Getting organized for ordering seed

Using a spreadsheet to get your seed order organized for the NARGS Seed Exchange
by Bill Beuerlein

No sooner than the leaves are raked away and the garden put to bed than “its seed list time again”! What wonderful timing-just like having dessert served as the entrée dishes are being cleared away.

This year I’ve gone high tech (at least for me, that is) and have used the seldom opened spreadsheet program that comes with Microsoft’s Works ® (or Excel with Office). The resulting list that I prepared will give me a record that I can keep in my “Garden” file and expand from year to year. And, as you will see, it performs mundane tasks such as sorting as quickly as you can command.

Get started by opening “Works”. Click on programs, and then click on Works Spread Sheet. (In Excel click “file” and “new”).

Click again, this time on “start a blank spread sheet”. The program will give you a screen full of “cells” numbered from 1 to… down and “A” to….. across. Click on “File” on your tool bar, then on “Save As” and put it in your “Garden” file in “My Documents” or some other handy place.

Label this “2009 Seed List” across the top. In cell B,2, type “Envelop #”, in cell C,2 type Genera/species. Number cells in column A from one to….

A heavy line to differentiate first and second choices can be added by a technique in “Format”. Highlight row 25. Now click on” Format” and then on “Border”. In the dialog box select the wide line and click on the picture showing the line on the bottom of the cells, what you should have will look like this….

Open the download-able Word or Excel seed list file to your computer. You can now copy the names from this list (highlight, right mouse click-copy) and then paste them directly to this list without the tedious process of typing all of those hard to spell Latin names. You will need to type in the envelope numbers.
Items can be added to the list in any order. When you list is complete, highlight the rows of cells with envelope numbers and plant names (Alyssum spinosum to Zinnia grandiflora). Next go to “tools” (“data in Excel) on the tool bar and click on “Sort”. In the dialog box that opens select “Column B” and “ascending” and click “sort” in the lower RH corner. (NOTE: the numbers in these examples hypothetical, they ARE NOT for the 2009 Seed Exchange!)

Instantly you list looks like this…..

Now label Column D “A/B”, and make your choices. Your list will look like this……..

Now highlight Columns B, C, and D and then go back to Tools and re-sort based on column D. your list will now be arranged with your first and second choices in numerical order. Is this cool or what?

Now “save as” NARGS 2009 Seed List in your “Garden” folder.

My list will be expanded by adding columns for “Received” (the seeds I actually got) “Planted Date”, “Method” (I use letters to indicate how the seeds were planted, pretreatment, etc), “Left Over” (I seldom plant all the seeds in a pack, the rest are a hedge against failure), “Germinated Date”, and “Result” (the number of plants for the garden). Adding a “1” to the Left Over column and then sorting by that column will give you an inventory of remaining packs. Second choices that were not needed may be your first choices in the second round. First choices I did not get may be tried again next year.

You can add columns to your heart’s content and never run out of spreadsheet.

Save the again as “blank seed list” and delete all but the form. Save again and close and you’ll be ready for next year, the second round, or the SRGC.

I hope this helps.