Seed Savers Alliance
Supporting Northern Wisconsin in sowing seeds of success.
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    • Plant Families >
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Beetroot Family

Chenopodiceae

Members of the Beetroot Family that are in the species vulgaris are biennial and the rest are annual. Beetroot Family members are cross-pollinated by wind so you need to make sure that different varieties within the same species are at least a mile apart if you’re relying on isolation to keep your plants from crossing. It is ideal to have at least 60 plants of each variety to avoid inbreeding depression.

The Beetroot Family contains a variety of edible plants including, but not limited to:

  • hortensis–orach (mountain spinach)
  • vulgaris–garden beet, sugar beet, mangel, Swiss chard
  • album–lamb’s quarters
  • bonus-henricus–Good King Henry
  • capitatum–beetberry
  • quinua–quinua
  • oleraea–spinach
Italic words=species, regular words=variety 
*Remember that varieties within the same species are likely to cross-pollinate with one another and you must take proper precautions to isolate these if you or a neighbor are growing more than one variety within the same species.


Click on the orange words to find more information on how to plant and save seeds from these varieties.
Online fundraising for Seed Savers Alliance
We would love to improve the quality and outreach of our current libraries, as well as help to start new ones, but we need your help to do so. Please, help us help you support our right to share seeds by donating now. All you need to do is click the green donate button to the left to do your part. Every little bit counts.
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