Germinating now- - photos of seedlings

[Kristl Walek]

As a PS to the above, I have for some years wanted to follow up on a study I read some time ago suggesting the most efficient manner of raising Podophyllum hexandrum to maturity. The relevant passage is as follows:


Treatment of cotyledonary leaves of 1 week-old-seedlings with 200 ppm GA(3 )resulted in true or functional leaf emergence within 7 days, and the resultant plants were also more vigorous than the ones obtained from manual removal of cotyledonary leaves. The study helped advance the establishment of seedlings by one growing season (almost 1 year).

For those of you who have not been down the "podophyllum seed road", seed normally sends out a very long root first, then sometime later a cotyledon leaf will emerge above ground. Normally the plant will do nothing further its first season, except developing its root system, with the cotyledon (not first true leaf) on top. On some rare occasions, and without human interference a true leaf is formed instead of the cotyledon leaf in the germinating year, but that is not the norm.  Normally the seedlings go through a cold period later and the first true leaf appears the second year.

So, as I have so many seedlings to play with, I have prepared two large pots---one batch has been treated with GA-3 today. The second pot will have all the cotyledon leaves removed once they fully emerge. If the study is correct and the true leaves emerge within a week or so, this is truly significant & cuts out at least a year in the growth process.  I will report what happens later.

[Maggi Young]

What an extraordinary project, Kristl. I cannot say I have heard of this way of taking off the cotyledons... it seems rather drastic.  It will be a most interesting experiment.

[Lesley Cox]

With P. hexandrum I find the two cotyledons come at germination and in the second year the true leaves form, as one might expect but with all the others I now have, including some from our other Nova Scotian, the true leaves have come straight up first, no cotyledons at all, and then have followed up with a second and now a third true leaf, all in less than a year from sowing.

[Kristl Walek]

With P. hexandrum I find the two cotyledons come at germination and in the second year the true leaves form, as one might expect but with all the others I now have, including some from out other Nova Scotian, the true leaves have come straight up first, no cotyledons at all, and then have followed up with a second and now a third true leaf, all in less than a year from sowing.

Lesley,
I have read another study from India that noted the following of seed of P. hexandrum, collected from alpine regions, which I found very interesting and is obviously an adaptive measure:


Seed germination in this species is very. poor under natural conditions. The main reasons seem to be a postharvest ripening requirement (Nautiyal et al. 1987) and a hard seed coat, especially in temperate populations where germination takes several months. It was interesting to note that whereas the seeds of most (but not all) temperate populations showed hypogeal germination, all of the alpine populations undergo epigeal germination. The adaptive significance of such variation in germination behaviour of alpine
and temperate populations is not clear.

[Kristl Walek]

I have often, over the years, wished I had made a list of some of the interesting/funny letters I have received from my seed customers. This is one I received this morning:


I am considering ordering several packets of fern spores.  Can you please let me know roughly how many spores are in each packet?  Or, roughly how many mature ferns each packet will yield?


It is very hard for me to answer some of the letters in an earnest frame of mind.

[Hoy]

I have often, over the years, wished I had made a list of some of the interesting/funny letters I have received from my seed customers. This is one I received this morning:


I am considering ordering several packets of fern spores.  Can you please let me know roughly how many spores are in each packet?  Or, roughly how many mature ferns each packet will yield?


It is very hard for me to answer some of the letters in an earnest frame of mind.

Oh, I did believe you counted the spores and wrote "Contains at least 6.5 * 10⁶ spores that will give approximately 3.2 * 10⁴ prothalli if correctly sown. Each prothallus can give several fern plants".

[Hoy]

These 3 germinated in 10 days 16-20C.
Cremanthodium sp 1 Shika Shan; Cremanthodium sp aff campanulatum Grongga Shan; Hedysarum boreale var boreale

      

[EmmaCampanula]

Trond, I just saw your picture of the Cremanthodium campanulatum seedlings. That's a plant I'm really looking for!
So let the cat out of the bag: where did you get your seeds from? I never saw them offered anywhere.

[Magnar]

Dianthus nitidus,, I had some 2 year old seeds, stored in room temperature, that I wanted to test. They germinated after 5 days, and 100%, as you can see 

[Magnar]

Trond, I just saw your picture of the Cremanthodium campanulatum seedlings. That's a plant I'm really looking for!
So let the cat out of the bag: where did you get your seeds from? I never saw them offered anywhere.

I think it's a good guess Trond has found the seeds on this list http://trillium.no/

[Hoy]

Trond, I just saw your picture of the Cremanthodium campanulatum seedlings. That's a plant I'm really looking for!
So let the cat out of the bag: where did you get your seeds from? I never saw them offered anywhere.

Yes, Emma, Magnar is perfectly right! I got the seeds from Bjørnar.

[Magnar]

Trond, I just saw your picture of the Cremanthodium campanulatum seedlings. That's a plant I'm really looking for!
So let the cat out of the bag: where did you get your seeds from? I never saw them offered anywhere.

Yes, Emma, Magnar is perfectly right! I got the seeds from Bjørnar.

I bought a few species from that list too,, among them the C. aff campanulatum.. will sow them this week

[EmmaCampanula]

Thank you Magnar & Trond!!! I placed an order...

[Kristl Walek]

As a PS to the above, I have for some years wanted to follow up on a study I read some time ago suggesting the most efficient manner of raising Podophyllum hexandrum to maturity. The relevant passage is as follows:


Treatment of cotyledonary leaves of 1 week-old-seedlings with 200 ppm GA(3 )resulted in true or functional leaf emergence within 7 days, and the resultant plants were also more vigorous than the ones obtained from manual removal of cotyledonary leaves. The study helped advance the establishment of seedlings by one growing season (almost 1 year).

For those of you who have not been down the "podophyllum seed road", seed normally sends out a very long root first, then sometime later a cotyledon leaf will emerge above ground. Normally the plant will do nothing further its first season, except developing its root system, with the cotyledon (not first true leaf) on top. On some rare occasions, and without human interference a true leaf is formed instead of the cotyledon leaf in the germinating year, but that is not the norm.  Normally the seedlings go through a cold period later and the first true leaf appears the second year.

So, as I have so many seedlings to play with, I have prepared two large pots---one batch has been treated with GA-3 today. The second pot will have all the cotyledon leaves removed once they fully emerge. If the study is correct and the true leaves emerge within a week or so, this is truly significant & cuts out at least a year in the growth process.  I will report what happens later.

First follow-up on the above, posted January 18th.
Today in the pot of GA-3 treated Podophyllum hexandrums I noticed the emergence of true leaves in about 75% of the potted seedlings. This is truly exciting. HURRAY FOR SCIENCE!!!!!

LAST follow-up--
Today I am posting the mostly final pictures of the Podophyllum a few weeks later (these have actually been at the true leaf stage for some time now.

The last picture shows a close-up of one seedling that was already too advanced when I applied the GA-3. It finished sending out the cotyledon leaf---and, after GA-3 application, sent out the true leaf on a stalk right next to it.

[Maggi Young]

Marvelous shots of the growing leaves Kristl.  Great stuff, thank you!