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With the growing popularity of organic foods these days, it's only natural that more and more gardeners are turning to organic seeds. But how do organic seeds fit into the organic food movement and are they really worth the extra cost? Before you decide, let's look at the benefits and drawbacks:

PROS

1) Organic seeds are bred to grow well under organic conditions. This means the resulting plants often have better disease and pest resistence, higher nutritional content, higher yield, and are more vigorous than plants grown from conventional seed. This is because organic seeds are intended to be propagated under organic conditions and must be able to perform well without the aid of chemicals.

2) Buying organic seeds supports organic farming. If the environment is important to you, this is the best reason to buy organic seeds. These seeds are grown on organic farms by farmers committed to the organic process. Organic agriculture plays a major hand in the development of healthier soils and stronger plant stock. Each time you buy organic seeds, you support the efforts of these farmers.

CONS

1) Organic seeds do not produce organic food. When food is given the label of "organic", it simply means it was grown without the use of pesticides and chemicals. It has nothing to do with what type of seeds were used. If you want to grow organic foods, you must be committed to using natural disease and pest prevention methods and natural fertilizers. The moment you apply chemicals to your plants, they are no longer organic. Simply buying organic seeds does not make you an organic gardener.

2) There are fewer choices with organic seeds. When shopping for organic seeds, you will find your choices are limited in terms of variety. As the demand for organic seeds grows, more varieties will become available. But for now, if you have a particular kind of tomato in mind or are looking for an heirloom variety, you will probably have better luck with conventional seeds.

HYBRIDS

One final consideration is that organic seeds are not genetically modified. This can be viewed as either a positive or negative. Genetic modification allows growers to produce hybrids which are usually easier to grow. However, they are also often less flavorful than non-hybrid varieties. For this reason, many gardeners prefer to avoid genetically modified seeds.

When deciding whether organic seeds are worth the extra cost, you must first look at your reasons for buying them. If it's simply so you can grow organic foods, you might want to save your money and buy non-organic seeds instead. You can still produce organic foods by eliminating chemical treatments from your gardening methods. However, if your goal is to support the environment and organic farming, the extra cost of organic seeds is money well spent. Finally, if you do decide to buy organic, try to buy as locally as possible. This will help ensure your seeds will perform well under your local growing conditions and you'll be supporting local agriculture as well.

Learn more about this author, J Tyler.
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