Borrow seeds to grow your own healthy food and contribute to a sustainable community—it’s 1-2-3 easy with your Burlington Public Library card. Limited availability. Seed Library is located year-round at Central Branch, 1st floor. Here's how our seed library works:
- Browse & Borrow... select what plants you’d like to grow—you can select up to three "try-it" sample-size seed packets per family. Please see a staff member to check out your seeds.
- Sow & Grow... plant, tend, and enjoy your crop
- Reap & Return... if you are able, harvest new seeds and return them to the library, packaged (we explain how!) to be borrowed by local gardeners next growing season.
Seeds For Every Gardener
With so many possibilities, you might wonder which seeds best suit your skills and interests. Our handy guide will help you have the best gardening experience.
🌼 Curious: (Re)Discover the joys of gardening! These seeds are easy to sow and the plants need basic care, like watering and weeding. They are great for everyone—from beginners to experienced gardeners.
🌼🌼 Comfortable: These seeds and plants need some tender loving care and are perfect for gardeners with 1-2 successful growing seasons or adventurous new gardeners.
🌼🌼🌼 Confident: You're up for a growing challenge! These seeds and plants need patience and regular care to reach their full potential—but the extra effort is worth it!
Seed Types Available Year-Round
While most seeds are available only at the start of the current outdoor growing season, we have a small selection of seeds that you can borrow year-round as supplies last.
Chives
🌼 - Curious. The green stalks add a mild onion flavour to salads, soups, and more. You can eat the purple flowers too.
Chives are a perennial member of the onion family that sport beautiful edible flowers. This herb is cold-tolerant and best planted in early to mid-spring. It can also be grown indoors in containers.
How to grow: 60 days to harvest; plant 1/2" deep, create a small trench and disperse seeds, lightly cover; full sun
Lettuce
🌼 - Curious. Lettuce is a cool-season crop that grows well in the spring and fall in most regions.
Our seed library offers three varieties. Baby Market Blend is a mix of premium traditional lettuce varieties. Lola has full frilly leaves that are clear dark red from edge to base. Buttercrunch is a popular and time-proven variety with thick green outer leaves and a sweet, cream-coloured compact head.
How to grow: 75 days to harvest; plant 1/8" deep, create small trench and disperse seeds, lightly cover; full sun
Oregano
🌼 - Curious. Sometimes called wild marjoram, oregano is a woody perennial culinary herb and a fragrant and pollinator-friendly ornamental plant. It's easy to grow in containers or as ground cover. Oregano is self-seeding and spreads easily. An excellent companion plant for tomatoes and peppers.
How to grow: plant 1/4" deep, create a small trench and disperse seeds, but don't cover them as they need light to germinate; full sun; thin plants to 12 inches apart; harvest just before the flowers form for the best flavour.
Parsley
🌼 - Curious. Curly leaf parsley adds a clean and earthy flavour to salads and other culinary dishes. Use as a garnish and in salads and cooking. It performs well in containers and the field, allowing for multiple cuttings per season from one planting. Upright leaves make harvesting easy. Tolerates light frost.
How to grow: 80 days to harvest; plant 1/8" deep, create a small trench and disperse seeds, lightly cover; full sun
Spring Planting 2024
Get ready to get growing! Seasonal seeds will be available to borrow starting on April 22, 2024.
Along with the year-round seeds that you can borrow, we offer seasonal seed types in the early spring on a first-come, first-served basis until our supply runs out. The selection of seed types changes every year.
Acorn Squash
🌼🌼 - Comfortable. Also called winter squash, acorn squash is distinctive in its acorn shape, with longitudinal ridges and butter-coloured flesh. These winter squashes are grown on productive, semi-bush plants. They're a good source of fibre, vitamins A and C, and minerals.
How to grow: 71 days to harvest; plant 1/2" deep, 3 feet apart; full sun
Aster
🌼 - Curious. Like little starbursts of colour in your garden, this lovely needle variety of popular asters is eye-catching! The China aster is a profusely blooming, cool-weather annual, and the Nova Mix features a fantastic mix of colours: white, purple, scarlet, pink, yellow, and apricot!
