Alana,
Are you referring to the one day "lightening swap", a swap with a high ticket count or both? I vaguely recall one that was both - I don't think I ever got all those seeds planted, though. The plus side was that every seed packet that I offered got snapped up. I'm not up for it this year, since we now have a Spring swap available.
If we can attract newbies, a "piggy swap" (but not a lightening swap) would be a good way for some of us to clear out seed surpluses.
One swap where the ticket count was accidentally set too high had folks upset who didn't expect every seed packet to disappear. As long as the "piggy swap" is advertised as such, those who don't prefer that kind of swap can choose not to participate. That's my take on it. Others?

There are no tickets in a piggy swap. It's done outside the seed swap framework. I'm starting to bake for tomorrow, but I'll try to fill in a little more info in the next couple of days. Lisa has done a piggy swap and the blind swaps. So has bluespiral. Patrob has hosted blind swaps and I am sure we have others. Maybe they will elaborate and give their perspectives, too.

Apparently I'm not an alumnus. Either that's before my time in the swaps, or I missed something along the way. Now I'm really curious.

Karen participated in the original version on DavesGarden. My experience was on Cubits. For several years Ella hosted the Piggy Swap there. In brief, when the barn doors open players post what they have available. Not everything, just a couple of offerings, on a swap thread. The pigs who are waiting to get to the trough try to be first to claim the truffles. It's rough and tumble and fast paced and involves a little bit of strategy and a quick snout.

There are a few rules, but not many.

Few rules in a blind swap, too. Each player sends in the pre-determined number of seed packets, usually no more than three packs of any one offering. The host shuffles the seeds, makes sure you don't get anything of your own back, and sends them back out, usually not priority. The postage is considerably less.
You can add rules to tailor it to the tastes of those involved, for example:
1. Trade in kind, if you send in 30 veggies and 20 ornamentals, you get the same number of each back, providing enough seeds come in for each to make that possible.
2. Or, you can specify all rare or hard to find.
3. Or you can make it around an event or holiday. I used to do a Halloween one. All seeds sent had to be for orange, black or purple flowering or fruiting plants, or have a Halloweeny name.
4. All pink, or all white, or all whatever color, height, etc.

Anything else really. It makes it fun to match seeds to theme.

One batch coming out of the oven. Back to work.

@poisondartfrog . I was thinking about the old fashioned swaps we used to do. I know I took part in piggy swaps on cubits but I can't remember how it actually worked.

The 50/50 swaps we hosted on garden web were fun. @kywheeler who did the theme swap was a great one too! The woman that took it over when she gave it up ruined it!

I remember hosting one called Garden Genie, it was players got back what was sent in from their wishlist only. I bought a ton of vegetable seeds that year to fill in for the vegetable growers.

I have almost all my collected seeds organized, I say you host a swap in January.😊 I miss the days when we swapped all winter!

I have this Great Big Bin of seeds waiting for new homes! This is just collected, I'm still working on the commercial boxes.

The seeds. OMG, Lisa.
Not this season. I am excited about it, but not that excited, lol. Not right now.
I'll start sowing mid-next month for houseplants and certain other seeds and if I was ever great at multi-tasking, I've long since lost my mojo.
On the other hand you, or some other enterprising worthy...

Long term though, I think I will plan on a Halloween themed 50/50 next fall.

YES, I enjoyed your Halloween swap too. I didn't have a lot of Orange back then but I have a good amount of orange blooming seeds now. I have black and purple covered I'm definitely in for that!

I would be down for hosting a swap in January or February. I do have the baby 2 days a week but with my Mom passing, I'm going to have a lot of time on my hands. I'll need something to get me through the winter blues. It would also give me the opportunity to get rid of some of these collected seeds. I think that I have so many because I'm only doing one or two swaps a year now.

I'll look into printing my own labels so that I don't have to stand in line for an hour and a half while they weigh and make change for envelopes. 😂 The postal workers used to get so upset because I would come in with open packages and money paper clipped to the outside of each package. It would be weighed and then I would throw the money inside and seal it up. It took forever!

It would be simple enough to make a swap for sign ups and then a thread for receiving and returning packages.

Lisa,
Did you see the "Early Spring Extravaganza Swap" that was added last week?

I am a piggy swapper too. I'm game assuming I get more seedlings to survive Florida. I have a new seed germinating setup (which will be setup after I finish tiling the kitchen floor).

OT. I couldn't stand the old fake farm fake floor - not even vinyl. It looked dirty on purpose. Yuck. I am in another fixer upper rental - and thrilled to be able to afford this area. Got a batch of tile on Craigslist enough for my kitchen for $10 including grout and mastic. Nice, shiny white tiles. That will cheer me up so much! A shiny clean kitchen!

I could not handle entering seeds into the system for another swap this year and I wouldn't want to play with the same old seeds. Lisa if you decide to do one of those quick turnover swaps I might join. I might want to buy a few new seeds first. I'm a little tired of what I have. I would need to decide a little later, but it could be good.
If you do it on the seed exchange thread we might pick up some swappers that remember those swaps and get people interested in swapping in general.

@DraDiana, it's too soon for me! I'm still trying to pack and organize my commercial seeds to get some listed. I also packed seeds for Karen. I've just about had it with seeds 🙂.

When I get through the holidays, I'll likely want to do some swapping but old school style!

