Re: Re: HYB: weather, germination

Linda from past posts I know you are trying to get bigger seedlings the first year. Your experiment has resulted in better germination. Bad germination has been my biggest problem. This year I am trying a modified Walter Moores method. I froze my seeds in December. I am going to plant them in late February. At that time we will not have too many hard freezes. Here germination is in late April.

I believe my problem is partial thaws. The top of the pot thaws and melted snow or rain stands in the pot causing the seeds to rot. This thaw has happened four or five times a winter. Because of lack of space I do not bury my pots or mulch.

With your method you are pushing Mother Nature to the limits. At the time the seedlings need sun and warmth they are getting poor light and cold. Thus your seedling loss. They are not weak seedlings just ones that have been pushed too far. Is it worth it?

Have you thought of timing your burrito method so that germination starts about a month before normal time? Without a greenhouse good growth during the winter is chancy.

If you have some spring germination you should try my method of pushing seedlings.
http://home.cinci.rr.com/irisinohio/tipps.htm
It has worked great for me I have had two sets of increases on SDBs and bloom on many of them in the fall. I don't work with reblooming TBs. With your longer growing season I think you could have fall bloom on TBs with my method. Robin Shadlow tried it last year and like it. I think she had fall bloom from some of her seedlings.. It would be worth a try on a few.

It is extra work for me. Either way potting or lining out I have to put chicken wire over them to keep the squirrels out. 20 oz plastic drink cups or Styrofoam both work for pots for individual plants. I use recycled nursery 4" pots, have several hundred.

Mike Greenfield
Zone 5b
SW Ohio
Region 6
http://home.cinci.rr.com/irisinohio/


----- Original Message ----- From: "Linda Mann" <lmann@volfirst.net>
To: "iris- talk" <iris@hort.net>
Sent: Tuesday, January 10, 2006 7:40 AM
Subject: [iris] Re: HYB: weather, germination


Yes, that's something I learned from you (and Paul Black) starting last
year.  I piled shredded tree leaves over them about 4 or 5 inches
thick.  That settled to about an inch thick.  That has made a huge
difference in keeping moisture more even, but when it's this warm out
night and day, it doesn't affect temperature much.

This is a situation where your/Paul's technique of burying pots in a
trench with mulch on top would really help a lot to dampen temperature
swings.  But that won't happen here unless some servants drop out of the
sky to do it for me. <g>

What I will probably try to do, if we get a sudden abrupt drop to really
cold temperatures (without some gradual cooling first to let seeds
adjust), is pile a bunch of cola bottles of water around the pots and
cover the whole area with Reemay.

Or I may just let nature thin out the survivors for me.

<Linda, have you tried using a mulch over your pots to regulate
temperatures?
                  You've not mentioned either way.  Betty>
--
Linda Mann east Tennessee USA zone 7/8
East Tennessee Iris Society <http://www.korrnet.org/etis>
American Iris Society web site <http://www.irises.org>
talk archives: <http://www.hort.net/lists/iris-talk/>
photos archives: <http://www.hort.net/lists/iris-photos/>
online R&I <http://www.irisregister.com>

---------------------------------------------------------------------
To sign-off this list, send email to majordomo@hort.net with the
message text UNSUBSCRIBE IRIS

---------------------------------------------------------------------
To sign-off this list, send email to majordomo@hort.net with the
message text UNSUBSCRIBE IRIS
Other Mailing lists | Author Index | Date Index | Subject Index | Thread Index