SDK1's Seedlings 2023

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mmcavall
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Re: SDK1's Seedlings 2023

Post by mmcavall »

SDK1 wrote: Thu Mar 16, 2023 6:53 pm
I'm hesitant to use hydrogen peroxide at anything more than 1% strength due to the destructive properties it has. It's no longer recommended by any (I think) emergency care organizations due to the fact that it causes more damage to healthy cells surrounding a wound and increases the amount of time to heal. Might kill a fungus (or maybe not in your case) but I have a mild worry that it would cause as much damage to a seedling or any positive/neutral microbes that may be hanging out in the soil.

]

Indeed. I have tried with Mammillaria, Gymnocalycium, Frailea and Acanthocalycium and the seeds of Frailea had very bad germination when treated with hydrogen peroxide. The others had good germination.
keith
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Re: SDK1's Seedlings 2023

Post by keith »

Ive used hydrogen pexoxide full strength 3% on seedlings it didn't seem to harm them. How well it works against fungus probably not that great best to keep fungus away in the first place. I use soil from the desert in my mix its thoroughly decomposed ( 10M years) and may have antifungal properties ? if you can avoid getting valley fever coccidioidomycosis , a fungus found in the Desert soil ( don't dig down it lives a foot down or more) it works well for me.

3 of my pots are germinating including the lophos :D , and the M herrerea not germinating so in process of drying out the pot and will start over.

Already plastic covering seedlings coming off at night , this may slow down the growth but I'm OK with that . The seedlings have to be hardy I grow outside in cold frames not in a hothouse so they have to acclimate . Grow big roots and stay compact.
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Re: SDK1's Seedlings 2023

Post by SDK1 »

keith wrote: Fri Mar 17, 2023 3:31 pm Ive used hydrogen pexoxide full strength 3% on seedlings it didn't seem to harm them. How well it works against fungus probably not that great best to keep fungus away in the first place. I use soil from the desert in my mix its thoroughly decomposed ( 10M years) and may have antifungal properties ? if you can avoid getting valley fever coccidioidomycosis , a fungus found in the Desert soil ( don't dig down it lives a foot down or more) it works well for me.

3 of my pots are germinating including the lophos :D , and the M herrerea not germinating so in process of drying out the pot and will start over.

Already plastic covering seedlings coming off at night , this may slow down the growth but I'm OK with that . The seedlings have to be hardy I grow outside in cold frames not in a hothouse so they have to acclimate . Grow big roots and stay compact.
I would bet the top layers of the soil from the desert definitely has good mix of microbial life that has similar sort of suppressive properties against the "bad" fungi that can kill seedlings, similar to the compost that MikeInOz has described before. I briefly did some work out in Saguaro National Park and one of the coolest things I learned while out there was about the cryptogamic crust that covered a lot of the ground off the trail. Growing up in the Midwest I'd never thought of "the desert" as a place rich in complexity or lots of life. Joke's on me because I couldn't have been more wrong. Your comment about using desert soil made me think of all the lichens and other microbial things our liason told us about when my crew was out there.

Glad the seeds are working out for you! I've gotten a couple more to pop up after keeping the lid on my germination chamber more for the new seeds. The M. coahuilensis have been the quickest off the mark for me, probably 8-10 up already, one lone T. pseudopectinatus is up and growing, 2 of the M. schideana are just barely starting to peek through the top dressing, and nothing from the Escobaria or M. herrerae yet. I think it's been about a week since I've sown the seeds; I really need to be better about taking notes so I know when to pull some of the pots to let them dry out for awhile before trying again..
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SDK1
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Re: SDK1's Seedlings 2023

Post by SDK1 »

Just a quick observation from my seed starting adventures.

It's interesting seeing all of the seeds that had already popped up react to me keeping the lid on the chamber more and the heat mat on 24/7 again for this newest batch of seeds. Have had more seeds germinate in pots that I thought were finished and most of the seedlings seem to be growing faster. Could just be my imagination though. I even removed the layer of bugscreen I had in between the lights and the seedlings because it seemed like the E. obesa seedlings were stretching just a bit. What I thought was strange was that even though I technically increased the light intensity, some of the seedlings that were a bit red/brown with stress 7-10 days ago are greening up again. Looking back I'm guessing that the stress may have been from me leaving the lid cracked and not watering enough to compensate for the dryer air I was exposing the seedlings to. I've also been spraying the pots much more heavily in the morning and evening (or whenever I remember) to make sure the whole soil mix is wet/damp and there aren't any dry pockets. Just interesting to notice the effects of trying to balance between light, water, heat, humidity and all that.

