As winter’s chill fades, the Mequon Campus Seed Library opens its treasure trove, offering tiny bundles of hope that will blossom into spring flowers and thriving vegetable patches. The Seed Library offers a wide variety of plant seeds free to anyone in the Milwaukee area, including MATC students, faculty, staff, and the general community. “The goal of the Seed Library is to provide access to patrons to grow their own plants,” says Mequon Campus Librarian Stacy Mose. At any given time between March and mid-May, you have a choice of 100 seeds for flowers, herbs, and vegetables, as well as native plants from the Mequon Nature Preserve.
You can access the Seed Library online two ways. The first is to do a search in your favorite search engine for “MATC Seed Library.” The other is through the MATC Libraries page with a One Search for “seed library” and navigate to the Research Guide. You can look through the catalog, which is best viewed on a desktop or laptop, where seeds are organized into categories, such as herbs, lettuce, and peppers. Within each category, you can easily view each specific choice of plant. For example, in the pepper category the choices available last year included Hot Matchbox Pepper, Sweet Bridge and Paris Pepper. You can switch between any of the choices to see a photo of the mature plant, information about it, and detailed growing instructions.
You order seeds on the site via a Google form and request to pick them up at any of the four MATC campuses. “If you don’t find what you want,” advises Mose, “check again in another week or so” and you might find what you’re looking for. The choices change often for a total of 200 types of seeds available during the spring season.
Each household can choose up to five packets per season. The library does a brisk business with lending to 600 households each year. Once you grow your favorite greenery, you have the option to harvest seeds and donate them back to the library. An experienced gardener in Cedarburg spent 10 years developing his own variety of corn and now donates the seeds which you can use to grow your own popcorn. Just look for “Doug’s Poppin’ Good Popcorn.”
Seed companies also donate organic and heirloom seeds to the library in packets which four student workers then subdivide into smaller amounts of about six seeds for each smaller packet. The workers put instructions on how to grow the plant on each packet.
On the Seed Library home page, you can see patrons’ photos of successful plantings. Here you can also sign up for the “MATCseeds” community email list which sends news updates to its 1,000 subscribers.
Although Mose hasn’t kept a garden in recent years, she was an avid gardener for 10 years and serves as your first line resource for general advice about the gardening space you have, say putting basil in a window pot, or your purpose for planting, such as growing cilantro for cooking. You can visit the Mequon Library as well to find the largest collection of books in Wisconsin about gardening and horticulture to research your interests and needs. For example, some of the books tell you how to attract bees, monarch butterflies, or specific birds. For expert advice, Mose refers you to the MATC Landscape Horticulture Program which partners with the library to make the Seed Library possible.
“People get really excited,” Mose says. “There’s a lot of pride in ‘I created this.’ Borrowers also involve their children or grandchildren.”
The Seed Library stayed open even during the COVID pandemic when patrons were able to pick up seeds at a drive thru. Gardening was a healthy and safe activity that people could continue during the lockdown. “Green things are good,” comments Mose, “and growing things feels good.”
Have no fear: Spring is near. Some gardeners even started planning in January. Visit the Seed Library and get ready for this year’s green season.
