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Seed help w/ d spatulata

Hey,
I have a flowering D. spatulata. Lots of stalks are comming up from the little larger than a golf ball size clump of green and red mucus. So how to i get the flowers to germinate and than when are the seeds ready to get from the pods and how do i do that?

Let me know, ive never messed with seeds before.
Jeff
 
Wait until the oldest pods are dark and then gently pull them off. This is a species that doesn't require much encouragement to propogate itself. You can literally place the pods in a pot and they will germinate without difficulty. If you want to help it a little, you can water the pot and keep covered until you seed seedlings. They are tiny, so you may want to use a magnifying glass.

This is an excellent beginner plant. They also spread quickly through producing plantlets.
 
ok, so let me get this right. I wait until the pods themselves are dark and than i pluck the individual pods off the stalk. Than i take the pods and put them on a pot on top of my soil mixture. I cover it (with a wet paper towel or something?) until what? Im really confused...

Hehe, sorry... im new... as you can tell from the other topics of mine to which you have responded (with great patients, i might add)

Thanks,
Jeff
 
now that i think of it. I think i have heard somewhere that you can put the pods themselves on a wet paper towel for a while until the seeds come out...?

jeff
 
Heh... how do you get the flowers NOT to germinate?

The flowers of mine seem to be cleistogamous (not opening)... I have never seen a flower of it fully open. But they mostly self-pollinate.

When the stalk has turned brown, you can harvest the seed.

Snip off the stalk. Open the pods by grasping/pinching the base with one hand, and pulling the petals out with your other hand. Do this over a white sheet of paper, something of high grade so seeds don't get stuck in it.

Tease the seeds out by flicking your fingernail back and forth over the opened seed pod. You should see lots of very small seeds fall on the paper.

You can sow them immediate on wet peat/sand mix, or make up wax paper packets and stick them in the fridge for later.

I segregate my D. spatulata from the rest of my plants... it is a weed!
 
When my D. spathulata flowers, I just pull off the ripened (brown) seed pods and crumble them between my fingers over the pot I'm sowing them in. It's not very precise, but my D. spathulata flowers constantly so I'm in no danger of running out of seed. I think what Jim meant by covering was to put something translucent like plastic wrap over the pot, or stick it in a freezer bag. This will raise the humidity and temperature, which is helpful to seeds. On the other hand, it's also helpful to little pests like moss and algae. For something as prolific as D. spathulata, it may not be neccesary to bother covering at all - in a year or so you'll probably have more plants than you'll know what to do with.
~Joe
 
Yes, as to what seedjar and sscott said, you almost can't go wrong- seeing the flowers can be a bit of a trick though, I have 20+ stalks on my D.tokaiensis (which is half D.spatulata) and so far I've only seen two of the flowers actually open- they seem to stay open for around an hour, if not a bit less, and I grew them all from seeds I got almost one year ago

I keep them in a completely separate room from the rest of my collection on a windowsill and they don't seem to need any sort of maintenance other than watering
 
The flower stalks that i have, about 15, all have numerous pods on them that have been there for weeks and which open and close at random. Its actually kinda a treat to look into my terrarium and see if i have purple flowers or not. Anyway, thanks for the help. Once i have the seed packets, are there ways i can trade them (ICPS seed bank, ect.) IS there anything special i have to do? counting seeds into packets? seeing if they will gow when i sow them on my housemates pain in the neck cat? (its called poetic justice for eating so many of my plants)

jeff
 
Sorry I wasn't clear, but the other 3 gave covered the concept. Chia cat? Hmmm....

Don't bother counting seeds. Not worth it! Just crumble one pod's worth into a packet. you can send them to the ICPS or you can psot a topic in the Trading Post forum. I'm sure there will be newcomers interested. Happy growing!
 
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