Who Knew?? Frozen Seeds Germinating...
Hi Everyone,
Well, did any of you know that you CAN germinate frozen amaryllis seeds!!
I found out quite by accident. I had some seeds of Exotica x Rio Negro (the only time I've had any success with Rio Negro) so I germinated about 10 of them and I put the rest in one of those little brown paper bags and put it in my container of pollens that was in the fridge and totally forgot about them!
Over the next few months I continued to save pollen as the flowers bloomed and one by one the little brown bag of seeds got covered up with plastic bags of pollen.
Probably around some time in early June, or was it May, I decided it was time to freeze the pollen so I just put the already covered plastic container in the freezer. We keep our freezer at about -4 degrees.
When I noticed several weeks ago that I was going to have some summer flowers to play around with I went looking through my little bags of pollen to see what appealed to me for making crosses and low and behold, guess what I found??!! Yep, my frozen seeds. So I just thought what the heck.. I might as well give it a try and so I dumped all 30 seeds in water and about a week later I saw my first one germinate!! Currently, I have about 10 sprouting seeds and they have nice white roots and seem to be progressing just fine, not one of them is mushy (so far)!!
So... did any of you know this could be done (to a small extent as they were only in the freezer for about 2 months) or have I made an astounding discovery??!!
Here they are...âºâºâºDonna
Comments (14)
salpal
9 years ago
jodik_gw
9 years agoRelated Discussions
Frozen seeds - still viable?
Comments (7)links, First, the first part of the plant to come out of the seed is the ROOT, that needs to be BELOW the surface when you plant them, preferably facing down. The entire thing CAN be put under the surface. In my case, with the peppers I mentioned, lightly put some seed starting mix over the top after making a little notch in the soil for the root. Then I sprayed the top with a fine mist of water to help settle the soil. The plants popped out of the soil in a couple of days (2 or 3). Second, I too have large fingers, but I do not use the seeder tools. I personally am not a fan of buying many things that are only good for doing one thing, and a seeding tool isn't worth doing anything else. Now, one thing that I do to help with smaller seeds is: Fold the seed packet and slowly tap so that I can control the flow of the seeds. I let a few small seeds like lettuce or basil fall into the place I want them. (It is normally recommended to plant a few seeds into a cell anyway.) Then I thin them as needed when they germinate. I give them a little while to all grow and the one that sets true leaves soonest, or shows the most promise by that time is the one that stays, the rest are casualties. I trim them away with scissors - this causes no stress to the remaining plant. (I came across this method by accident. I had my son helping me one year - 3 year old - and he seeded the same cell about 12 times, unbeknownst to me. Well, next thing I know, I have about 30 cabbage all coming up in the same cell. What else could I do? So, I figure I overseed a little, but it pretty well ensures that I get at least one plant to germinate in each and every cell. Nothing is as sad as an empty cell. I don't have enough space under my lights to leave cells empty! If you have an extra $15 laying around that you can't find a better use for, go for it. For me though, using popsicle sticks, etc. and the occasional tweezer, if necessary....See MoreOld Seed Germination
Comments (11)Congrats! It's so fun to see how resilient Mother Nature is, isn't it? I have been surprised several times by old seeds. I still have some tomato seeds left I got for free from Trudi's site three years ago. I didn't have a lot left, but had several Chadwick Cherry seedlings came up. I remember these from my first year, and they were so prolific right up until frost. I have some old Thai Bottle Gourd seeds that were a couple years old when I purchased them on sale, a couple years ago. The two I direct sowed into my raised beds are no shows, so I planted almost all the rest in a container. I am really hoping to get at least one, preferably two. I will report my results later. I let a few of my cucuzzi gourds cure outside over the winter, and I think I might be hooked. I haven't tried any crafts with them yet, but I think it could be fun....See MoreGerminating seeds in LF sphagnum
Comments (23)For my personal plant collection I use Fafard 2 Mix for seeds and cuttings and 3-B for everything else. I usually ammend it with various things, orchid bark, pumice, compost, charcoal, etc. The guys use Pro-mix for the business. I can't stand it. Having to pre-wet it before using it is a major PITA. They don't use fungicides on a prophylactic basis. There's also nothing growing in there that requires being covered for more then a couple weeks. We have 15,000+ ft under glass at the farm and rarely have a problem with fungus. I wouldn't say we have perfect air circulation or humidity but there's decent exhaust, irrigation and misting systems. The seeds I have at home are another story. I have some that take up to a year to germinate. Karyn...See MoreSeed Germination and Soil Temperatures
