! RANT !- PLANT SWAPS

i have attended quite a few plant and seed swaps in my day, at least, as many as i can find (alas, this is not a popular area for gardening enthusiasts)! But there are some things that bother me...First off, if you want plants or seeds and show up at my garden, i will probably give you more plants than you can carry away! We gardeners are like that. But, when i attend a SWAP (i.e., TRADE), i expect everyone to bring something in exchange for the other items they are interested in. Well, in my city, the plant and seed swaps also welcome people who bring nothing to swap (and there are many folks around here who want something for nothing), i believe primarily to promote this wonderful hobby/lifestyle, which i am all for. So i am happy to see folks show up who are beginners, or people who just don't want to bother to bring anything, that is, IF there is a time period provided for the 'swappers' to swap first -the ones who actually have dug the plants up, divided them, potted them, watered them and labeled them, and/or collected seeds, dried them, packaged them, labeled them and transported them to the swap! That is a lot of work, but for the possibility of finding something cool or rare or pretty at the swap, it's worth it to me.But don't show up with nothing, run in ahead of me and grab the only variegated lilac, or Butterbur,or speckled violet that i had been looking for, when you don't even know what it is and didn't do anything to warrant your having it! Plus most beginners don't realize that if two or three of you want one plant, most of them can be divided! But the "something for nothing" people just grab a huge bag of Cannas or grasses and run, not realizing that a lot of gardeners just bring them in that way, thinking everyone will take a part of them. So it has bothered me enough that i have contacted the people who organize these swaps and given them my opinion on this (whether they wanted it or not- LOL).

AND it always seems like those are the people who complain the most- "Oh, it's awfully crowded", "Why doesn't this have growing instructions?", "This is an older packet of seeds, someone's trying to rip us off!" All actually heard from a young (non swapping) couple near me at the last swap!

Please, if you don't have plants or seeds and want to go to a swap, at least go to the local dollar store and buy a few packets of seeds, or ask a gardening neighbor if they have anything extra you could bring. It's only the considerate thing to do.