Hello and Welcome to the Pilling St John's School Seed Bank!

This year, our Eco-Team have been looking at all the potential that a seed holds. From the potential to grow food, provide habitats, create beauty, encourage exercise and mental wellbeing, provide medicines, encourage investigation and learning to the potential to even save the planet. 

In September we took over assembly to talk about all this potential and the idea for the seed bank was born (germinated if you will!) 

What is a Seed Bank?

A seed bank is where we store seeds and the information you will need to grow them. Then people can ‘borrow’ them (like a library) to plant in their own gardens or local area. We want to encourage more people to get growing and save the planet.

Why We’re Doing It – Our Inspiration

It all started with a B&Q advert, you may even have seen it on TV yourself. (If not have a look on the link below). We loved the idea of the crack in the concrete being all that was needed for nature to strike back in our world and that got us thinking......

The Crack in the Concrete - B&Q -We Will Grow Again Advert

If all nature needs is that tiny crack in the concrete, how can we help it along? We did some research and found out about a project in a preschool where the children used their tiny fingers to push seeds into the cracks in the pavement to see if they would grow and they did......

We  even spoke to a staff member who told us they used to be a secret gorilla-gardener when they were younger ( we can't reveal their identity!!!!!!!)

And of course who can forget the wonderful David Attenborough  Green Planet series. We took so much inspiration from what we saw here that each week we were coming up with new information, facts and discoveries. KS1 and EYFS even had a go at making their own seed bombs. Have a look at the link below to see Sir David talk about the different types of seeds.

David Attenborough's - Green Planet

So that was it, the Eco-team decided this year we would focus our efforts on the amazing world of plants. Plants not only look beautiful they can help us to save our world. Whether it’s by providing food for us to eat (cutting down our food miles), habitats for other animals and providing pollen for our declining bee population. We want everyone to plant a garden.

• Seed banks, like ours, are used around the world to help save plant species that are dying out.
• Did you know 11% of the world’s medicines come from flowering plants?
• Scientists estimate there are around 30,000 species of plant in the world that are still yet to be discovered. Who knows what we may find out!

What Seeds Do We Have?

Flowers – aqualegia, antirhinum, clary, cleome, cornflower, daisy (shasta), delphinium, foxgolve, honesty, lupin, marigold, pollinator mix, poppy, spanish flag, sunflower, sweet pea, wild flower lucky dip.

Edibles – beetroot, berlotti beans, broad beans, broccoli, brussel sprouts, butternut squash, cherry, cornflower, corriander, cucumber, cucumelon, leek, lettuce mix, melon (honey dew),  peas,pepper, pumpkin, raddish, runner beans, sunflowers, sweetcorn

How To Get Them

If you decide you would like to borrow from our seed bank you can email Miss Bell your request on jbell@pilling-st-johns.lancs.sch.uk

Or if you know a pupil from school you can send your request in with them. Seeds will either be delivered by pupil post, or actual post!

What To Do Afterwards

Follow the growing guide provided with your seeds, take some pictures, let us know what grows. Once your plants have gone to seed, collect some seeds and send them back to the seed bank, just like you would with a library book. Don’t worry if your seeds don’t grow ( or on the off chance something entirely different grows!) you can always try again next year! You can send pictures in via a pupil, on email to Miss Bell or if you have school tapestry you can post your pictures on there. We will try to add some pictures to our gallery as we go along so you can see how our Seed Bank Project is progressing.

Now what are you waiting for, get busy growing!!!!