Have I Been Scammed, or Just Educated?

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Or possibly both.

The day after Christmas I placed our first seed order for the gardening year.

One of the things Michael and I want to do is sell cut flowers at the farmers market. So I did some shopping for pollen free sunflower seeds. They are more expensive than standard sunflowers with pollen and there were a lot of packages of 10 seeds for $2.50.

I did more searching and began finding much better deals. One particular variety appealed to me at the moment and this is what I saw.





Nice. Even free shipping!





And the details.





Well, they got here yesterday.





We opened it excitedly, and this is what we found...





A closeup.





Yes. Those kernels have no hulls. They look rather like snacking kernels. I wrote back to the seller:

Hello, I just received my order for these sunflower seeds and they are not what I was expecting at all. These seeds have no shells and they cannot be planted and grown. I am very unhappy with this purchase. Can you please send me seeds that can be planted and grown? I hoped to have these pollenless cutting flowers for this summer. Thank you.

And this was their very informative response. (Read mild sarcasm)

YES THEY CAN BE GROWN, SHELL IS JUST A SHELL BUT YOU MAY RETURN IF YOU LIKE.

So I decided to be a little more specific in my questions:

How and why did they come to be without shells? That is a lot of extra work for garden seeds, and I've never seen that done before. Where is the packaging that shows what variety of sunflower they are?

All this time, I am researching on the web... and I got another slightly annoying response, giving me no more information than I already knew.

I am a dealer and buy my seeds in bulk. That is how they arrive to me.

I have an eBay store. My answers will be MUCH longer and more informative than that. I am considering sending this message back, before leaving negative feedback.

I am pleased by your quick replies, but frustrated by the simplistic nature of them.

Every dollar is a struggle for us, these seeds are not just seeds, but the commitment of valuable garden space for producing cut flowers for setting at market so that my son and I can survive financially. If these seeds are not the pollen free variety we need, then we can't sell them and we've wasted a lot of time and work.

Nothing in my experience of gardening in my entire life has shown me that hulled, unlabeled sunflower seeds would add up to an expensive cut flower planting lot.

I am left with choosing between returning these seeds at my expense, when they were not listed as hulled in your eBay ad, or using up an entire garden bed and hope they sprout and are the type that was claimed in the ad.

If these seeds are as you claim, at least give me the information I need to feel comfortable with my purchase, and not spend the next 6 months wondering if I've been had.

Thank you.

I don't know, am I asking too much? I do not feel comfortable with this purchase. Would you?

OK, so I was off to do research on the web again. You know, a lot of time in my life is spent on research.....

I could not find anyplace that recommended removing the hulls from seeds to plant them in your garden.

I did, however, find that people who sprout sunflower seeds for baby greens, or seed sprouts, buy them this way and that they are indeed supposed to sprout better that way. Many of them say it's good for gardens as well, as an added afterthought.

So I have several questions after all this

1. Why would anyone go to the time and expense of shelling these sunflower seeds for mass sprouting of pollen free varieties? You would not want to spend the extra money on a specialty variety that you were never going to worry about if it were pollen free or not, because you were going to eat them as sprouts.

2. I seriously doubt that this seller, out of the goodness of her heart, individually shelled 100 seeds for me, so they would sprout more easily. So she's obtained them, already hulled, somewhere else in bulk and is selling them off in lots of 100. How do I know that these hulled seeds are even the variety listed?

Actually, somewhere in my mind is a concise and logical list of successive questions to ask, thereby leading all to one conclusion. There is no way this is legit. However, it's locked away tightly in the Fort Knox of my mind and I can't seem to remember where I left the combination right now.

All I know is, we have a choice. Either return these at our own expense, or plant them and hope they grow, and double hope they are the variety she claims so we don't waste valuable garden space on a useless variety.

I don't think we'll be buying seeds off eBay again. I have since found many pollen free varieties, at good prices, from well known seed sellers. And I wonder if we can sprout one of these kernels and see what kind of flower it produces by real sunflower planting time....

Anybody out there with experience planting only the kernels?

~Faith

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Double Trouble

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( EDIT - Having issues with my two main browsers, so had to go through IE to post pics on last entry. Whew! Took me 1/2 hour. )

I had just decided to put my pictures on manually since the browser coding issue had not been resolved yet, but discovered that I cannot even do it manually.

