Instagram story viewer> @secondgenerationseeds> Posts

Second Generation Seeds

@secondgenerationseeds

9.9K

followers

127

following

Preserving & evolving heritage crops, stories, and foodways of the Asian diaspora 🌶🌱
Seed Shop now open ⬇️

POSTS STORIES REELS TAGGED

Download All

Waxy “Una Corn” selections! Moving towards our desired shapes, sizes and colors. In the winter we will test kernels to make sure the waxy trait is present. by @secondgenerationseeds

291

10

16 days ago

Baby food. The fuzziest soybean pods on our 오리알콩. Fruit setting on our grow out of 7 Korean watermelon varieties from the USDA genebank. And our purple 찰옥수수 “Una Corn” forming. by @secondgenerationseeds

107

3

2 months ago

Team field trip to visit Kristyn @secondgenerationseeds back in May. We learned so much and got a chance to connect with the land that’s producing some of the food for The Studio. Grateful for leaders like Kristyn who are generous with their knowledge: both preserving the past and shepherding in the future. 💚
📸 @teocriderphotography taken in Sebastapol, California by @secondgenerationseeds

173

1

2 months ago

We grow our kkaennip in open field conditions. Over the past 16 years, they’ve managed to meaningfully adapt to the wild conditions they’ve had to endure. Much of the perilla sold in groceries is grown in more protected greenhouses, allowing for consistent, and year round harvesting. For us, growing them and supporting their capacity to learn from, and gradually reflect the ecosystems we live within, is part of the magic of seed stewardship. Our plants have shown us time and again, how we may become greater than the sum of our parts, expressing where we come from, as well as where we are. Our relationship to place, and one another. Full sun exposure results in robust seeds and strong flavors, but at times, our dry, windy and hot conditions can make leaves thicker than people may be used to. We grow six varieties of Korean perilla, some leaf types, others, short season seed oil types. We’ve found that leaf quality tends to be more a result of environmental conditions, rather than genetics, since all of the varieties we’ve grown have thicker leaves in full sun, and softer leaves when shaded. Rather than manipulate their environment, or use more water, we tried to select for a trait that we found to be a genius development: bushy architecture, with multiple, simultaneous growth points. As our 38N variety grows, they first race vertically, creating new pairs of leaves at their apical point. But once they reach their fourth leaf set or so, side shoots emerge. Along the central stem, leaves are quite large, and thicker, so we harvest those for preserving or jeon, anything where their coarse texture is helpful to the process. For ssam, we harvest interior leaves. Each plant creates its own canopy, with tender growth being shaded by the larger leaves.
If you’re growing these at home, you can harvest like this to have a range of leaves appropriate to different uses. You could also plant more densely, which would also cause plants to elongate between nodes, and also result in smaller, more tender leaves. But this can also in the long term lead to more potential disease pressure. Scroll through to then develop!
Which type of leaf do you prefer? by @secondgenerationseeds

409

13

3 months ago

A peek into the process behind how we are breeding celtuce seeds with @gohyang_fields ! Six years of growing and cross-breeding with @ucdscopeproject and this year, we have some stable varieties to assess! We recently hosted a Celtuce Field Day where we brought chefs, growers/farmers, and wholesalers together to discuss what traits are important in celtuce. We examined the different leafy celtuce in the field and esteemed chef Siew-Chinn Chin (Chez Panisse, Charlie Cart Project, Ramen Shop) harvested and prepared different varieties for tasting.
Developing seeds at @secondgenerationseeds is a patient and community-oriented process.It takes time for varieties to show stability; it takes community to decide what a crop should look like and taste like to be culturally resonant, and how it should grow to be locally thriving. by @secondgenerationseeds

191

9

4 months ago

Bay Area farmers and gardeners, join us June 3 at the @gohyang_fields farm for CELTUCE FIELD DAY 🌱and be part of cultivating our future celtuce seed lines. RSVP by DMing us or @gohyang_fields. Space is limited.

We’ve been collaborating with @ucdscopeproject to grow different celtuce varieties, mostly derived from the most promising crosses. Check out these different varieties and get treated to a tasting with the amazing Siew-Chinn Chin of Chez Panisse, Charlie Cart and Ramen Shop fame.

What do you love about celtuce? by @secondgenerationseeds

68

2

4 months ago

Second generation 2026 seed catalog goes live tomorrow! 🎉🧧🌱 🌶️ Happy lunar year! Been busy packing seeds, stamping envelopes, getting them ready for YOU! Shop is on our website / Wholesale orders via secondgenerationseeds@gmail.com by @secondgenerationseeds

205

3

8 months ago

So grateful to be surrounded by these guys. Logging information, bean by bean. Getting ready for longer days and more light. We will have more information including a database and opportunities for you to join Team Soybean next season on our Seed Stewards platform. by @secondgenerationseeds

229

7

9 months ago

This season we grew over 100 varieties of 토종Korean soybeans. Now these early rains have had us scrambling to create enough dry spaces to harvest the seeds. We managed to multiply seed stock for most of them aside from some super late maturing types that we’ll keep in the field for as long as conditions permit. Some photos at the end show some interesting leaf phenotypes that look more like what you’d expect from vigna species in terms of shape but still have that soft downy soybean texture.
Excited to have a good amount of promising early to mid season potential 메주 types! by @secondgenerationseeds

337

8

a year ago

Year 5 of our 찰옥수수 waxy corn project. We started with 10 varieties shared by friends, allowing crossing between them, hoping for a range of combinations we could then select from. This became a collaboration between me and my daughter, whose strong preference for purple quickly narrowed our palette. We’ve got a really nice spectrum now, from magenta tones to deep blue shades. We are continuing to shape the ear and kernel characteristics, as well as field traits. You can see some of our favorite ears, as well as the amazing abundance of this season. Waxy corn is a unique branch of the maize family tree. The selection for glutinous grains (as seen in rice, sorghum, barley and millet) is an interesting preference in parts of East and Southeast Asia. These chewy kernels remain a seasonal favorite for Koreans and Korean Americans, and usually can only be found steamed and frozen in Korean markets.
At the end of each season we use iodine to test kernels to determine whether the waxy genes are still there. by @secondgenerationseeds

593

26

a year ago

What is your love letter for the future? 💛 We’ve drummed and danced our hopes into the field, into these seeds. Happy Chuseok and mid-autumn to you all. 🌕🌽 taken in Sebastopol, California by @secondgenerationseeds

565

21

a year ago

Gochu going strong in the greenhouse. Our Lady Choi and Gyopo, as well as an 오이고추 breeding project we are very very excited about. We also have a landrace from Jeju Island that played a significant role in chili pepper breeding in Korea during the 80’s. Breeders had identified many lines of pollen sterile parent peppers which was a great boost for hybrid development (these parent lines and CMS IP were so valuable that Seminis went on to acquire both primary Korean vegetable breeding companies because of them). Jeju peppers were a “restorer” variety, used to continually maintain seed production of these hybrid cultivars. We’ve been preserving them as a special part of both Jeju Island’s history, as well as for their role in shaping Korean pepper breeding. The now infamous Cheongyang Gochu is also a cross between Jeju and Thai chili peppers 🤓
This time last year we had just finished putting the cover on our greenhouse, so it’s quite heartening to see that same structure totally packed with happy plants at this point in the season. You can swipe through to see the greenhouse in various stages of being built out. by @secondgenerationseeds

235

4

a year ago