Agrarian Seed and Garden is excited to spend their three year anniversary (to the day!) hosting Wild Ones Twin Cities and Nokomis East Neighborhood Association! On Earth Day, Saturday, April 20th, Vicki Bonk of Wild Ones will be presenting on native plant gardening basics and pollinator habitat, and give an introduction to Agrarian Seed and Garden’s extensive native plant selection.
Dusty Hinz, one of the co-owners of Agrarian Seed and Garden, has been into organic farming for about 13 years. His store has over 100 different native plant species, several kinds of grass alternatives, and more types of fruit and vegetable plants than I cared to count. It is very obvious he takes caring for the earth seriously. “I am absolutely a radical environmentalist, and I think the way we are living now is killing the planet and is not sustainable,” he said about why he chose to spend his life working with plants. He is working hard to make gardening accessible to the average person. He believes we would all be much better off if we could grow some of our own food and plant native plants to help the local ecosystem.
Dusty lives his values both in and outside of his work at Agrarian Seed and Garden. His family has a farm about two hours south of the cities with four acres of chestnut trees already planted and plans to plant ten more acres. The idea here is to produce staple human food calories inside farm systems that sequester carbon, do not require chemicals, and no longer require tilling soil.
He also co-manages a nonprofit called the Experimental Farm Network (EFN), which features seeds grown by over 50 different small-scale organic growers from across the country. This year the EFN seed catalog surpassed 600 total varieties. “It feels great being able to put money in the pockets of seed growers doing the imperative work of regional adaptation and genetic preservation,” Dusty said.
Of course, Dusty can’t do this all alone! He co-manages EFN and co-owns Agrarian Seed and Garden collectively with his brother, Colty, and Colty’s wife, Kierra. Colty and Kierra play a critical role in the day to day logistics in both of these operations.
Kierra, Colty, and Dusty are very happy with the kind of garden center they have created, where both novice and experienced gardeners feel welcome. They are also grateful for the resounding support from the Nokomis East community.
I hope you can join us on April 20th from 1pm-3pm to learn more about how to garden with your local ecology in mind. Agrarian Seed and Garden’s address is 5152 Hiawatha Ave, Minneapolis, MN 55417. If
you would like to come please click here to RSVP.
If you can’t make it, please check out Agrarian Seed and Garden some other time this spring! Their hours are Tuesday-Friday 10am-7pm, Saturday 9-4pm, and Sunday 10-4pm. However, they are only open seasonally, so be sure to come in before June 30th! For more information you can check out Agrarian Seed and Garden’s website and Experimental Farm Network’s website.