Here, in my editor, all the html icon links above are working.... except the "Add Image" icon. Is anyone else having this problem?

So I don't know what's up, but I hope the issue is resolved soon. Without pictures my posts are way too wordy.

Yesterday we weeded and tended the herb, strawberry, and flower beds. I ended up with two large bouquets of sunflowers. The June bearing strawberries are laden with green fruits, that the birds are even eating now. We harvested another large basket of basil.

We began gathering branches to make bean teepees, as the corn did not come up sufficiently to do so. We will do more this morning.

Last night, until about 10 pm, we cleaned out the tool shed. It's done but we need to find a place to store all our sports equipment. The year before DH left us, was the year Michael and I focused on his sports. We spent several hours each day doing a variety of sports as part of his school. We had the back of the minivan packed with equipment and just carried it around with us.

However, we've not had time for sports at all any longer, and are hauling all kinds of farm stuff around in the van, since our truck doesn't work. LOL So the sports equipment has been in the tool shed, taking up a good deal of room. We've got to find a place for it all.

I am selling a tennis ball throwing machine that I had found thrown away and had wanted to repair.

Still have a box of cukes, a large basket of summer squash, and the basil from yesterday to process today. And go up on the hill to cut and strip red cedar saplings for bean poles. Perhaps we can get to cleaning out the studio today as well.

I haven't even got to the pool yet.

And this is too wordy. ;)

~Faith

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We made a successful trip to go get the pool. It's not much to speak of, but it's enough to get wet, cool off, and swim in! YAY! The drive there was a good two hours each way, so we didn't get much done at home yesterday, just the pool and heading to a Bible study at the home of some friends.

Here are those pics of the Swiss chard we hung on the net. I had wanted to get home and bring them in to the dehydrator that night, but we didn't make it until the dew had already settled all over them. Here they are still covered in dew the next morning.









So yesterday we hurredly got them into the dehydrator before leaving for Bible study, then of course, forgot to turn it on. LOL So we dried them overnight and just got finished bagging up a lot of them, and putting the ones that were not dry enough back in, cutting away even more of the stalk.

You really need to remove the entire stalk, so just figure on cutting every leaf in half to remove it. I like folding them over and slicing the stalk out in one motion.

I am not quite sure HOW dry they need to be. Not as dry as herbs, or they will crumble, but I don't know how much moisture is OK before you have to deal with mold. Another learning experience. We are going to know a lot someday. ;)

A neighbor of the pool place was just a little ahead of us on a greenhouse project, so I got permission to go and look at it and take photos.





















Am setting some cuttings from my folks' lavender plants. There were not a lot of good growth areas, I'm not sure the flower stalks will make good cuttings. But I took what I thought was the best of what was there. If they don't work out, I can try again. The nursery downtown was completely bought out.





I tried to buy all my supplies at WalMart late last night for making bread and butter pickles. Most everything was sold out and all other stores were closed. I have no idea what I'm going to do with the cukes. I am not making another trip to town today, and there is no room in my fridge.

And our first sunflower bouquet of the season.





I LOVE having my own cutting flowers again!

~Faith

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The Joy of Working With Friends.

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We had a really nice day yesterday. Here is Leah, being introduced to Kohlrabi. :)





We got up, did our usual morning stuff of straightening up, Bible study, prayer; then we went out to begin working. Leah came by around noonish and we worked outdoors until dark, with a brief interlude during some showers when Michael played his pirates game and Leah and I watched "The Belly Button Song" on YouTube, an interesting video about prophecy and possible ties to eclipses, and studied up on some herb questions we had.

The Japanese Beetles are not bothering the vineyard too badly, since Michael sprayed it, but they'd moved over to the Doyle Thornless blackberry row, so that got sprayed. We had to removed some of the grape clusters, due to Black Rot, but not too many. We've got more grapes than we've ever gotten before, but I've been ruthless in cutting off, pulling off, and spraying. Next year, I can't wait to eat grapes!

