Ooh! Blight-resistant American Chestnut!
My list would probably include a lot of invasives and non-natives, and I would be looking for non-GMO organic stock, preferably from the northernmost latitudes in which they will grow for hardiness' sake.
Trees/shrubs
Western Red Cedar, Sitka Spruce, Coast Redwood, Doug Fir, viable soil samples for each, Quercus Macrocarpa, Siberian
Pea Shrub, Russian Olive, Red Mulberry, Green Alder (preferably at least two subspecies,
crispa and
sinuata), a few raspberry and blackberry types, preferably with an aim to have each bearing successively, Hawthorne, a selection of
apple, peach, pear, plum, and apricot seeds and/or stones, again preferably selected for winter/frost hardiness where possible, Blight-resistant American Chestnut, Sugar Maple, Red Pine, White Pine, Korean Pine, Sugar Pine, three species of Yew (
Taxus baccata, Taxus brevifolia, Taxus canadensis), Black Walnut, phyllostachys edulis (a type of lumber bamboo),
black locust (
Robinia pseudoacacia) and some of the lesser-cultivated berries like Serviceberry, Bayberry, and Bearberry, although these might not all be shrubs. That's all I can think of off the top of my head.
I would love to get a selection of different varieties of grape, both varieties usually cultivated for food and those prized for viticulture. I would also want as many prairie denzien species as I can get, both tall and short grass, with a focus on natural foraging of ruminants and browsers both. I would also love a diversity of wild blueberry seeds and cultivated ones, and some currant species.
If I had space in the cargo container, I'd fill it up with cold-hardy varieties of buckwheat, hull-less oats, barley, and rye.
Free is a good price. This, by the way, probably isn't an exhaustive list for what I am planning. "What if" is one of the most powerful questions in any language.
-CK
EDIT: The moment I hit the Submit button, I realised I had no hops. And (I stress THIS part is not a request, but its utility in a
permaculture setting is hard to dismiss) Cannabis (just some varieties suitable for fibre, seed, and for animal fodder/forage, I don't have a problem finding the medical variety
).
EDIT2: Amaranth, quinoa, spelt.
A human being should be able to change a diaper, plan an invasion, butcher a hog, conn a ship, design a building, write a sonnet, balance accounts, build a wall, set a bone, comfort the dying, take orders, give orders, cooperate, act alone, solve equations, analyze a new problem, pitch manure, program a computer, cook a tasty meal, fight efficiently, die gallantly. Specialization is for insects.
-Robert A. Heinlein
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