What's the best way to germinate old seeds 1990-2014

[Widgekhalifa]

I have quite a few seeds been given to me
old.. some new..
Heirloom afgan x Orange Cookies is one I've picked out of the bunch and I don't know much about heirloom strains of anyone knows anything, be good to gain some knowledge, also have underground original seeds.

 

[tylerzigzag9029]

If there old is soak them in a jar with a cap full of peroxide (3%).keep an eye on em and once they pop get them in damp paper towl right away to finish getting to better size. You just have to check them frequently so u don't drown them. Good luck

 

[Alabamasf]

I dont know why so many people act like seeds are so delicate. As far as ive seen so far they are next to indestructable. The ones i planted are from atleast 2008 or better. They grew fine. And i would go through all yhe wet paper towel stuff. Just put em in dirt and let them go. Thats how nature wanted it. And if you have some old skool seed that would be great. Make sure you get them into the ground.

 

[BAWBAG'69]

I'm no expert but personal experience of scuffing the seed lightly with sand paper has worked for me.

 

[MickFoster]

Nature doesn't provide scuffing, pre-soaking, or paper towels.
Either use rapid rooters or just plant them in your chosen medium.
Good luck.

 

[BAWBAG'69]

Hmmm, nature doesn't store seeds allowing the outer casing to harden up needing assistance in getting moisture to the (hopefully) lovely lady inside but like I said I aint no expert just penniless with personal experience of old seeds.

 

[tylerzigzag9029]

For me the paper towels method is most reliable. And i would only soak if the seeds are old but you will have to let us no what you decide and how it turns out i haven't popped seeds that old before

 

[Widgekhalifa]

I dont know why so many people act like seeds are so delicate. As far as ive seen so far they are next to indestructable. The ones i planted are from atleast 2008 or better. They grew fine. And i would go through all yhe wet paper towel stuff. Just put em in dirt and let them go. Thats how nature wanted it. And if you have some old skool seed that would be great. Make sure you get them into the ground.

how did you go about germinating them

 

[Alabamasf]

I lived on a farm for 20 so years and we always put seeds in the ground and watered. I figured weed was no different. I kept them in a prescription bottle all this time. And just put them in dirt and watered.

 

[Flash63]

#2​

Senior Member Join Date: Apr 2009 Location: Canada Posts: 1,061

5% bleach in autoclaved, distilled water with a couple of drops of Tween-20 per liter of solution. I sterilize the water in Duran jars (loose lids) in a pressure cooker @ 20 PSI for 20 minutes, and then allow the jars to cool under my flow hood and tighten the lids when the water has cooled. This is probably overkill for most purposes, but it's a variation of the protocol I use for sterilizing explants for tissue culture, and it seems to work with minimal contamination. You can get away with a drop of dish detergent instead of the Tween, I just have the tween-20 in the lab so I use it. If you are going to be doing a lot, you can order a few ml of Tween-20 on Amazon if you like. First I rinse the seeds in a tight mesh strainer to remove any leaf debris that might be harboring bacteria or spores. These seeds were a little dirtier than most having been field grown, so you definitely want to wash away any superfluous materials. This can be up to a 5 minute rinse in lukewarm water. Cannabis achenes have a lot of little crevices where spores and bacteria can hide, so a thorough rinse is a wise step. Then I take the seeds and drop them in maybe 100-200 mls of the bleach/Tween-20 solution in an Erlenmeyer flask, but any clean glass vessel will do -the seeds should be fully immersed, maybe 2x the volume of water as seed. You want to keep stirring and swishing the seeds around gently to ensure the current is washing away any contaminants. After a minute of swishing I remove the bleach and strain the seeds from the liquid and start again. No more than 3 minutes total, and if I see bleaching on the small test batch (always do a test batch to seed how the seeds react), sometimes I'll only do 2 minutes. The next part is key. Immediately rinse 3-5 times (for 5 minutes per rinse) in the same sterilized distilled water (baby water / distilled water from Walmart or the local pharmacy is fine), again using a tight mesh strainer, or simply rinse the seeds in a different vessel with the same volume of water, at least 3 times to ensure the bleach is removed. I use a labratory orbita shaker, but you can do it by hand it's just a little tedious. Once the rinses are completed, soak the seeds in the distilled water as before, for 2-24 hours depending on the age of the seed and the medium you will be growing in. Sometimes I'll use agar plates, but most often I'll just sprout them in paper towels and transfer to a light dirt (like Light Warrior for you Americans) or surface sow on a .peat based planting substrate. You can use whatever medium you prefer, it's not that big of a deal as long as the seeds remain moist.

