Re: Photos of Z. zamiifolia seeds

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On 4 April, way back in 2008, I asked in this forum whether anyone had photos of Z. zamiifolia seeds. No on ever answered, but in private correspondence with several forum members, I learned that no one knew of pictures.
Over the years since I wrote, I have tried pollinating the inflorescences. There is seldom visible pollen, so on the occasions when there is some, I have saved it in the freezing compartment of my refrigerator (not in a deep freeze). In 2018, I finally had seed. Twice. The first inflorescence was lost simply by being jarred when I moved the plant. The second, though, matured and produced three seeds. I was expecting seeds about the size and shape of olive pits, like the ones I had seen on aglaonema, but these were much bigger, rather like hazel nuts (2.76 MB photo, ZZ seeds.jpg).
I photographed the seeds and planted them in whatever commercial potting soil I had then on 28 December 2018. The pot was kept in my office, which is generally 21 or 22 °C during the day and a few degrees cooler at night. On 28 March 2019, three months later to a day, I saw that one seed had sent up a shoot. Over the next few days, the others did so. The shoots didn’t look like much, but by 18 April the first had opened to give two leaflets (2.26 MB photo, ZZ seedling.jpg). These resembled what ZZ’s commonly send up from the roots.
On 7 October 2019, I separated the little plants into three pots. For photos, I removed nearly all the soil (2.38 MB photo, ZZ plants with seeds-roots.jpg). ZZ surprised me again: the seeds were not being consumed to nourish the little plants, but appeared to be growing into tubers. Since I had a different kind of potting soil, I packed some of the old around the roots.
I hope my naivete comes through here. Maybe no one answered my query because everybody knew all about this and assumed someone else would tell me. Maybe my ZZ seeds aren’t becoming tubers, but are doing something I don’t know about. If anyone does find this interesting, the photos are free for all to use.

Walter Turner
Wuppertal, Germany

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