This is the best way to beat out winter. Fill your house with seedlings 😈

Is the unknown Canna seed from your plant? Ive got about 10 or so I have to try this year.

How did you start the macadamia? Shelled or unshelled nut? Very nice plant too..

Ive been waiting for 3 months for my avacado pits to sprout. The outter skin has some cracks, thats about it. LOL

Great success so far

Congrats Cameron!

The Chusan seedlings are so large already, very well grown!
And that Araucaria are going to want their own pots soon!
Good job on it all

Thanks guys!

Canadianplant, the canna seeds are from a friend in Tennessee, and he harvested them from his own plants. They germinated so easily, I'm sure you'll have close to a 100% germinatio ratio! I got the macadamia from ebay, I think they were unshelled. Do you have your avacado planted in soil or water?

I have the avacado pits suspended in a class of water. So far they havnt worked. So im going to grab some more, and half bury them in soil, in a pot, and put that all in a bag.

Here are some plants that I've germinated within the past month or so:

Unknown plumeria on the left and in the middle, plumeria "Rubra" on the right:

Closer shot of an unknown plumeria:

Unknown canna:

T. fortunei "Chusan" from Jim:

Macadamia:

Hylocereus undatus (these need to be divided!):

Araucaria araucana:

Not pictured (but recently germinated):

Canna "Red Stripe"
Avacado
T. fortunei "Tesan"
Eucs
Callistemon pityoides
Phoenix dactylifera
Opuntia ficus-indica
Poncirus trifoliata "Flying Dragon"
Thomasville citrangequat
Changshu kumquat
Yuzange
and a few types of tree fern

Cameron

Those Trachys look great -they should be as pure of Fortunei as you can get
since they are from (I believe) a natural population in China.

Have any of the other Trachy seeds come up?

Sorry.... thanks for the info on the Canna. That is very good to know..

Also, you asked a few days ago ( I keep forgetting to answer you) im 25 LOL

Canadianplant, I did the same thing with the avacado pits. I just stuck three toothpicks into them, and kept them in a glass of water. I've had a couple that didn't work for me as well!

Jim, earlier this year I had a large batch of the Tesan, Chusan, and the Bulgarian seeds all come up. I had them in bags, and left the bags in a sunny window... 2 days later and they were all burnt to a crisp :angryfire: Right now I've got some more Tesan coming up.

Any Bulgarian seeds left?

Jim, I don't have any Bulgarian seeds left. I was supposed to get 1000-2000 from Kiril this year, but he had a smaller seed harvest than usual, so it didn't work out! 😕

Cameron

Whats the method you use to germinate tree ferns?? How long did it take?

Canadianplant, I use 100% peat and cover it in boiling water. I wring out the water, and let it cool down a little. Then, I try to spread the spores evenly over the surface. TF spores are like dust, and as they develop, they're susceptible to mold, so I use the boiling water to try to kill all germs.

I keep them in the ziploc containers, not the bags. The main reason I do that is because I find with the bags the soil can shift a little bit, and since the tf spores are so tiny, I don't want them to move at all! I saw the first signs of germination after about a month, and the species was Dicksonia squarrosa.

I'm still waiting on 5 or 6 other types. The type I'm most hopeful about is Lophosoria quadripinnata, which is hardy to about -15 C, so it could probably make it here with minimal protection!

This website has been very helpful. It gives a step-by-step guide from harvesting spore, all the way to planting out the ferns: http://www.thefernhouse.moonfruit.com/#/spore-prop-1/4524570707

I just wanted to make an update about a germination test that I tried out.

I used the "de-lidding" process, and it seems to be working great so far! Last night, I took 2 Sabal minor var. Louisiana seeds out for the test. I used sandpaper on one seed until I could see the embryo, and the other I left as is. I put both seeds in warm water, changing the water 2 or 3 times over a 24 hour period.

Well, I can already see germination on the de-lidded seed, and it's only been 1 day!! My BB doesn't have the quality to capture the small size of the germinating seed, so I'll have to wait a few days before I can post a pic of both seeds, side by side.

If the root continues to grow over the next couple of days, I'll be using the de-lidding method for the majority of the seeds.

Cameron.

Congrats on the de-lidding success Cameron.
I've tried it also with sandpaper on seeds of Bizzie, Copernicia, Nannorhops, Pritchardia, all with zero results.

The biggest Q for me is WHERE the embryo would emerge (i.e. where to de-lid).
It's easy on seeds like Foxtails etc. where the embryo emerges at the end the fruit was attached, opposite the sharp point.

But on Trachies (even Chamaerops humilis), the embryo emerges somewhere towards the center of the seed.
Can't figure out where on the seed to de-lid: end, middle, what side?
Not much avail on the internet for the species I've attempted.

Read an interesting pdf file where for thousands of seeds, a six-second scarification in a mechanical scarifier with sandpaper did the job electrically.
You'll likely wish you had one for all your seeds Cameron.

I've just received a bunch of Trachy seeds, so I'm at it again.
Anybody know if Trachy seeds need light to germinate?

Looking forward to those pictures Cameron.

Barb

I got lucky for the sabal minor seeds, the end that I started at was the end of the embryo. I tried a Jubaea, and started at the wrong end! For some that I'm not really sure about, I'm just going to go for somewhere in the middle. I remember on the PalmTalk thread there was a pic of a needle palm seed germinating from the middle. There's really not that much info out there about the technique!

I've now had a Jubaea seed pop within about 6 hours of me de-lidding it (versus the up to 1 year if I planted it in the ground 🙄 ), so I have a feeling that this method will work very well! 😀