Blossoming seed collection sees Collie Library awarded

The creation of a seed library saw Collie Library win an award for innovation and collaboration at the recent Library Board of WA awards.

The catalogue of seeds was an idea put forward by the Collie shire’s former information services manager Alison Kidman last year.

Her successor, Shannon Wood, said the library staff had worked with the Collie Community Garden to allow the catalogue to blossom into what it is today.

“The library team had this idea and we were lucky there was a new member of the community garden who had previously run an online seeds shop which she had recently closed,” she said.

“She donated all the seeds, as did others garden members who had collected heirloom varieties of vegetables and herbs.”

“It was really a perfect example of how different groups can work together to benefit the community.”

She said library staff had to be commended for getting behind the project with such vigour.

“You can only build on what we offer as a library to the community — this is just one aspect of that,” she said.

“The award also came with $5000 of prize money and that will go into running different programs, workshops and potentially some upgrades within the library.”

The Collie community can view what is in the seed library via an online catalogue or by visiting the Collie Library to browse the physical collection.