Mowing took hours again, so did weeding the herb garden, pruning and tying up blackberries and grapes, and tying up cucumbers. Then it was dark. LOL

For anyone who does not know kohlrabi, it's a brassica, so it tastes remarkably like broccoli. However, you can serve this at parties and not worry about having broccoli stuck in your teeth. That is note-worthy in my book!





Just cut off the exterior, slice, chill, and serve these crisp and crunchy bulbs with veggie dip.





We have so much to begin picking right now. The broccoli is about ready.





The cauliflower is making an appearance.





The piricicaba is showing up.





The piricicaba is getting away.






Piricicaba ~ There's something funny going on in the broccoli patch.

Working our way downhill, we were planning on documenting the progress of the Mockingbird chicks, but when we got to the sunflowers, look what we found.





It sat there for the longest time, exhausted, I'm sure, from learning to fly. It's parents sitting up on the overhead wires, were quite concerned, but knew there was nothing they could do. They probably gave up hope, but after we all just looked at each other for a while, we got back to work.





We stayed up til about 1 am, trying to see stars. Michael stayed up with us. With the light cloud cover and the two-doors-down neighbors yard spotlights, it was difficult to get good viewing, but we had fun playing games, making up limericks, and imagining all sorts of odd adventures in between clear spots.

We never made it to the tomatoes, so that's first on the list this morning. I may be able to gather my first sunflower bouquet, I'm hoping. And I need to make pickles. The counter is absolutely COVERED in cukes.

Later today we are going to help some friends with some chores, then hopefully, go the the movies together. We've not been to the movies in a while, but the theater is having discounts on Tuesdays, so if they are showing Night At the Museum 2, we'll go.

I better check the movie schedule!

Have a great day! Humidity is supposed to be lower all over. Yay!

Faith

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Sea Monkeys!

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Michael has been sick since Thursday. Yesterday, being our usual sabbath day of rest anyhow got him to thinking about our tradition of pulling out a craft or activity from the studio on Saturday afternoon. His choice was to grow another batch of troips, or what I used to know as Sea Monkeys, from the backs of comic books as a child. They should be hatching by Monday if they work. I'll post pics. Try not to fall off the edge of your lawn chair in suspense. LOL

I have figured out how to drag and drop pictures in a larger format here, using my Flock browser. I do like this browser, though I've heard that Firefox has an extension that is almost the same. I don't want to try another extension. My computer has about (__) this much room left...

Gardening successes and failures are coming to the forefront.

We started the last herbs we had in seed last week and these little guys are coming up. Aren't these German Chamomiles cute?




I did do a quick deadheading on my one fragrance-free peony by the studio.




Thanks to Tracy at Peaceful Acres We are trying to save a little money by finishing out our potato bins in straw. I'd heard of growing in straw but didn't think of applying it to potato bins. The bins are new to me, so it's an interesting experiment.




Blackberries and grapes are all pruned and tied up.




Flowers on the wild blackberries are white, these Doyle's are very light lavender.








The sunflower cutting garden. We're succession planting.




Not confident in our first pumpkin planting, in which we followed instructions for a 12" high hill in the garden, we dug a spot in a well fertilized area of the pasture and replanted. The stakes are high now in our competition. If we win, the other family has to dress up for the Christmas Ball.




An overview of the garden. Really a slow start this year.




Our first flush of Sugar Snap Peas.




Our second and third plantings.




We put in new melon seed one week ago. They are actually coming up this time. I think our spring was just too cool and moist for them. I'm so glad we are getting melons!




The summer squash are not doing well at all. The weather kept us from planting and I've read that if they stay in the pots too long before transplanting they will bloom far too early for their size. Just like this.




Michael gets 30 minutes a day for computer games. He doesn't use them up sometimes as we are so busy, but he got to use some saved minutes while sick on Saturday.




Where we went outside to enjoy perfect weather and work on our seasonal to-do list.
You can see, the front yard has had nothing done to it. The soil is awful. Some day! :)




Me, sporting that bruise from falling down while chasing the filly.




Seth, the Faithful Doggy.




Our initial lists, to be added to as we find the need. Don't know if you can read them. I'd like to put a list at the side of my blog that I can cross off here, if anyone can tell me how to do that.










Now that my list is done, I'm a lot happier!

Faith

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