FlytrapCare Carnivorous Plant Forums

Ok, so I had some sarrs seeds stratifying. Cool!!! (Ok, I just had to add the "cool" part! )

Innyhoo, I had done *really*, *really*, well in not being the impatient mother hen and checking on the seeds everyday. To be honest, I used one of Panman's techniques to keep from wearing the zipper out on the ziplock...I forgot about them. It was 4-5 weeks in when I first looked at them and this is what I found!!!!!!

Thankfully I always put each type of seed in their on ziplock and put that bag into another bag. To make sure moisture doesn't get zapped out by the fridge I wrap another wet paper towel around the actual ziplocks that contain the seeds. The seed ziplocks look fine, though that moldy, outer paper towel did give me a scare! I do wonder why that paper towel mildewed *so* badly. It was a regular white paper towel, not one of the brown, eletronically dispensed ones that were liberated from a public restroom "somewhere".

The actual seed bags look like these. I know it's kinda dark to tell, but I don't see any mold to speak of in the seed bags, though there may be a touch...and they're getting close to time to plant!

Are those the seeds you won from @Chefdean? I cold stratified mine but they are not sprouting and I fear I may have somehow done something wrong. I traded with @Panman and he sent me several Sars and Drosera seeds and all of the Sars are sprouting and the Drosera look to be close to sprouting. Let me know if any of yours sprout, if they are in fact the same seeds. I am still holding out hope for mine.

The leuco-leuco-oreo-thingamajig seeds came from Chef. As I recall it was a premature birth of these seeds and they came with a caveat. I'll post the results of them here....I haven't planted them yet.

Mine look like that all of the time. I've never noticed a significant problem from it, but I always start more seeds than I want.

Wow, that's a lot of mold/mildew spots it seems. I've had spots on the brown paper towels, but nothing approaching this level. Panman, do you use regular white consumer paper towels or do you wave your hand magically a few times in front of the towel dispenser in the bathroom at Huey McGoo's or Costco and get a supply of brown towels to use?

It is hit and miss what they look like. Most of the time there is red spots on it. Sometimes black. I just use white paper towel. I'll have to pay closer attention to the germination when I have one that looks like that. Saying that, I have a ton of seeds in the fridge that I need to get stratified.

So is there an advantage to cold stratifying using paper towels? I put mine in test tubes with distilled water. Seems to work pretty well. The seeds I received from @Panman only took about 10 days to sprout. My Drosera seem to take a bit to sprout no matter if I sow directly or cold strat them.

Panman wrote: ↑Wed Nov 08, 2023 2:04 pm It is hit and miss what they look like. Most of the time there is red spots on it. Sometimes black. I just use white paper towel. I'll have to pay closer attention to the germination when I have one that looks like that. Saying that, I have a ton of seeds in the fridge that I need to get stratified.

Someone (maybe Chef? or evenwind?) mentioned early on to me that using the brown, commercial paper towels gave them a slightly better germination rate and maybe a lessening of mold/mildew(?). After sticking that white paper towel in the big bag with the smaller bags I think I'm just going to stick with the brown towels from now on. It will be interesting to see how the brown towels look inside their individual bags.

Seeds in the fridge... Are we hoarders? Is Chef and the seed bank promoting a generation of hoarders? Will we soon have newspapers from all major state papers stacked to the sealings? Will we be sneaking rolls of brown paper out of the bathroom at WeCare Medical and Chunky Cheese Center? If an explosion hits our house due to an experiment trying to gas seeds with an exotic gas to increase germination rates cause seeds to be flung for miles around with carnivorous plants sprouting everywhere, devouring small cats and dogs along the way? Oh horrors!!! I can see that this is the making of an epic motion picture (as opposed to a non-motion picture)...where's Jack Nicholson when you need him!!!!

Intheswamp wrote:Seeds in the fridge... Are we hoarders?

Procrastinator is more like it. And a bit of a cautious one. I rarely sow all of any seed that I receive, "Just in case." Of course, the ones I did sow all of, like my oreophila, I promptly dropped and spewed soil everywhere. Back to better safe than sorry.

andynorth wrote: ↑Wed Nov 08, 2023 2:37 pm So is there an advantage to cold stratifying using paper towels?

I have no idea. It’s how I was told to do it so that’s how I do it.

andynorth wrote:o is there an advantage to cold stratifying using paper towels?

Good question, but I've always done it that way. I have tried water stratification but it hasn't seemed to work well for me. The paper towel method works for me so I stick with it.

Oh well, I'm not exactly sure what happened to the post I started...suddenly BOOM!!! and it was gone. Anyhow, I planted the sarrs seeds that were in the bag with the yucky-looking paper towel. I was pleased to not find any mold or mildew (which would it be?) in the inner ziplocks of paper towels and seeds. I've read of the fungal and antibacterial qualities of sphagnum moss and have seen how well plants grow in it so I decided to add a pinch of live moss to each seed bag. I'm not sure if the moss had anything to do with the absence of mold(?) or not, but I'll be sticking a piece in the seed bags from now, at least until it causes a problem.

Well, I said I’d update if I got some germination from the premature leuco-Oreo-thingamagig. Out of 12-13 seeds I had one to sprout and it seems to be growing pretty good, maybe 3/4” tall. @ChefDean

Don’t ya just love it when the pictures turn sideways?