Comments (10)Reed, I love Tom Clothier's data base. It helps take a lot of the guesswork out of knowing when to plant seeds. At his website there's also a similar set of data for other plants like annual and perennial flowers. I first really came to understand the relationship between actual soil temperatures and seed germination/plant growth and performance from Dr. Sam Cotner's incredible book "The Vegetable Book: A Texan's Guide to Gardening". I also learned so much from him about the way air temperatures impact growth and performance of our vegetable plants. While there are many gardening books that I love, love, love and find useful, Dr. Cotner's book is the only book I consider absolutely essential and responsible for whatever success I have had in raising vegetables. I grew up in a gardening family so understood all about when we planted each vegetable, but reading Dr. Cotner's book in the mid- to late-1980s helped me understand it all in terms of, not dates, but rather soil temps and air temps. After that, vegetable gardening became so much more easy to understand and manage. I've completely worn out my first copy of Dr. Cotner's book, and my second copy is starting to look pathetically well-used. And for anyone who hasn't seen the soil temperature part of the OK Mesonet, I'll link the three-day average map below. You can increase your own soil temps by mulching the soil heavily in the fall to help hold in the heat, or by covering it with black plastic several weeks before you want to plant. You also can use clear plastic placed over PVC hoops to form low tunnels over beds you want to heat up. The same greenhouse effect that keeps plants warm in our greenhouses will heat up soil in a low tunnel in no time at all. I usually won't plant anything until my soil temps have been in the right range for good germination for 3-5 days and the forecast looks favorable for the next 10 days too. I take my own soil temps using a thermometer with a metal probe, but also check the Mesonet maps to follow general trends. If you have raised beds or sandy soil, you may find that they warm up more quickly than grade-level soil and more quickly than dense clay soil. Dawn Here is a link that might be useful: 3-Day Ave Temp Bare Soil at 2...See More
kaboehm (zone 9a, TX USA)
9 years agooleg9grower
9 years agodondeldux z6b South Shore Massachusetts
9 years agodondeldux z6b South Shore Massachusetts
9 years agoHi Everyone,
Well. this is just an update on how my frozen seed embryos are doing. Some of them are ready to plant and I would say a good 3/4 of them germinated! Some are doing better than others but none went mushy. some just didn't germinate.
Now I already have 7 seedlings growing along nicely from this cross and they already have 4 leaves and the leaves are very slim and shorter than other seedling their age.. I really didn't need more of this cross but now that they are here and begging for a chance at life I guess I will have to give them their chance!
Donnaâºâºâº
kaboehm (zone 9a, TX USA)
9 years agodondeldux z6b South Shore Massachusetts
9 years agoHi,
Well, a few weeks ago I was rooting around my frozen pollen for something interesting to put on Mylan and this time I got to the bottom of the plastic container containing my frozen pollens and believe it or not I found another packet of frozen seeds that I missed the first time!!
This time they were aulicum (Telos) x papilio ( gifted pollen) and there were 9 seeds. So, once again I just put them all in water and today, about 2 weeks later 8 of 9 seeds are germinating with clean white roots. Who knew this was something we all could be doing!! This particular cross was the first cross I made from last year's season as my aulicum bloomed for Halloween last year. These seeds are even older than my Exotica x Rio Negro (which are growing on nicely by the way) by probably 4 to 6 months!
So, for those of you who might like to try this, don't hesitate.. Both of these packets of seeds hung around on my fireplace mantel for a month or more before finally being stashed with my pollen in the refrigerator for several months and then finally into the freezer. There aren't any more. So if you have a glut of special seeds, freeze some incase you run into a disaster with fungus gnats or the like!
Donnaâºâºâº
kaboehm (zone 9a, TX USA)
9 years ago
Brian Sakamoto (10a, CA, USA)
3 years agoChiming in about my own success with storing seeds in the freezer. These are from a Papilio x Papilio cross back in 2019. Prior to freezing, stored them in a TicTac container then vacuum sealed with a Foodsaver appliance. Put them in water on April 1, 2021 and looks like there are some signs of life. I do have other Hippe seeds in the freezer from 2019, so I may try germinating those a few years from now.
Empty Container, ready to re-use.
dondeldux z6b South Shore Massachusetts
3 years agolast modified: 3 years ago
petrushka (7b)
3 years agodondeldux z6b South Shore Massachusetts
3 years agolast modified: 3 years ago
petrushka (7b)