Ella’s Garden is hosting the 2014 Hog Wild Seed Swap again this year. This year’s seed swap will start on November 10th, 2014. The barn doors will open at 10 PM EST. The swap will end on December 10th 2014 at Midnight EST.

The Piggy Seed Swap is a great way to spend the long winter months. You can not only get a bunch of great seed, but make some new friends in the process.

Want to know more about this seed swap? Advance Sign-Up, Rules and Questions can be found here:

http://cubits.org/ellasgarden/...

Signing up now does not hold you to the swap. We just like to get an idea of how many folks are participating and it is also a place for folks to ask any questions they may have.

The current never ending Chat thread can be found in the Cottage Garden Forum:

http://cubits.org/ellasgarden/...

Feel free to just follow along, or jump in and chat. Everybody is welcome.

Folks are starting to get their Piggy Seed Swap lists ready. This year the Have and Wants lists can be found here:

http://cubits.org/ellasgarden/...

Folks will be adding seed to their lists all during the swap time. While the swap starts on November 10th. Not all folks will be ready then. Want to watch how the swap works and join in later? That is perfectly fine. Folks may join the swap at anytime up to and including the last day of the swap in December.

If you want to see what the Piggy Seed Swap is like, you can check out last years “Oinking” threads here:

http://cubits.org/ellasgarden/...

We hope that you will consider joining us for this year’s swap. Happy Oinking 2014!!

Patti,

Since this is the Classifieds and Group Buys Forum where folks pay for and purchase plants, supplies etc. you might want to post this swap on the Plant & Seed Trading Forum: http://garden.org/forums/view/... where more folks who are interested in swapping will see it.

Thanks Lin, will go do that now.

It is a fantastic swap!

You get to specify exactly what seeds you want to receive.

You get to pick from dozens of people's Have Lists. Some of those lists are HUGE.

If you list something rare or unusual in your Wish List, often someone will dig deep into their stash and send it to you even when they did not originally list it in their Have List.

You only pay postage twice: once going TO Ella and once coming BACK from her. And you can ask for 100 packets or more.

And it's on Cubits, Dave's "other free site".

I'm looking forward to participating this year -- every year since the beginning of Cubits I've been tempted to sign up, but haven't done so until now. And all the "piggies," although apparently somewhat crazed for seeds, seem quite friendly!!

This swap is going to start Monday, November 10th, 2014 at 10:00 PM EST.

That's 6 days away, and the more, the merrier.

P-A-A-A-R-T-Y!

Do you post what you want? What you have to swap? I would love some new seeds but I don't have much many seeds. I do have some plants I could offer. Anyone do that?

>> Do you post what you want? What you have to swap?

You post your HAVE list and everyone can request from that (we usually call a "request" an "oink"). It is nice if you put up most of your HAVE list early in the swap, but you can add to it as the swap goes along.

Then, during the swap, you look at everyone else's HAVE lists and request what you want. They will tell you when they run out of a particular thing.

Also, you should make up a WISH LIST with general and specific requests. People cruise those Wish Lists and dig around to see if they have something that they didn;'t list, but that someone really wants. Then they tell you it's available.

One nice thing about the Piggy Swap is that you don't have to have something wanted by each person that you want to request seeds from.

Then, you can request seeds from anyone. You might request 100 seed packets and yet only get requests for a few dozen of your packets.

That works out OK because many first-time people come back the next year with more seeds and a passion for seed-swapping or gifting. Some wind up "pimping their seeds" with photos and descriptions of their favorites to encourage people to request them.

I've seen several cases where someone donated unusual seeds one year, and several people multiplied them and re-offered them in later years. Then the first person had a crop failure and requested that same seed back several years later.

There are many generous people in the swap, and probably dozens of people who already have more seeds than they can possibly plant. Some are happy to give away dozens or hundreds of packets and bring home a few things they were looking for, for ages.

>> I do have some plants I could offer. Anyone do that?

The Hog Wild Piggy Swap hasn't traded plants. The trades all go first to Ella / Starlight, and then get sent back out to everyone, usually in flat rate priority boxes. Plants wouldn't fit, and even bulbs require a bigger box.

I got started with a few large packets of commercial seed, divided up into smaller packets.

One warning: lots of people join thinking, "Oh, I'll just request a very few seeds". Roughly the same number of people look up a few weeks later and discover that they've requested 100 or more packets. HOOKED! That happened to me several years in a row. THIS year I'm going to cut way back ... maybe ...

I may have made it sound complicated, but it isn't as complicated as I made it sound! During the "oinking" phase, you just post and c-mail a request for something, and watch for the reply that says "you got it" or "I'm already out". When you get a request, you just reply with a post and a c-mail saying yes or no. You do have to create a HAVE list in their "database" section, and it's too your advantage to create a long WISH LIST.

I hope to see you there.

Ella has mailed out all our Piggy boxes!!

Hurray!!!

Weeeeeeeeeeee !

Eagerly waiting ... USPS says "Thursday" ...

Man I really need to participate in this! Now I'll have to wait til next year

You'll love it!

I often pay a few dollars extra to get a BIG pkt of seeds, then split it into many smaller trade pkts. Mostly I offer vegetables or fairly common flowers like Mikado CA Poppies.

Many of the participants harvest and save heirloom seeds, or split up pkts of rare and unusual seeds that get "oinked" for early in the swap.

My package arrived , and it's like I was turned loose on a dozen seed vendor websites with someone else's credit card. Three years in the Piggy Swap have almost cured my O. Seed D. obsession.

But not quite!

Toni -- if you think it sounds like fun, multiply that by at least several times! This was my first year (as I'm sure I've already said) and it was a blast (and right now I have a pile of seed packets on my kitchen table that came in the mail yesterday that I need to sort through). Fun people and a great way to come by seeds you've been wanting (or didn't even know you wanted ). If you checked it out on Cubits and joined the "Ella's Garden" Cubit, then I'm pretty sure you'll get a C-mail there with a notice about when it's going to start. (If you didn't do that already, then just go join!)

Got my seeds too and sat down today to plan out winter sowing...what I can start now and what needs to wait. Sooooooooo many great seeds from veggies to natives to flowers. This was my second year participating. Highly recommend joining in next year.

Yes, Lisa and All. I was just thinking about that yesterday. Need to get busy on what winter seeds I want/need to start soon! We have had so many family/illness and a really unexpected death this past year, I really want Spring to get here and so hope that this New Year is Better! I really need it! I am just ready for some Sun, New Plants/Growth anything Cheery!

Cat, here's to only good unexpected events in 2015 for all of us... and my condolences for your loss.

Weedwhacker, Thanks! I am all for that!

I did sign up on the cubits site but somehow I missed getting notices. I forgot to go back to cubits until I saw Rick's post above
I am so glad everyone had a great time and now has lots of seeds to work with. What a wonderful idea

I don't think there is any automatic notification of the Piggy Swap. It's all word of mouth plus the repeat offenders know to start checking Ella's (Starlight's) Seed Trading forum and cottage gardening forum sometime in October to see when the official start date will be for that year.

I usually post a note here in ATP's Classifieds and Group Buys forum, but this year Patti beat me to it.

http://cubits.org/ellasgarden/...
http://cubits.org/ellasgarden/...