I've lost a couple seedlings that have just melted since I started putting the lid on more, spraying the pots more often and keeping the bottom heat on around the clock. Those seedlings were already compromised though. A couple of weeks ago I thought I could move all of the pots on the left side of the germination chamber at once if I just went slow and was careful. Turns out I was not careful enough and ended up spilling those pots. I saved what I could find and repotted all of the spilled seedlings into two pots where I've had a couple melt. Not too bad considering how many seedlings I spilled. Live and learn I guess.
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SDK1
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Re: SDK1's Seedlings 2023

Post by SDK1 »

jerrytheplater wrote: Thu Mar 16, 2023 8:20 pm
SDK1 wrote: Thu Mar 16, 2023 6:53 pm
I'd be interested in knowing how that turns out Jerry. I work in wetlands and most bog plants have to be able to adapt to the relatively low nutrient availability. That's a pretty decent amount of fert but i guess I'm thinking along the lines of synthetic fertilizers. Hope you see some bang for your buck on that one.

That Cryptocoryne I'm growing has been in that jar maybe for more than 8 years now. I periodically take it out to remove the runners and new plants. I fertilize usually every 2 months with a little bit of the cactus fertilizer I'm using that day. I only used the fertilizer to get to the bacteria. This photo shows Springtails in the jar. I don't have them now though.
2018-2-13 C. wendtii 2.jpg

I'm going to be ordering some stump killer soon because it's the only way I've found to get potassium nitrate at a retail level that doesn't involve ordering from labs or sketchy amazon vendors.

You can buy Potassium NItrate from Aquatic Plant suppliers like these. We use KNO3 in our aquariums all the time. Current price is $5.00/lb plus postage. AquariumFertilizer.com https://aquariumfertilizer.com/
Jerry, you're a legend, thank you so much for this, honestly.

I am in the middle of planting some dormant unlabelled Sarracenia rhizomes I bought early February. Its getting warm. I have to uncover my tender plants from their leaf pile storage. Its worked for the past 4 years. You said you work in wetlands, so I thought I'd bring them up.
That Cryptocorne is pretty cool, I've got a good amount of respect for growers that have plants in containers without drainage, especially for as long of a time period of 8 years. That's something to be proud of.

I hope you have good luck with your Sarracenias, S. leucophylla is always one that stops me in my tracks when I see photos of it. I do work in wetlands but I unfortunately work with mostly low-quality, highly disturbed sites so I don't get to see many cool plants through my job. It happens occasionally but the carnivorous plants in Indiana are restricted to mostly northern Indiana and a couple high quality sites that I don't come remotely close to through work.
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Re: SDK1's Seedlings 2023

Post by jerrytheplater »

SDK1 wrote: Mon Mar 20, 2023 2:38 pm I am in the middle of planting some dormant unlabelled Sarracenia rhizomes I bought early February. Its getting warm. I have to uncover my tender plants from their leaf pile storage. Its worked for the past 4 years. You said you work in wetlands, so I thought I'd bring them up.
That Cryptocoryne is pretty cool, I've got a good amount of respect for growers that have plants in containers without drainage, especially for as long of a time period of 8 years. That's something to be proud of. They can grow totally submerged perfectly well. They only bloom when emersed. I've only seen it bloom once. That is my criteria for doing a good job. It may need to see a flood cycle.

I hope you have good luck with your Sarracenias, S. leucophylla is always one that stops me in my tracks when I see photos of it. I do work in wetlands but I unfortunately work with mostly low-quality, highly disturbed sites so I don't get to see many cool plants through my job. It happens occasionally but the carnivorous plants in Indiana are restricted to mostly northern Indiana and a couple high quality sites that I don't come remotely close to through work.
[/quote]
S. leucophylla always puts on its best pitchers in the late fall. This photo shows it at its peak after an early snow. Finally buried it in leaves on Thanksgiving and used the pitchers for cut flowers. They still looked good on New Years. The tallest pitcher was about 32" tall. It was amazing.
2018-1~1.JPG
2018-1~1.JPG (111.83 KiB) Viewed 2068 times
Maybe 7 years ago I got to do some remediation on a boggy section of one of the rivers in the NJ Pine Barrens. It was privately owned over 40 years ago and the owner planted a lot of southern Sarracenia: S. rubra, and S. minor. When he got too old to do anything about it, he asked a friend to see if he could weed it out. He went yearly or more for more than 10 years. I met him at a CP club and was invited to go one time. We were waist deep in Sphagnum Moss. The river was just a trickle with a hard sandy bottom. Hidden spikey cedar trees under water to stab you. It was cool. We weeded out any CP that didn't look like pure S. purpurea. I still have what looks like a pure S. rubra from that trip.

