The Seed (National List of Varieties) Act 1973 made it illegal to sell varieties that weren’t registered on an official database. The listed varieties had to be shown to be stable, uniform and distinct. The legislation was intended to protect consumers from dodgy seed, but it’s also meant that we’ve lost hundreds of unregistered varieties.

For some breeders the process was simply too expensive and they couldn’t afford to register their varieties. Others were not classed as distinct because their particular qualities were hard to prove. The result? It is actually against the law to sell the seed of thousands of varieties. If we want to grow some of these valuable veg, there’s no choice but to save and swap.

The Heritage Seed Library, part of leading organic charity Garden Organic, is at the forefront of efforts to conserve our vegetable diversity. It maintains a collection of around 800 vegetable varieties that are not available commercially, including family heirlooms. However, it’s different from a gene bank because the emphasis is on making the seed available to gardeners, and they send out over 40,000 packets of seed to members each year. For more information and details of how to join, visit www.gardenorganic.org.uk/hsl.