A Truffula Seed

Photo by The Curated Feast

It's a Truffula Seed. It's the last one of all!

If you know the movie or book The Lorax, then you know this message and it’s weight. This pulse (another word for bean/legume) is a heartbeat. Have you checked yours today?

This particular runner bean doesn’t even have a name yet, so I propose that we call it a Truffula. Every seed is so precious and we are so lucky to have farmers, scientists, and seed savers working on keeping the biodiversity of our food system thriving.

The seed breeders of the world work over much longer scales of time than quarterly profit margins. Working from the palate of nature’s biodiversity, it can take generations of plants to attain what they are seeking in each seed. It’s romantic work, if you think of the attention given to every generation of plants. And it’s crucial for our food system’s future.

The runner bean is native to Central America, and its relatives have been used for centuries in both wild and cultivated forms. This particular vine, which grows clockwise, is being grown at the Earthbound Farm farm stand which I visited earlier this year through @thefeedfeed.

This single seed in a palm is a reminder of the pulse of life we are here to protect. What if you were in charge of the last of the Truffula Seeds?