Here is a photo taken before the bog was cleaned up. It looks really beautiful, but it is not natural for NJ. https://jasonksepka.smugmug.com/Sarrace ... -KwxTKQc/A

Sad to see that person was caught a few years ago trying to send 10 live iguanas to Hong Kong. He plead guilty to violating the Lacey Act.
Jerry Smith
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45 inches (114 cm) rain equivalent per year, approx. evenly spread per month
2012 USDA Hardiness Zone 6b: -5F to OF (-20C to -18C) min.
SDK1
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Re: SDK1's Seedlings 2023

Post by SDK1 »

jerrytheplater wrote: Tue Mar 21, 2023 12:16 am
S. leucophylla always puts on its best pitchers in the late fall. This photo shows it at its peak after an early snow. Finally buried it in leaves on Thanksgiving and used the pitchers for cut flowers. They still looked good on New Years. The tallest pitcher was about 32" tall. It was amazing.

2018-1~1.JPG

Maybe 7 years ago I got to do some remediation on a boggy section of one of the rivers in the NJ Pine Barrens. It was privately owned over 40 years ago and the owner planted a lot of southern Sarracenia: S. rubra, and S. minor. When he got too old to do anything about it, he asked a friend to see if he could weed it out. He went yearly or more for more than 10 years. I met him at a CP club and was invited to go one time. We were waist deep in Sphagnum Moss. The river was just a trickle with a hard sandy bottom. Hidden spikey cedar trees under water to stab you. It was cool. We weeded out any CP that didn't look like pure S. purpurea. I still have what looks like a pure S. rubra from that trip.

Here is a photo taken before the bog was cleaned up. It looks really beautiful, but it is not natural for NJ. https://jasonksepka.smugmug.com/Sarrace ... -KwxTKQc/A

Sad to see that person was caught a few years ago trying to send 10 live iguanas to Hong Kong. He plead guilty to violating the Lacey Act.
That is a truly impressive specimen you grew there. I love the way so many carnivorous plants look but I've just never been able to provide consistent enough care or pure enough water to grow most of them. I hate buying distilled water and we rented until just last year so didn't have much of an ability to capture rainwater to use. The photos at that link are stunning. Maybe not natural but wow, the detail shots of the pitchers are incredible, nevermind the wider shots of the area at large. It looks like an amazing place to visit. I tried growing sphagnum moss awhile ago and recently threw in the towel after realizing most of it had died. Maybe one day I'll give it another shot.
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Re: SDK1's Seedlings 2023

Post by SDK1 »

Some seedling pictures

The following were sown ~ Feb 20
Mammillarias 03.20.23
Mammillarias 03.20.23
20230321_110640.jpg (135.46 KiB) Viewed 2020 times
Mammillarias 2 03.20.23
Mammillarias 2 03.20.23
20230321_110846.jpg (118.4 KiB) Viewed 2020 times
E. obesa 03.20.23
E. obesa 03.20.23
20230321_110937.jpg (135.72 KiB) Viewed 2020 times
Lobivia famatimensis or Echinocereus pectinatus 03.20.23
Lobivia famatimensis or Echinocereus pectinatus 03.20.23
20230321_112707.jpg (124.13 KiB) Viewed 2020 times
Trichocereus 'Flying Saucer'
Trichocereus 'Flying Saucer'
20230321_112830.jpg (128.12 KiB) Viewed 2019 times
Last edited by SDK1 on Tue Mar 21, 2023 6:38 pm, edited 1 time in total.
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SDK1
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Re: SDK1's Seedlings 2023

Post by SDK1 »

More seedlings

These were sown ~ February 4, 2023 and accidentally knocked out of their pots on March 8th, 2023. A few losses but not terrible.
Astrophytum myriostigma 03.20.23
Astrophytum myriostigma 03.20.23
20230321_111056.jpg (106.57 KiB) Viewed 2019 times
Mixed everything 03.20.23
Mixed everything 03.20.23
20230321_111255.jpg (164.88 KiB) Viewed 2019 times
Mixed everything 2 03.20.23
Mixed everything 2 03.20.23
20230321_111345.jpg (181.81 KiB) Viewed 2019 times
Trichocereus 'Flying Saucer' 03.20.23
Trichocereus 'Flying Saucer' 03.20.23
20230321_112546.jpg (115.24 KiB) Viewed 2019 times
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Re: SDK1's Seedlings 2023

Post by SDK1 »