How to grow: Sow the seed directly on warm soil and very lightly rake in.
Basil
🌼 - Curious. A fragrant and tasty herb, basil thrives in rich, moist, well-drained soil with full sun. It's perfect for containers.
Dolce Fresca basil produces sweet, tender leaves that outshone the comparison varieties while maintaining an attractive, compact shape that’s both versatile and beautiful. Use the leaves as you would any Genovese basil. We hear it makes an excellent pesto!
How to grow: 75 days to harvest; plant 1/2" deep, 12" apart, lightly cover; full sun
Beans
🌼 - Curious. Green bush beans are an excellent source of vitamins A and C and dietary fibre. This bush-type plant produces excellent yields of 8" long by ½" wide green beans. The beans have excellent flavour and are tender. They can be used fresh, canned, or frozen.
How to grow: 55 days to harvest; plant 1" deep in warm soil, 4" apart, cover lightly with soil; full sun
Calendula
🌼 - Curious. Noted for its unique bicolour flowers, the Calendula Oopsy Daisy is a compact, bushy annual with aromatic, dark green foliage and flowers with petals ranging from gold to pale orange. Flowers bloom from late spring until the first frost.
How to grow: Sow the seed directly on warm soil and very lightly rake in.
Carrots
🌼🌼🌼 - Confident. Amsterdam carrots can be harvested as baby carrots or allowed to mature for long, slender roots that store and freeze well. Seeds produce 6-8" coreless, orange-scarlet roots, that are sweet and tender.
How to grow: 45-55 days to harvest; plant 1/4" deep, 4" apart, cover lightly, and keep the soil damp during germination.
Chamomile
🌼 - Curious. These miniature daisy-like flowers are commonly grown and dried for teas, essential oils, and balms. The tiny white flowers are sweet-smelling and prolific.
How to grow: plant 1/2" deep, 5" apart, lightly cover; full sun; harvest flowers when fully open, use petals fresh or dry.
Corn
🌼🌼🌼 - Confident. Peaches & Cream (also called Honey & Cream) corn has earned its popularity for its gourmet flavour, sweetness, and tender, fine kernels. Cobs are approximately 12" in length and have rows of white and gold kernels. They are a must for any garden!
How to grow: 70 days to harvest; plant 1-2" deep; 3" apart; full sun
Cucumber
🌼 - Curious. For many years cucumbers have been a main item in many home gardens. High in purified water, they contain numerous minerals, particularly magnesium and phosphorus, and vitamins A & C.
Straight Eight cucumbers have cool, firm flesh and a bright taste. For peak flavour and texture, pick when 8" long. Best grown on a fence or trellis. These plants are prolific and dependable.
How to grow: 68 days to harvest; plant 1/2" deep, 8" apart, lightly cover; full sun
Dill
🌼 - Curious. Fernleaf dill bears tidy, bright yellow umbels that attract butterflies. This dwarf variety can be used as a border or container plant.
How to grow: plant 1/4" deep, 18" apart, lightly cover; full sun; when seeds turn brown, cut the entire head and hang upside down for the drying seeds to fall out.
Ground Cherry
🌼🌼 - Comfortable. Try something new this growing season! This striking ornamental plant, commonly known as Chinese Lantern, produces a small, nickel-sized, yellow, edible berry surrounded by a papery husk. It has a sweet flavour similar to pineapple. The fruit is ripe when the husk drops off the plant.
How to grow: 70 days to harvest; plant 1" deep; 18" apart; full sun
Lavender
🌼🌼🌼 - Confident. English Ellagance Purple Lavender has striking, bright purple blooms and silvery grey foliage. It emits the lovely fragrance we all love and is perfect for any sunny part of the garden.
How to grow: Start seeds indoors until rooted. Transplant into warm, wet soil.
Nasturtium
🌼 - Curious. Whirlybird Nasturtium has large, spurless semi-double blooms in seven brilliant colours. The plant is dwarf, compact and non-trailing. The blossoms are edible!