Thank you for pointing it out though 😊

You know what's impressive at 4:00 AM when you're working on TG dinner? That just 24 players have entered more than 3200 different seed postings in a swap. We rock.

Happy Thanksgiving 🦃

I've got my turkey in the oven and my sides prepared. It's time to get some seeds entered.🙂

Happy Thanksgiving to you, too, Lisa, and to all fellow swappers!

happy thanksgiving to my main two enablers and to all the other dreamers and seedsters,

karen

Happy Thanksgiving everyone. I cooked the turkey last night. I wasn't expecting any company, didn't have to time the meal to any particular schedule. A friend snowbirds in my guest room half the year. She was hungry too. I made turkey, stuffing, gravy and green beans. didn't do pies yet. I would rather turn the oven on at night while I am hot flashing on the other side of my place.

This is my Chanel the Golden Retriever's first Thanksgiving with me. She is my constant companion especially when I am in the kitchen. I added a bit of chopped turkey and gizzards to her kibble and drizzled a bit of the gizzard cooking water over the lot (after adding turmeric and her other supplements). She thought it was the best thing ever! I have cooked a lot of holiday dinners, but no one loves a cook like her dog does.

Happy Thanksgiving to all!
I've already deboned the turkey and have a pot of turkey soup simmering. My compost volunteer tan pumpkin made delicious pies. I think it was hybridized with a tan colored squash. It was sweeter than a typical pumpkin and very smooth fleshed. The seeds are huge - I think I'll eat them.

I was a piggy back in the day. Ella spent hours and hours, actually days and weeks, sorting and packing seeds for us. I worried about her when she told me her bed was a sorting space. She gave us a certain number of "oinks" per day. The person offering the seeds had to respond and keep a list of what to send to whom. It was lots of fun and communication among participants.

I hosted the What's Left on My Want List Swap for several years on several sites, the last on Cubits. Many who participated sent quality seeds that partipants had put on their wish lists. Then there were others who dumped whatever they had, old seeds included, in their bag and expected me to sort them out. I spent at least a month, many hours a day, on those swaps. I sorted seeds as they arrived, noting on my spreadsheet what wishes had been filled. Some participants did not mind duplicates; others did.

Then there was the issue of a person posting a wish list of fairly common seeds and sending in 20 or so packets. Hundreds of packets would likely be sent in for her; after her return bag was filled and some extras added, there would still be a few hundred common seeds to divvy up among the other participants.

Several times I returned seeds to the sender when they were not on the recipient's or anyone else's wish list. Then right near the deadline a huge package would arrive, once containing 900+ packets of wonderful seeds. The sender was one of the most conscientious and generous I have ever known. Now what? Go back through all the bags, usually around forty, and redo.

Sonetimes a participant who sent in a large number of packets asked for a lesser number in return. Others, however, asked for the same number back and were miffed when they got some generic seeds. I had nothing else to send.

I am glad I hosted those swaps, but I would never do it again. Maybe some of you who are younger and have more energy than I do now, can figure out how to make it work. I tried to make it better each year, but I never was satisfied with what I sent the traders who gave the most.

I myself love Dave's setup and think it's about as good as seed swapping gets.

I agree that Dave's set up is the premier platform for seed swapping and is irreplaceable. And I am intimately acquainted with the ungenerous, ungrateful trader.
But once in a while, the fast and free surprise exchange, casual and full of unexpected treasures would be a fun change of pace. It takes me months to pack and list all those seeds in the system. I can pack 50 seeds chosen for a pass around swap in a dedicated afternoon, send them off and quickly get back either some nice surprises or, upon occasion, an envelope of junk. It's just fun.

Patricia, you did a great job with the wish list swap. It was one of the best, and labor intensive.

I wonder how Ella is these days...she was something, really knew her stuff.

@patrob , I love Dave's set up here too. I enjoy looking through lists of available seeds and the dibbing for your most wanted is exciting. It's a wonderful way to swap and I'm'sure a lot of work went into creating it. But, like Alana said, the entering of seeds is a process and time consuming. I always run out of time to enter in what I have to share, this has resulted in several bins of unused seeds here.

Recently, I opened thousands of seed packets (2018) and dumped them out into a gallon sized Ziploc bag, it was FULL. I took the bag and walked down my street grabbing handfuls and just throwing them into the wooded area. Hopefully, I'll get something to grow. I'm not hopeful, I did it before the leaves fell.🤦‍♀️

The quick turnaround swaps, like 50/50 can be packed and labeled in just a few hours. Yes, I received many packages in return that most of what was in there went in the trash or offered to a newbie but I still liked doing them.😊 I knew that the host/hostess could only send what came in for swapping.

The wishlist swap was a tough one to host. I'm pretty sure I did that one for a couple of years after you? It's sad that there were people who would join just to dump old seeds and receive fresh in return. I used to order seeds and use a lot of my own stash to fill wishes of the veteran players but would not be happy with their return envelopes either. I'm sure you did the same or did the best with what you had available! I loved your searchable list.

I join an international seed swap each year for the last few years. I only send in a hundred packets which is the maximum for trading, extras may be sent in but the postage is so high! This year, with my mom passing I only sent in 90 packets of seeds with Just 10 to 15 seeds in each packet (this is the norm ). It was $20 to mail and $10 postage for my return envelope. I get a lot of things that I can't grow here because they're not hardy but I enjoy it and look forward to receiving my return package.

Whew, I'm long winded this morning. 😂