Dactylorhiza seed

[Stephen Vella]

Im hoping for some Dactylorhiza seed as I think I have had some success and would like to try some more. Hybrids and species are most welcome. Im after some whites especially. hope Im not too late for seed.

ppm me

thanks in advance

Stephen

[Lesley Cox]

Stephen I could send some seed later in the summer but I have no whites I'm afraid. Mine (elata, foliosa, maculata and m.ssp fuchsii) seed around quite happily and come up in all kinds of unexpected places.

[Maggi Young]

Stephen, I checked the Dact. 'Eskimo Nell' heads today but those which had formed seed had already shed it. Sorry, but I will look sooner next year.  

[Paul T]

Stephen,

Did you just sown your seed around your existing plants, or did you do it artificially?  I'm hoping to do the same thing myself at some point, as i would like to get a selection of Dacts here as well.  I have elata and fuchsii so far (1 of the former and 2 of the latter) and am hoping to try some from seed at some point.  I'm hoping to get to the stage one day where they start popping up in unexpected places for me as well.  If you have enough seed to spare later in the season, could I beg a few as well Lesley?

[Stephen Vella]

Thanks Lesley, I would be happy to try what ever you have to spare and thanks for looking Maggi.

Paul I simply scattered the seeds around some dact's but one thing I did do was hold off on sowing when I had recieved seed from the northern hemisphere(spring) and when reading up on the topic of germinating orchids that a cold period is needed to break dormancy(which happene in the fridge, plus sowing them in late autumn, so they recieved a longer cold period and they came up this spring(a few weeks ago). My Dact's never produce seed and there's grass like leaves coming up beneath them. Call it a fluke.

cheers

[mark smyth]

All my Dactylorhiza have shed their seeds

[Paul T]

Stephen,

So you received them from the northern hemisphere and then stored them dry in the fridge?  I thought that one of the problems with orchid seed was that it had no reserves of food (hence the need for the fungal association), so it couldn't be stored?

If it is a fluke, then it is a damn nice fluke!    Well done! If you end up with too many of them I'm always willing to be a host family!  

[Stephen Vella]

The best way to store orchid seed is to store it dry and cold 4c, 3c,this may effect the breaking of the dormancy in a positive way but Im not 100% still learning and reading. I know Bleach can be used to break dormancy as well as sterlizing before flasking.These are sterlized in 10min and left for hours depending on sp for breaking dormancy. Growers use bleach because its a faster process.

I understand that mycorrhorizal is needed to feed the proticorn which is the seed that has produced the begining of a rhyzome and once attached to the suitable host fungi will then produce leaves and roots, still reading up on this too. Somebody may know more on this??

Its seems that all available information is more about invitro processes and completely misses any mention of how mycorrhizal exactly works with orchid seed as its not needed when producing via invitro means.

But one thing that I did learn from Australia's leading fungi group that came to visit here at Tomah Bot Gardens, where they did a survey of our native fungi and found that exotic fungi have moved in to our exotic woodlands eg American and  European. They informed us that the leaf litter here is providing a host for it to flourish. Fungi spores are everywhere!! which in turn associate with exotic orchids.

In regards to germination percentage its low 1% and was to be expected so its no amazing break through. I guess thats why Orchids produce so many millons of seed and are wind blown to land in suitable locations with a suitable mycorrhizal association. There are a few more coming up and will let you know what numbers come to maturity to pass on.

cheers

[Paul T]

Stephen,

My understanding of the in vitro versus fungi link is that in nature the seed has no storage of food for germination and needs to fungi hot to produce food for it to start the germination process (and therefore roots and shoots etc).  In the in vitro agar solution the sugars are provided directly by the solution, therefore there is no need for the fungi host to provide the food for the germinating seed as the food is provided by the agar solution.  That said, certain chemicals need to be present in the agar for germination to be successful (i.e you can't use the "normal" agar solution for in vitro germination of terrestrial orchids) so you need to use an agar solution that is specifically designed for terrestrials for them to be successful. 

This info comes from chatting to a friend who has an orchid laboratory setup who does the whole agar process etc for various orchid genera.  I've been tempted to try stuff through him, but it is difficult for him as the agar chemicals come in a certain minimum amount so his initial outlay will be high and not worth getting the chemicals in just for a couple of flasks for me.    Also made more difficult of course by the fact that we need to bring seed in dry rather than in pods, making the sterilisation process that much more difficult (so much easier for those still in a pod and therefore internally sterile).

There are a number of different genera I'd love to bring in by seed if I felt I could germinate them successfully. 

[Otto Fauser]

Hello Stephen , I know you are still a spring chicken , but to safe you a few years growing   
 Dact. from seed , I am happy to send you plants of the following in autumn :
  D. foliosa , elata , mac. ssp . fuchsii and ' Harold Esslemont ' .
   Please remind me in due course .

    Otto.

[Stephen Vella]

Thanks Otto,

but still looking for seed, especially hybrids/cultivars that are not in the country. Will pm you. Thanks again

[Joakim B]

As Stephen said fungus often exist in the soil already. Maybe more round established plants? I have from Ian's bulb log seen that a key is to not disturb the small seeds when they mature and hence he has been most successful in places that is not disturbed.
Regarding media for invitro Malmgren of Lidafors Orchids uses a basic formula and then and organic compounds like potato, ananas/pineapple, turnip etc to get the enzymes and other special components.
He has explained it well on his webpage and if Your fried have a set op he might be successful with others as well.

General info
http://www.lidaforsgarden.com/Orchids/engelsk.htm
For Dacts
http://www.lidaforsgarden.com/Orchids/dactylorhiza_eng.htm

Best of Luck
Kind regards
Joakim

[Paul T]

Thanks Joakim, I'll have a look.