How to grow: Directly sow in the ground a week after the last frost, 1/2 inch deep and keep moist.
Peas
🌼 - Curious. Two varieties are available. Peas are relatively easy to grow with few diseases or bug problems.
Tender Sweet snap peas are like candy off the vine. These peas have dark green, slightly curved edible pods and a longer picking window than most.
Grundy-Perfect Arrow peas are tasty and sweet and tolerate cool and warm conditions. These strong plants produce high yields of 4" pods. Excellent for eating fresh or
How to grow both varieties: 65 days to harvest; plant 1 1/2" deep, 1" apart, cover lightly with soil; full sun
Peppers
🌼🌼🌼 - Confident. Both varieties. Ace Hybrid is one of the best bell peppers for areas with short or cool summers. The plants produce early and heavily, even when nights are cool.
How to grow: 55 days to harvest; plant 1/4" deep, 12" apart, lightly cover; full sun
Bright Star peppers are bright orange in colour, with a pleasant, sweet, crisp flavour. The plant produces blocky, 3-4", mostly four-lobed fruits.
How to grow: 75 days to harvest; start seeds indoors; plant seedlings 18" apart; full sun
Poppy
🌼 - Curious. This unique variety of poppy has flowers with crimped petals in shades of orange, yellow, rose, white, and scarlet. The plants are compact and have grey/green foliage.
How to grow: Sow the seed directly on warm soil and very lightly rake in.
Pumpkin
🌼🌼 - Comfortable. Grow your own Halloween pumpkin this year! The Aspen Hybrid variety is an ideal Halloween pumpkin, growing large with thick stems and burnt orange skin. This semi-bush plant grows 10-20 lb pumpkins.
How to grow: 95 days to harvest; plant 1"deep, 5" apart, cover lightly; full sun
Ornamental in nature, Blanco pumpkins are brilliant white with dark green handles. This highly productive, semi-bush plant grows 4-6 lb decorative pumpkins
How to grow: 100 days to harvest; plant 1" deep, 5" apart; cover lightly; full sun
Radish
🌼 - Curious. Amethyst radishes are an unusual bright purple skin, with a tasty white flesh. These radishes are small to medium in size, averaging 1" in diameter.
How to grow: 30 days to harvest; plant 1/4" deep, 12" apart; full sun
Sunflower
🌼 - Curious. This cheery plant was first cultivated in North America thousands of years ago for food, medicine, oil, and dye.
The Soraya is a common pollenless sunflower variety with large flowers and thicker, sturdier stems. Flowers have rich golden orange petals and dark centers.
How to grow: Directly sow seed a week after the last frost, 1/2 inch deep and keep moist.
Tomatoes
🌼🌼 - Comfortable. With their fast growth, high yields, and sugary fruits, Super Sweet 100 hybrid cherry tomatoes are a true favourite. This indeterminate plant produces large clusters of fruit that should be supported by stakes or cages.
How to grow: 60 days to harvest, plant 1/2" deep, 24" apart, lightly cover, full sun
Looking for a great sandwich or hamburger tomato? Look no further than the Big Beef tomato. Support is required with a tomato cage, stake, or trellis.
How to grow: 73 days to harvest; plant 1/4" deep, 24 inches apart, lightly cover; full sun
Zucchini
🌼 - Curious. Also known as summer squash and courgette.
Raven hybrid green zucchini have dark green, cylindrical fruits that are smooth-skinned and especially tender-fleshed. They have consistently delicious flavour, whether picked as babies with blossoms still attached or at larger sizes.
How to grow: 43 days to harvest, plant 1" deep, 2 feet apart, cover lightly, full sun
Collecting & Donating Seeds
All seed types can be "returned" to the library, whether they were initially borrowed from BPL's seed library or not! Returning seeds is not a requirement for borrowing seeds—but seeds returned from successful plants will grow our collection and help cultivate seed stocks best suited to our local climate. How you collect seeds depends on the types of plants you are growing. Generally:
- Harvest mature seeds from your healthiest plants.
