A regional network is racing to save the Midwest’s native seeds

Under the warm light of a hanging lamp, Marty Landorf carefully crumbled the dried flower head of a Black-eyed Susan between his fingers, parting the flakes to reveal its tiny black seeds. Each was intended for long-term cold storage alongside approximately 46 million other seeds at the Chicago Botanic Garden.

Every seed in the garden canopy is different. Some seeds have hooks. Others border on the microscopic. Some give off a pungent and dissuasive odor. And some, like the airborne seeds of milkweed, the host plant of monarch caterpillars, are attached to silky fluff that drifts everywhere, hitchhiking on volunteers’ clothes and following them home.

“Fluff is fun,” Landorf said with a laugh, sitting alongside five other volunteers cleaning, counting and sorting seeds on a long metal table in the garden’s seed bank prep lab.

Despite all their variations, these seeds share one common trait: they are native to the Midwest. These species have genetically adapted over thousands of years and support the region’s ecosystems. This evolutionary heritage makes them essential to restoring the country’s remaining grasslands, wetlands and forests.

The problem: native seeds are rare. And climate change is intensifying demand.

“Climate change is affecting our climate and the frequency of natural disasters,” said Kayri Havens, chief scientist at the Chicago Botanic Garden. “Wildfires and hurricanes are becoming more frequent – ​​increasing the need for seeds. »

In 2024, the Chicago Botanic Garden, a 385-acre public garden that is home to one of the nation’s leading plant conservation programs, launched the Midwest Native Seed Network, a first step in improving the region’s fragile seed supply. The coalition now includes approximately 300 restoration ecologists, land managers and seed growers at 150 institutions across 11 states. Together, they research which species are most in demand, where they are likely to thrive, and what it will take to produce them at scale and get them into the ground.

The group gathers information on seed collection, processing, germination and propagation while identifying regional research gaps and planning collaborative projects to fill them. For example, the network is currently bringing together research on submerged aquatic plants like pondweed, and other hard-to-germinate species, like toadflax, a partially parasitic perennial herbaceous plant.

“We are addressing these local, regional and national shortages of native seeds that are actually hindering our ability to restore highly diverse habitats, build green infrastructure and support urban gardens,” said Andrea Kramer, director of restoration at the Chicago Botanic Garden.

Last year, the network undertook its first major project: a large-scale survey of more than 50 partners across the region. The results were striking. They revealed that more than 500 species native to the Midwest are effectively unavailable for restoration. In some cases, it’s because no one grows them. In others, seeds are available, but the cost – even a few dollars per packet – becomes prohibitive when restoration projects require thousands of euros. And for some finicky species, the bottleneck is technical: Researchers and growers still don’t understand how to reliably germinate them or help them thrive in restoration contexts.

Kramer said ultimately the goal is to connect people who need seeds with those who know how to grow them. Although the network does not sell seeds, it works with organizations and partners who do. “We use the network to help elevate what we all know and share what we know to make things easier,” she said.

The shortage itself is not new. In 2001, following widespread wildfires in the West, Congress charged federal agencies including the Bureau of Land Management and the U.S. Forest Service – which together manage about one-fifth of the nation’s public lands – to develop an interagency public-private partnership to increase the availability of native seeds. But according to a 2023 report, which identified the lack of native seeds as a major barrier to ecological restoration projects in the United States, these efforts remain unfinished.

Wildfires burned more than 170 million acres in the United States between 2000 and 2025, according to the National Interagency Fire Center. In 2020 alone, the Bureau of Land Management purchased approximately 1.5 million pounds of seeds to rehabilitate burned landscapes. In a bad fire year, the agency can purchase up to 10 million books.

The bipartisan Infrastructure Act of 2021 dedicated $1.4 billion to ecosystem restoration over five years, including $200 million for the National Seed Strategy, a coalition of 12 federal agencies and various private partners created in 2015 to provide genetically diverse native seeds for restoration purposes. The following year, the Inflation Reduction Act invested nearly $18 million to develop an interagency seed bank for native seeds. And in 2024, the Interior Department announced an initial $1 million fundraiser for a national native plant seed bank.

“The United States has a large seed bank managed by the [Department of Agriculture]and it primarily stores crops,” said Havens, the Chicago Botanic Garden scientist. “But we don’t have that kind of infrastructure in place for native seeds.”

Momentum for establishing a local seed bank stalled following funding cuts imposed by the Trump administration. In early 2025, the Department of Government Effectiveness cut 10% of staff from the National Plant Germplasm System, which hosts one of the largest and most diverse plant collections in the world.

“If something isn’t supported nationally, then it’s up to states and regions to do that kind of work,” Havens said. “That’s why we’re focused on the Midwest right now.”

The network is the first of its kind in the Midwest, although similar initiatives have been active elsewhere in the country for years. Today, there are more than 25 similar networks operating across the United States. In the western United States, these coalitions have come together in response to post-wildfire restoration projects.

“One of the reasons we were among the first is because of this federal land ownership that we have in the West, whereas in the Midwest it’s more private land,” said Elizabeth Lager, a professor at the University of Nevada, Reno and co-founder of the Nevada Native Seed Partnership. More than 90 percent of all federal lands are located in 11 Western states.

Kramer said she hopes to re-conduct the seed availability survey in 20 years and get a different answer.

“I want them to say, ‘We have access to all the seeds we need,’” Kramer said. “And we can move on to the next difficult question, like: ‘Why aren’t the seeds establishing in my restoration? Or how can we handle the next challenge coming with climate change?'”