One interesting thing to note that I've only noticed after looking through these pictures is that the seedlings with old scars (or current blemishes) from rust or something similar are from my first batch of seeds where I used crushed granite as the top dressing. There were definitely instances where a seedling had to try to push past a piece of granite which resulted in a small wound which is still visible, particularly in that last photo of the T. 'Flying Saucer' seedlings. The seedlings seem to be doing fine despite the wounds, I haven't noticed the orange bits really spreading so much as just staying constant. Time will tell if it becomes an issue or not.
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Re: SDK1's Seedlings 2023

Post by MrXeric »

Your seedlings are looking good so far! I get those lesions on my seedlings every now and then. Seems to be a toss-up on whether they'll heal or just melt away.
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Re: SDK1's Seedlings 2023

Post by jerrytheplater »

SDK1 wrote: Thu Mar 16, 2023 6:53 pm
jerrytheplater wrote: Wed Mar 15, 2023 8:59 pm
I just used the Espoma Organic Cactus Fertilizer today on a bog plant I have growing in a terrarium. The plant is a swamp plant from SE Asia called Cryptocorne wendtii. It is growing in a 1" deep very clay rich mixture of gravel, sand, peat moss, and clay. Fully saturated with standing water, no drainage. I just added about 25 ml of fertilizer water at their rate of 2 tsp/qt. I'm curious to see what happens.
I'd be interested in knowing how that turns out Jerry. I work in wetlands and most bog plants have to be able to adapt to the relatively low nutrient availability. That's a pretty decent amount of fert but i guess I'm thinking along the lines of synthetic fertilizers. Hope you see some bang for your buck on that one. I generally stay away from "organic" fertilizers because I don't think it's worthwhile to rely on microbial activity within a container. In the ground, sure, organic all the way. I read, and have found it to be the case, that using organic ferts in a small system like a pot tends towards boom and bust cycles which leads to an uneven availability of nutrients to the plant. Sometimes not enough and sometimes so much that it borders on toxicity of certain compounds. For me, it's just easier to use synthetic ferts and know what my plants are getting.
I just noticed a Spathe coming up on that bog plant (Cryptocoryne wendtii) last night. It must have been growing for at least a week, but I just noticed it. For those interested, this link goes to the pages of a recently deceased botanist that spent a large part of his life studying these Aroids from SE Asia. I am so glad his pages did not disappear. https://www.cryptocoryneworld.org/spathe.php

And here is a link to the page on this particular species: https://www.cryptocoryneworld.org/c_wendtii.php

Now is it caused by the mycorrhizae mix? By the extra fertilizer? Don't know. I first fertilized using it on March 15, of this year. One month ago. Photos to come. I have to set this one up.
Jerry Smith
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2012 USDA Hardiness Zone 6b: -5F to OF (-20C to -18C) min.
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Re: SDK1's Seedlings 2023

Post by jerrytheplater »

As promised, here are the photos taken April 14, 2023.

Photo taken through the curved glass walls:
rsz 2023-4-14 C. wendtii flower 1.jpg
rsz 2023-4-14 C. wendtii flower 1.jpg (106.18 KiB) Viewed 1754 times
Photo taken from above:
rsz 2023-4-14 C. wendtii flower 2.jpg
rsz 2023-4-14 C. wendtii flower 2.jpg (164.71 KiB) Viewed 1754 times
And another from above:
rsz 2023-4-14 C. wendtii flower 3.jpg
rsz 2023-4-14 C. wendtii flower 3.jpg (130.65 KiB) Viewed 1754 times
Jerry Smith
Bloomingdale, NJ
45 inches (114 cm) rain equivalent per year, approx. evenly spread per month
2012 USDA Hardiness Zone 6b: -5F to OF (-20C to -18C) min.
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Re: SDK1's Seedlings 2023

Post by SDK1 »

Very cool Jerry, thanks for sharing. I'd love to see what the fully developed flower looks like. Please keep us updated. I know this is a cacti forum but aroids, particularly the temperate ones around me (jack in the pulpit, green dragon, etc.), are always interesting. They're surprisingly diverse for something I thought was mostly restricted to tropical and sub-tropical climates.
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Re: SDK1's Seedlings 2023

Post by jerrytheplater »

SDK1 wrote: Mon Apr 24, 2023 2:04 pm Very cool Jerry, thanks for sharing. I'd love to see what the fully developed flower looks like. Please keep us updated. I know this is a cacti forum but aroids, particularly the temperate ones around me (jack in the pulpit, green dragon, etc.), are always interesting. They're surprisingly diverse for something I thought was mostly restricted to tropical and sub-tropical climates.
That flower was fully developed. It wilted in the next 2 days!
Jerry Smith
Bloomingdale, NJ
45 inches (114 cm) rain equivalent per year, approx. evenly spread per month
2012 USDA Hardiness Zone 6b: -5F to OF (-20C to -18C) min.
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