 

[tylerzigzag9029]

​

#2​

Senior Member Join Date: Apr 2009 Location: Canada Posts: 1,061

5% bleach in autoclaved, distilled water with a couple of drops of Tween-20 per liter of solution. I sterilize the water in Duran jars (loose lids) in a pressure cooker @ 20 PSI for 20 minutes, and then allow the jars to cool under my flow hood and tighten the lids when the water has cooled. This is probably overkill for most purposes, but it's a variation of the protocol I use for sterilizing explants for tissue culture, and it seems to work with minimal contamination. You can get away with a drop of dish detergent instead of the Tween, I just have the tween-20 in the lab so I use it. If you are going to be doing a lot, you can order a few ml of Tween-20 on Amazon if you like. First I rinse the seeds in a tight mesh strainer to remove any leaf debris that might be harboring bacteria or spores. These seeds were a little dirtier than most having been field grown, so you definitely want to wash away any superfluous materials. This can be up to a 5 minute rinse in lukewarm water. Cannabis achenes have a lot of little crevices where spores and bacteria can hide, so a thorough rinse is a wise step. Then I take the seeds and drop them in maybe 100-200 mls of the bleach/Tween-20 solution in an Erlenmeyer flask, but any clean glass vessel will do -the seeds should be fully immersed, maybe 2x the volume of water as seed. You want to keep stirring and swishing the seeds around gently to ensure the current is washing away any contaminants. After a minute of swishing I remove the bleach and strain the seeds from the liquid and start again. No more than 3 minutes total, and if I see bleaching on the small test batch (always do a test batch to seed how the seeds react), sometimes I'll only do 2 minutes. The next part is key. Immediately rinse 3-5 times (for 5 minutes per rinse) in the same sterilized distilled water (baby water / distilled water from Walmart or the local pharmacy is fine), again using a tight mesh strainer, or simply rinse the seeds in a different vessel with the same volume of water, at least 3 times to ensure the bleach is removed. I use a labratory orbita shaker, but you can do it by hand it's just a little tedious. Once the rinses are completed, soak the seeds in the distilled water as before, for 2-24 hours depending on the age of the seed and the medium you will be growing in. Sometimes I'll use agar plates, but most often I'll just sprout them in paper towels and transfer to a light dirt (like Light Warrior for you Americans) or surface sow on a .peat based planting substrate. You can use whatever medium you prefer, it's not that big of a deal as long as the seeds remain moist.

That is overkill and i would never put bleach near my seeds

 

[Flash63]

Its for old seeds like the title says,and bleach is just fine when used properly.

 

[Snoopy808]

I dont know why so many people act like seeds are so delicate. As far as ive seen so far they are next to indestructable. The ones i planted are from atleast 2008 or better. They grew fine. And i would go through all yhe wet paper towel stuff. Just put em in dirt and let them go. Thats how nature wanted it. And if you have some old skool seed that would be great. Make sure you get them into the ground.

Good words brother. Papertowel is a sign of rookies, always more broken roots and hassles.

 

[Mohican]

I have been studying this process and I have seen soaking in acid, soaking in hot water, soaking in hot acid...
When birds eat plants with seed the seed must make it through the digestive system to germinate.
I have a batch of old seeds I am going to use as tests for all of the published methods.
I have also read that beer contains the hormones for germination. I am going to try that (Guiness) and also coconut water.

Wish me luck!

 

[Snoopy808]

Nature doesn't provide scuffing, pre-soaking, or paper towels.
Either use rapid rooters or just plant them in your chosen medium.
Good luck.

Nature does provide scuffing. Passing through bird gullets is one way. Chewed on by animals for your stone fruits and scuffed by rocks or gravel for some seeds that like disturbed areas, think pugs rooting or latge herds ripping up clods and compacting soil.

 

[Snoopy808]

For my old seeds if the first batch is poor germination, ill soak in maxi-crop overnight then soil or rooter plugs.

 

[tylerzigzag9029]

Good words brother. Papertowel is a sign of rookies, always more broken roots and hassles.

I have never had a problem with paper towel method its easy and reliable i also put mine in a Ziploc so they can't loose much moisture. Never had problems with a 99% success rate

 

[Widgekhalifa]

80 percent of them have cracked at the side.. Not split as usuall.. After leaving them floating in water for 4 hours, and then changing the water and actually popping them under the water for around 10 hours there was bubbles all round the seeds and they had cracked, on paper towels now in a tupperware box will see if they stretch out. . What does anyone know about heirloom strains?

 

[tylerzigzag9029]

I haven't Grown any personally but i have heard they are generally harder to grow and usually longer flowering period depending what u have. Probably sensitive to nutrients too. U will have to post pics how they turn out