Gerhard Bohl - a private German seedbank

[clara]

I’ve been thinking about starting this thread for a while and after getting Mischka’s okay, I finally do!

I’m in contact and trying to support Gerhard Bohl, who is a private German seedsaver, not only for tomatoes (actually he has about 2800 varieties in his collection), but also for a lot of other veggies (about 540 hot and sweet peppers, 120 potatoes, 700 beans and several hundreds of other rare and old veggie varieties and lots of flowers, but no hybrids!).

Gerhard has published a lot of informations which are highly appreciated in the German speaking tomato world, for example about Late Blight. By the way, he offers about 50 varieties which have shown good resistance against it.

Gerhard sells his seeds for 1 Euro per packet (each packet containing 10 – 15 seeds) + postage. The price for veggies such as potatoes, other spuds etc. are different. I’ve never been disappointed with his seeds!

Gerhard does not only sell seeds, but he is always interested in getting new-to-him varieties in an exchange; i.e. 1 gram of new seeds (tomatoes) = 1 packet to choose from his collection.

The only problem is: Gerhard is NOT on the internet with his collection (But if you google him, you will find articles ABOUT him.) In the past, Gerhard published his collection in a printed version, his “Sortenbuch”. But as Gerhard has had to add a lot of new varieties, he does no longer sell a print. In his opinion, the printed version would be too expensive and he would have to limit the informations in an inappropriate way and/or use a very small type size.

So, how can you get his seeds now? Two possibilities:
1) You buy a CD-R (actually 5 Euros including postage)*
2) You buy a USB-stick for 10 Euros including postage*. You can send him the stick back from time to time to get an update (3 Euros + postage for every update*).*I shall ask Gerhard about the postage to the US for example.

Gerhard is also looking for people who are willing to grow the same variety/ies every year to support him with fresh seeds. Of course, in return, they can choose new-to-them varieties for free. This is what he calls “Erhalter/in”. Gerhard has a huge nursery (only partly commercial) and you can imagine that he can’t grow about 10000 different varieties of veggies and flowers every year. He appreciates every help!

If you are interested in getting Gerhard’s seeds or doing an exchange:

1) Get his “Sortenbuch” (CD-R or the stick, at the moment without pics, but Gerhard is planning to add them in the future). Please don’t send him a letter asking: Do you have the variety x or y? Gerhard is a very busy man, please avoid superfluous work for him! Have a look at the “Sortenbuch” first!

2)..Send him your wish-list, for example: T 1435 Lehrertomate or T 1521 Zlato Skifow (“T” for tomato) or A 052 Don Kihot (“A” for aubergine), S 089 Gul Feggeblomme (“S” for potato) and so on. Add money to your letter (only Euros, only bills, no coins) and add some Euros for the postage. At the moment, I have only the following infos concerning postage to European countries:
weight up to 50 grams – postage 1,25 Euros, up to 500 grams – 3,40 Euros, up to 1 kilogram – 6 Euros
Believe me: Gerhard is a very honest man, he will send you the surplus back or give you a voucher for the next order!

3) Gerhard does not accept checks in foreign money. If you want to send him a check, please in Euro! And please put a copy of this bank-confirmed check into your letter. (You can ask me for the IBAN code.)

4) When sending him a letter with your order or the seeds to exchange, please put a self-addressed label and a small envelope in it. Please don’t send him a bubble envelope – postage to and from Germany will increase and Gerhard hates waisting money. You will get the seeds well-packed.

One last thing to mention: The “Sortenbuch” is written in German. You can use a translation program or: You ask me! Please don’t hesitate, I’ll do my best!

Gerhard’s address:
Gerhard Bohl
Waldstr. 40
D-90596 Schwanstetten
Germany

Thank you for your patience with this long posting and I hope that I’ve said everything clear enough…
clara

PS: For those in the US or Canada who can’t wait for getting the CD-R or the stick, please pm me… You should jump to page 42 on the CD-R (version from January) when only wanting to look at the varieties, starting with the wild tomato section or page 48 (other tomatoes).

[twistingtendril]

Sorry if I'm not understanding your posting, but are you saying we would need to spend $8 to $14 US to see his list of offerings? Might Gerhard Bohl, or maybe you as his sales agent, just post here his listing of available seeds? More direct, and no need to mail USB sticks and CDs back and forth across the globe?

[clara]

twistingtendril,

I am NOT Gerhard's sales agent.

I only thought it would be a good opportunity to get a lot of different varieties at a really low price! As I said before, Gerhard is NOT on the internet - getting the CD-R or the stick is the only way to get his seed list. It contains more than 10000 varieties...
clara

[twistingtendril]

Clara, I understood your saying he is not on the internet, but the file or files of his available tomato seeds could easily be posted here, could it not? If you felt like sharing it with readers here?

[DeanRIowa]

Clara thank you for the information.

I had the same question about the DVD, but I wonder if purchasing the DVD might be to help him keep out the people using him only as a seed catalog.

The biggest problem I see is, how would I convert US dollars to Euros reasonably?

thanks,
Dean

[Sherry_AK]

Thanks, Clara. Your post was well written and very clear. It might be nice if the list could be broken into different parts so that it could be requested by e-mail. For instance, if I just wanted to see the list of tomatoes, or whatever. But this might be too much work for Gerhard to respond to many requests. Just a thought.

Sherry

[dice]

Online currency converter:
http://www.xe.com/ucc/

[DeanRIowa]

Dice,

I actually I meant how to cheaply physically change Dollars to Euros. At bank?

Dean

[dice]

Some local bank probably has the lowest fees for this.

Here is Wells Fargo's online guide to buying foreign exchange
products, for example:

https://www.wellsfargo.com/foreignexchange/products

[DeanRIowa]

Dice,

That is prefect. Cheaper than I thought only a couple of dollars for the conversion.

Dean

[dustdevil]

Clara mentioned he doesn't take foreign checks. She didn't say if he takes US cash...

[amideutch]

Here is a page out of Bohl's Sotenbuch from 2009 to give you an idea of the format. Excuse the quality of the image but my scanner isn't the best. Ami

[amideutch]

Gerhard Bohl is like a private seed bank as he collects and saves seed of several different vegetable varieties. He also grows many varieties himself. His agenda is similar to SSE as he want's to save and perpetuate the varieties for future generations to come. I can see why he went soft on his listing as his book of listings was over 300 pages. Maybe Clara and I could come up with an easier way to make his listing available to you folks back in the States. I'll have to talk to Clara about it. Here is a link to his website. Ami

http://www.garten-pur.de/153/Garten-....%20v_Bohl.htm

[stormymater]

That would be fabulous Ami! My interest is piqued!

[Flame of Bodensee]

well i know Gerhard Bohl not very well, but i have a few friends who have changed seeds with him he is also very popular in one german garden forum. some seeds he is offering are surprise ones, cause everyman can change seeds there, as an example you want cherokee purple tomato and a brandywine comes out or something other there is no real guarantee to get what you want. i'm not against mr. bohl or his project of seed saving !! i thought about joining it too with true uncrossed seeds, but through all seed exchanges, he can't check if they are not crossed due of the masses of seeds he gets through the year.

i have this seedcatalog of him too as an windows document file about 4 mb big in size this is what he sends on cdr or on the sticks, well i dunno if i can upload this file somewhere so many could read it cause the copyrights belongin to mr. bohl not me and like clara said it's in german.

For Germany he is the biggest collecting private man who sell or trade historical and heirloom seeds or plantable stuff like potatoes, like seedsavers for US.

greetz Matthias