemed variety. Branched and late plant.