By Amy Simone
Extension Master Gardener
University of Vermont 

Choosing seeds and starting your own transplants are among the most empowering ways to garden. Why grow the same vegetable varieties that you can buy at the grocery store when there are so many others to try?

In addition, purchasing unique varieties of seeds encourages growers to keep offering them. As a bonus, diversity in your vegetable garden can give our pollinators and other beneficial insects a wider diet.

Perhaps you are looking for the ideal tomato to slice fresh off the vine into your salads and prefer them to be balanced between acidity and sweetness. As you read the growers’ notes on various tomato varieties, focus on the description of their flavors and uses and let that guide you to a few options. 

Among the choices between those perfect, not-too-sweet, fresh eating tomatoes, there also are options for hybrid, heirloom or open-pollinated seeds. 

Hybrid seeds, also referred to as F1 (first generation off-spring) hybrids, are the result of a controlled cross between two parent plants of the same species carefully chosen for their attributes. This is a lengthy process that may take seven to eight years until a consistent hybrid plant is achieved. 

The seeds from this winning combination are packaged and sold with a higher price tag. In exchange for the extra cost are seeds with “hybrid vigor.” These seeds germinate into strong seedlings that become larger plants, yield more fruit and are more resistant to the common diseases and pests for that type of plant. 

To clarify, hybrids are not genetically modified organisms, also called GMOs, as some people may believe. GMOs are made by modifying the plant’s genetic material in a lab. 

The downside to hybrids is that to continue to grow the variety that you like, you will need to buy seeds for it each year. Seeds saved and planted from F1 hybrids will not result in the same plant. 

Open-pollinated seeds, often noted as OP on packets, are from plants that are pollinated naturally by the wind and insects. Seeds saved from these plants will grow exactly the same variety. It’s especially easy to save the seeds of beans, lettuce, tomatoes and peas for planting in future seasons since these are self-pollinating plants.  

Heirloom seeds are open-pollinated plants that were developed naturally outside of the commercial plant trade. Heirloom plants often have been saved and replanted for more than 50 years, and there is usually an interesting backstory to how that variety developed. 

Standard and heirloom open-pollinated seeds will yield stable traits from generation to generation. Many people feel that their flavor is superior to that of hybrids. They are less expensive than hybrids, especially when you save their seeds for the following year’s crop. 

If saving seeds is important to you, there is likely an open-pollinated variety with the desired attributes that is similar enough to a hybrid that you like. 

Hybrid varieties may be better if you have a smaller garden and want to get more yield from fewer plants. Open-pollinated plants will offer more varieties that focus on taste and uniqueness. There is room in your garden for both.

Most importantly, embrace the power to expand the diversity of vegetables that you grow by selecting your own seeds. 

For questions about seeds, seed starting and other gardening topics, feel free to reach out the Extension Master Gardener Helpline at https://go.uvm.edu/gardenquestion.