Growing Chestnut Trees from Chestnuts

[rrroae]

I've had 1 grow of the 20 I got from Larry. Not sure what's up. Planted them the same ways indoors that I do with oaks in miracle grow.

[letemgrow]

Originally Posted by rrroae

I've had 1 grow of the 20 I got from Larry. Not sure what's up. Planted them the same ways indoors that I do with oaks in miracle grow.

Mine came in and were not germinated, I put them in the fridge for a couple days, then out at room temp for a day and they were starting to pop open.

[NH Mountains]

Originally Posted by rrroae

I've had 1 grow of the 20 I got from Larry. Not sure what's up. Planted them the same ways indoors that I do with oaks in miracle grow.

Did you put them in the fridge for cold stratification? I had over 400 chestnut seeds from Oikos and Empire. All but 6 have sprouted roots and the main trunk. They stayed in the fridge crisper since November. I took out 200 last week and the other 200 this past weekend. The remaining 6 look like they will probably sprout.

[rrroae]

Originally Posted by letemgrow

Mine came in and were not germinated, I put them in the fridge for a couple days, then out at room temp for a day and they were starting to pop open.

That must of have been the problem. I put 10 nuts back in the fridge for the past 1 1/2 weeks so maybe I'll take those out and see what happens.

[Thayer.qdma]

I have about 6 Americans that have sprouted from Larry and I have a couple approaching 8" of top growth.

[indianasam44]

Originally Posted by rrroae

I've had 1 grow of the 20 I got from Larry. Not sure what's up. Planted them the same ways indoors that I do with oaks in miracle grow.

I'm sorry to hear this but I can't tell what your time frame is. The seeds were in the refrigerator (between 34 and 39 degrees) from the time I picked them off the ground until the time I shipped them so they should have been stratified. All seeds I ship pass the sink test, i.e. I never ship floaters. I get my seeds to germinate by splashing a little water into the baggie making sure they are well moistened and then resealing. I keep them in a dry sink in a back room where the temperature varies between 55 and 75 degrees. Most seeds germinate in 6 to 14 days at a rate I estimate to be 80 to 90%. Once the radicle appears I pot them in MiracleGro Potting Mixture just under the surface and keep them in the same room as above. The shoots appear in two-and-a-half to four weeks. The time from seed to shoot is thus three to six weeks. My experience has been that bigger seeds take longer to germinate than smaller seeds. I am certainly hoping the seeds you re-refrigerated germinate.

[CrazyED]

Larry I will hopefully get another dozen or 2 from you next winter. If you think of it try and come around to the forum when you have some forsale. Let us know when they are ready.

[johnrpb]

Originally Posted by indianasam44

I get my seeds to germinate by splashing a little water into the baggie making sure they are well moistened and then resealing. I keep them in a dry sink in a back room where the temperature varies between 55 and 75 degrees. Most seeds germinate in 6 to 14 days at a rate I estimate to be 80 to 90%. Once the radicle appears I pot them in MiracleGro Potting Mixture just under the surface and keep them in the same room as above. The shoots appear in two-and-a-half to four weeks. The time from seed to shoot is thus three to six weeks. My experience has been that bigger seeds take longer to germinate than smaller seeds. I am certainly hoping the seeds you re-refrigerated germinate.

That's pretty much what I have done for all my acorns and chestnuts this year and I've had less than a dozen out of ~300 fail to germinate. From my experience the most important thing is to keep the moisture content consistent once they have begun to germinate until the radicle is longer than about 1/2 inch, this is fairly easy to do with a couple damp paper towels and a ziploc.

Larry,
Thanks again for the chestnuts, I'm looking forward to experiment with these on our farm. Even if these eventually get blight i'm hoping to learn the best way to plant/grow them so i'll be that much further up the learning curve when i can get blight resistant nuts,

[rrroae]

Originally Posted by indianasam44

I'm sorry to hear this but I can't tell what your time frame is. The seeds were in the refrigerator (between 34 and 39 degrees) from the time I picked them off the ground until the time I shipped them so they should have been stratified. All seeds I ship pass the sink test, i.e. I never ship floaters. I get my seeds to germinate by splashing a little water into the baggie making sure they are well moistened and then resealing. I keep them in a dry sink in a back room where the temperature varies between 55 and 75 degrees. Most seeds germinate in 6 to 14 days at a rate I estimate to be 80 to 90%. Once the radicle appears I pot them in MiracleGro Potting Mixture just under the surface and keep them in the same room as above. The shoots appear in two-and-a-half to four weeks. The time from seed to shoot is thus three to six weeks. My experience has been that bigger seeds take longer to germinate than smaller seeds. I am certainly hoping the seeds you re-refrigerated germinate.

Larry, don't worry about it. With the success others have had, I'm sure it was something I did or just bad luck. Either way, I think it's really good of you to be selling these so cheap and hopefully we can get some Chestnuts growing.

[robsulm]

Larry, johnrpb, NH Mountains,

How were you guys storing your chestnuts in the refrigerator for cold stratification? Did you just place the nuts in a ziploc or did you use some peat moss (the ground kind) or peat moss (the stringy kind)? Or some other method?

What do you do after two months of storage? Do you take them out and let them get room temperature in order to germinate or do you wait some more (perhaps weeks to months) so that they germinate while in storage?

Thanks in advance!