- Pick fruits and vegetables a bit riper than you normally would. Remove the seeds, rinse them, and let them fully air dry.
- Leave your flowers to dry on their stems, then carefully snip them and shake the seed into a container.
We recommend reviewing a seed-saving resource, such as the Community Seed Network, if you are new to harvesting seeds. Or, explore the library’s seed-saving collection to help you get started.
How to Package Seed Donations
- Make sure your seeds are completely dry.
- Put each type of seed into a different bag or envelope. Make sure your packages are well-sealed!
- Label each bag or envelope with the seed name, variety, and harvest year. Library staff can provide labels. For example:
- Seed Name: Sugar Snap Pea
- Variety: Pea
- Harvest Year: 2024
- Drop off donations to a staff member at any of our branches during open hours. Do not put seeds in our drop boxes, please.
Frequently Asked Questions about the Seed Library
Q: Do I have to return the seeds?
The beauty of a seed library is the ability to engage in the complete growing cycle—sowing, growing, harvesting, and seed saving. We encourage all seed borrowers to try their best to save seeds and return some to the library.
However, we understand this is a challenging task. So, during the growing season, we'll share more information about seed saving and instructions on donating harvested seeds to our Seed Library. And watch for seed-saving programs to help build your skills so you can confidently harvest seeds from your crops.
Q: May I donate seeds?
We want to build our seed collection from the healthiest vegetables and herbs in your garden. We appreciate that you might like to donate extra seeds from store-bought packages—instead, please pass those seeds along to your friends and family to grow, harvest, and then give to our seed library!
Q: What seeds do you have?
We order a selection of vegetable seeds you would traditionally see in a home garden, as well as herbs. We attempt to order a few varieties in each category. All seeds are non-hybrid and organic where possible. Most of our seeds are supplied by William Dam Seeds and Stokes.
Q: How many seeds can I check out?
You are now part of a community of gardeners, and we ask that you respect that the Seed Library is a shared public resource. You may borrow up to three seed packets on one library card per family.
Q: Are seeds available year-round?
The seed library will have materials available throughout the year, though not all seeds can be planted year-round. More information about when to plant various seeds can be found in our seed library catalogue.
Q: What do I do if I can’t find the kind of seed I’m looking for?
If there is something that you would like to see next growing season, let us know. Or, if you choose to purchase heirloom seeds instead this year, you can choose to save those seeds and donate some to the library to help us grow next year.
Q: How do I properly save seeds after harvest?
The methods for saving seeds will depend on the variety of plants. Some seeds are quite easy to save. The seeds in this collection have little risk of cross-pollination, so when you plant seeds next year, you’ll get the same fruits or vegetables that you got last year. These seeds also require fewer steps to successfully save seeds. Some seeds, like those in the squash and pumpkin family, require a bit more work to successfully save. These seeds easily cross-pollinate and need plenty of space between plants; they also may need to be hand-pollinated.
We encourage home gardeners to save seeds from the "easy" plants: tomatoes, lettuce, beans, peas, and peppers. (Some extra know-how is needed for peppers.)
Q: Are the seeds from BPL's Seed Library all organic?
The start-up collection of seeds in the library were heirloom varieties (saved and passed down for generations) and bought from a vendor that is certified organic by an independent certifier, Pro-Cert Organic Systems Ltd. BPL Grows Seed Library encourages seed donors to practice organic growing methods and to be honest when providing information on their seed donations. However, there is no guarantee that the seeds donated by community members are organic. As long as you use organic growing methods, your vegetables will be essentially organic, just unable to be certified by an independent certifier until you have been growing them organically for a minimum of three years.
Q: Is there supporting information for the seed library?
BPL Grows Seed Library provides access to information to support our gardeners in growing their own food. As well as information sheets on basic gardening and seed saving, the library may offer workshops of interest to gardeners throughout the year. Burlington Public Library also has a wide variety of resources of interest to gardeners.
Q: Who do I contact for more information?
For more information, please call our Digital Resources & Collections Librarian.