Novice attempting seed stratification, any advice?

12 years ago

I know its long, go to the last paragraph for my questions.

So I garden as a hobbie, not really focused on breeds or such. These 4 roses have grown at my old place for years, having originally been bought as walmart clearance. They suffered through many struggles, from a powerful vine nearly fully killing them, to idiot lawn caregivers running over them several times with a lawnmower.(Even with signs and us telling them to avoid the roses.) They survived and bloom beautiful roses throughout the year.

A couple days ago I walked through my old garden and found a huge amount of plump rose hips on all of them. I plucked them all and started removing seeds. I dont know if they mixed, even if they did I think it would be beautiful. All huge blooms, a purple rose, a sunburst rose, a red to white layered rose and a deep blood red rose. Since Florida weather does not permit winter sowing really, cold stratification is best.

I have read through tons of articles and have come to choose my plan of action. Please tell me if I am missing anything or if it is wrong. I am going to rinse them in a cup of water with a couple cap fulls of Hydrogen Peroxide, rubbing them in a washcloth for cleaning. With more mixed peroxide and water I will soak some coffee filters and put the seeds in, pushing out air bubbles. Into a ziploc bag they go and into my fridge for 2 months. Afterwards they should be ready for planting indoors, since it would be too hot outside. Advice?

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Comments (4)

JessicaBe
12 years ago
I never thought about doing coffee filters and since I have a lot of those I can use those... Thanks for that idea :)

I am a first time seed grower my self and I did what you are doing and the first time I didn't soak them in water perioxide mix and they molded on me. So I still need a month or two to see if I did it right :)
seedmoney
12 years ago
Howdy,
First time sower of rose seeds here, too. I religiously followed the hydrogen peroxide method on rose hips of 'Madame Isaac Pereire' and afterwards performed two experiments--one seed batch went straight into moist paper towels at 70F; the other batch underwent cold moist stratification in my fridge at 40F. Today I am beginning to have massive germination in the warm batch, but so far none in the cold, moist batch. I pricked out the germinating seeds and will grow them on in a warm greenhouse. FWIW.
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seil zone 6b MI
12 years ago
First off, I tried the coffee filters and they disintegrated really quickly so I'm back to a good sturdy paper towel.

Second, don't worry about the mold. That doesn't mean they won't germinate. There are some studies that show that the mold may even aid in germination. So don't throw them away. Keep checking them!

Don't be afraid to really scrub those seeds! You want to get all of the hip material off of them and that's tough. But so are the seeds so you don't need to be gentle about it. I SCRUB mine against the sides of a fine mesh sieve. It's thought that the hip material has some kind of enzyme in it that inhibits germination so get it all off.

Mine go into the fridge too but I start to check them at about 2 to 3 weeks because they will start germinating in the fridge. If you wait 2 months you'll lose some of them because that's too long for them to go. After that I check them once a week until I stop seeing germinations. I also rotate the seeds in and out of the fridge a week at a time and sometimes that will jump start germination.

The germinated seeds go into starter trays filled with seed starting soil and under lights. When they get 2 sets of real leaves I pot them up into cups and if it's warm out they go outside. If not they stay under the lights until it is warm enough outside but I get them outside as soon as possible. Roses hate the conditions inside most homes. If it's hot outside put them in morning sun only or in a place that gets dappled shade most of the day. Do not let them dry out completely. Keep them moist but not soggy and they should do fine for you.
henry_kuska
12 years ago
My rose hybridizing information is at the link below.

I recomment sand rather than paper. The reasons for using moist sand instead of moist paper are: 1) that the sand changes color when drying out, 2) the root of the sprouted seed is not as easily damaged when removed from sand as when removed from paper, 3) the sand does not decompose and 4) the seeds are easily separated from the sand by using a kitchen wire strainer with a mesh large enough to pass the sand particles but not the seeds. The last is important as some seeds leach out inhibitor chemicals. A "freshen up" every once in a while with the strainer gets rid of the leached out inhibitor. The leaching away of inhibitor is one of the possible reasons given for an explosion of seed germination outside after a heavy rain.

Here is a link that might be useful: link for rose hybridizing info

Novice attempting seed stratification, any advice?

Comments (4)

JessicaBe

seedmoney

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