Library of Seed Images

The Hardy Plant Society has provided a Seed Distribution scheme for several decades and recent seed lists typically have about 2000 different species and varieties.  Each year we have several entries which are new to our list, and in some cases unavailable elsewhere.  This provides a unique resource for building up both a physical collection with good verbal descriptions, and a photographic index with some aspects of the seed magnified.

This Seed Index will be a useful resource for those receiving seed for both our own distribution and other seed schemes when seed which has been donated needs some verification. However the index does not set out to be a seed database by which a totally unknown sample can be identified; it is not intended as a searchable database.

We currently have nearly 2000 specie/varieties in the index and as this is a “work in progress” there are many more to come. The seed is photographed on 2mm graph paper and the scale and name is given on each figure, and in most cases we also include a close-up of part of the image.

Cultivars are unlikely to come true from seed. so they are labelled as ex---, eg Clianthus puniceus ex 'Albus'.

Photograph aficionados should realise that this is not a photographic competition; the various blemishes are part of the price of getting through the numbers!