Frequently asked questions

Not yet. The shop opens in December. Seed may only be sold once every packet can carry a European plant passport, and the authorisation for that is still under way.

Until then, you can read along on the blog.

Through Mollie. After ordering, you land in their secure payment environment, where you choose how to pay. I never see your card details.

Send a message as soon as possible with your order number. As long as the letter hasn't left yet, I'll see what I can do. Once it's on its way, it's too late: nobody gets a letter back out of the postbox.

The quickest way is the contact form.

As a standard letter with bpost. Seed weighs next to nothing and fits flat in an envelope, so a parcel would mostly be shipping air. The letter comes through your letterbox, so you don't have to stay in.

€2.00 in Belgium and €3.50 to the other countries of the European Union. Shipping is free from €25.

Yes, to every country in the European Union. Not beyond it: the reason is further down, under the plant passport. The rates per country are in the table.

No. A letter has no tracking. That's the flip side of low shipping costs. If your letter doesn't arrive, let me know and we'll sort it out.

Report it via the contact form, with your order number.

No. The seed comes from a specialist supplier; I divide it into packets here. I do grow peppers and tomatoes myself every summer, though, so I know the feeling when nothing has come up after two weeks.

Every batch gets a lot number and is tested. The germination rate is the percentage of seeds that germinated in that test. The test date is shown with it, so you know how recent the figure is. You'll find the lot number on your packet.

Peppers early: from January, indoors and warm, because they need the longest head start. Tomatoes from February. After March it gets tight for the slow peppers. The plants only go outside once the risk of frost has passed, around mid-May. Each variety shows when it's best sown.

For peppers, usually two to four weeks, and sometimes five for chinense types such as the habanero. Warmth makes the difference: around 25 to 28 °C is quickest. Digging them up after ten days mostly just disturbs them.

First: give it a bit longer, and check that it's warm and moist enough. Germination depends on warmth, moisture and patience, and those are out of my hands once the packet is with you. That's why I give no germination guarantee and no harvest guarantee. What I do: test the germination rate of every batch, with the date.

If nothing at all has come up after five warm, moist weeks, send a message via the contact form with the lot number of your packet. I'll check whether there are other reports about that batch.

A few years, if you store it well. Germination rate doesn't vanish overnight; it declines slowly. With pepper seed, count on two to three years of reliable germination. That's why every batch shows when its germination rate was tested.

Dry, dark and cool. Leave it in the packet, put that in a well-sealed tin or jar, and keep it somewhere the temperature doesn't swing much. The windowsill above the radiator will be ideal for your seedlings later, but it's the worst place for seed that has to wait.

An official label that is required in the European Union when selling, among other things, tomato and pepper seed. It shows that the batch meets the European plant health rules, and makes it traceable. Every Waplantikier packet carries one.

The EU flag and four details: the botanical name of the species, the Belgian registration number of the business, the lot number of the batch and the country of origin. It's on a separate sticker, apart from the label with the growing information.

Because the plant passport is only valid within the European Union. Outside the Union, including Switzerland and the United Kingdom, every shipment needs a phytosanitary certificate: a separate inspection and a separate document for each letter. For a packet of seed that is out of all proportion, so I don't do it.

Yes. You have a 14-day right of withdrawal from the day you receive the letter, and you don't have to explain why. Then send the packets back within 14 days; the cost of returning them is yours.

The quickest way to withdraw is the withdrawal form.

For an unopened packet, yes. If the packet has been opened, I may deduct the loss in value. If you withdraw from the whole order, the shipping costs are refunded too.

The full rules are in the terms and conditions.

Because every packet has to be traceable to a single batch, and I can no longer guarantee that for seed that has been with someone else. I don't know how it was stored or what happened to it. Returned seed is therefore destroyed.

Wrong variety, a damaged packet or a letter that never arrived: let me know with your order number and we'll put it right. That's separate from the right of withdrawal; this is covered by the legal guarantee.

Please use the contact form.

Arno Roelandts, from Zellik. Waplantikier is a sole proprietorship that I run alongside my job. If you email, I answer myself, and if I don't know something, I'll say so.

How it all started is in the story.

Because three hundred varieties mostly means you have to work out for yourself which ones are worth it. Here the choice is smaller, with the reason each variety is included and the information you need to succeed: germination time, germination temperature and when to sow.