Seed growing Japanese Maple Experiment

[TimS]

Thank you Mark and Ryceman,

It's been both an enjoyable and enlightening experiment to conduct and i'm better equipped to try again this year having been through it once now. Growing under shade cloth has certainly been a big help, especially through summer, and i have more of a gauge now for what growth to expect over what time for my next attempt.

I applaud you Ryceman for your commitment to your pines, i can empathize with some of your constraints being as i face some of the same ones; a-la space and possibly some of the very good type of mania required for this I think there is a point in life at which you embrace and own your interests (or obsessions!) and bask in the simple enjoyment that it gives you. Years ago i wouldn't have ever thought i'd be growing a hundred plus JM from seed and loving every minute of it, but i'm glad i did do it now!

You can bet that i will be selling them off just as soon as i see ones that shoot well in spring. At any rate i need the space back for the next batch so i can't really afford to keep too many from the space constraint point of view. I just am hesitant to sell plants that may simply fail to grow next season, i would feel pretty terrible taking money and then not delivering a quality plant. I'd sooner have them all die and not sell one than have taken money for a single plant that was never going to grow properly.

Of course it is necessary to note that any even though they may shoot on well in spring, these will be nowhere near as hardy as straight species Japanese Maple, and anyone who does buy one or more should be aware of that. They will be far more sensitive to heat and wind damage, they will certainly have the best chance in dappled shade or under shade cloth, and i can't predict how well they will perform in a more harsh environment. Likely that will differ from tree to tree based on genetics. That is one reason why i have collected predominantly straight species this time, the risk of genetic abnormalities on the long term strength of the plant should, in theory, be low to non-existent compared to weepers.

I will take this into account with pricing, though i haven't really thought about what i will ask for them assuming there are some amount that grow on well. Essentially it is just my time and input into them for the 12 or so months to grow them. This was never meant to be a business for me, i really just want to grow some interesting trees for the future of bonsai; that people years down the track might take some enjoyment from them. But anyway i'll cross the money side of things bridge when i come to it and if i ever dud anyone price-wise it's always myself.

If nothing else it has been a great thrill; from avidly collecting seeds, to watching the seedlings emerging, seeing them grow into tiny weeping maples to finally approaching their do-or-die moment in 4-5 months time. If not a single one lives i will consider it a success simply from it having been a greatly enjoyable experience, and if every single one does die then i will have learned even more than i already have.

[TimS]

Well, about 4 months or so ahead of when i expected to see them, the first couple of seeds of the 2019 seed growing experiment have germinated.

This is the "low care" experiment of simply collecting the seed, throw them in a big poly box with some glass panels over the top to retain a little bit of heat and see what happens. No idea how many will actually germinate with this attitude but it is at least 2/2000

The 2018 batch are all dropping their leaves now, so their moment of truth approaches, and my moment of truth of just where the hell i'm going to put the next batch approaches as well. Ah well, cross that bridge when i come to it!

[TimS]

The 2019 guys are totally ignoring the cold weather we are having and popping up all over the place now. Up to about 40 already germinated before we even get to winter proper! Only another 1,960 odd to go!

I managed to snag about 750 pots on the weekend so at least that goes some small way to covering what may grow

mapleseedlings.jpg

[MJL]

Blimey! Tim you are one of the more passionate folk on this forum. Again, I look forward to watching these seedlings hatch and picking up a few to boot. Cheers, Mark


Bonsai teaches me patience.
Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

[TimS]

Thanks very much Mark!

I really just get bored sometimes, and when i get bored i start growing plants, and maples are my favourite. If i can start some reasonable material for people to bonsai then that is just a bonus really.

I find myself regularly at Trevor's and Tien's nurseries and struggling to find what i'm looking for, so eventually i just had to bite the bullet and grow it myself. I still go and visit anyway because you never know what you're going to find, but more and more frequently i come away empty handed, something i would never have been able to do in the past.

There is a nice moment when you start to be discerning in what you apply your money, and more importantly time to. Not that i still don't buy absolute rubbish on a whim of course. Did that a few weeks back at Trev's and now I've a plant in the back garden i'm going to have to air-layer, and totally rebuild from the beginning, that i could have walked away from and put the money towards something much better

[TimS]

Well i spent the morning down-potting my original seed grown weeping maples from 6 inch back into 100mm pots. I decided not to do any significant root pruning to them, I pinched a few excessively long roots back, but on the whole i left them as is to grown on strong this year.

Partly went backwards in pot size because they just haven't grown enough roots to justify a 6 inch pot, partly to make some space in the driveway, partly to work out what ones are acceptable to sell, and partly to find which don't look like they have enough roots to be confident selling to people as a viable plant. I've kept back about 20 or so that I think will struggle, and i'll see how they go this year. I think i only lost about 5-10 plants through winter by the look of it.




These 70-80 have roots that i consider acceptable for their size and age and have buds swelling/ breaking.

seedmaples819.jpg

These few had actually grown roots into the ground through their pots, so have quite substantial root systems. Selfish me will hang on to at least a few of these to play with, having put the effort in to growing them i'll take the first pick of the lot

seedmaples2819.jpg

I did pot up my 1 year old seed grown Ginkgos from last year into 6 inch pots, a few of them have grown trunks more than pencil thickness in one year which is great. I'm trying them in the driveway, sitting where the roots can access the ground to see if can push them on that way.

Just a few weeks away now from the weeping maples being fully leafed out and being able to offer them for sale!

Final result seems something like: Starting seed number 1250 -> Germinated -> 450(ish) -> Survived through until spring -> ~80-90 -> Success rate = somewhere around 6-7%

FYI, won't be doing weepers again from those numbers!

[boom64]

Hi Tim ,Well done and some great results for all the work you have put in. Cheers John.

[TimS]

Thanks John, it’s been fun and enlightening to watch them grow from the seeds to where they are now, that’s for sure!

The next batch I started too early, so they have really struggled through winter, that’s why there has not been many updates on them. Come Spring I’ll go through them properly and decide if I continue them or not. At this stage 100 or so have germinated but look really rough, and potting them up into the cold doesn’t seem to fix the issue.

At and rate it will just be good to have some space back around the house, it’s gotten a little out of control over the last 12 months.

[MJL]

“These few had actually grown roots into the ground through their pots, so have quite substantial root systems. Selfish me will hang on to at least a few of these to play with, having put the effort in to growing them i'll take the first pick of the lot.”

Tim, you make me smile - I don’t think it’s selfish, rather it’s logical and much deserved that you select those plants you want after all the effort you’ve put in here!

I’ll be getting some for sure - much like Ryan and his pines; work like this means that these plants have been given a strong start and folk like me have a firm foundation to hopefully grow some quality trees in future. Cheers, Mark

[Ryceman3]

...it will just be good to have some space back around the house, it’s gotten a little out of control over the last 12 months.

No idea what you’re talking about?!?

Hi Tim,
You’ve got quite a bit on the go, I wouldn’t feel too bad about taking first dibs on what you are going to keep for yourself, I think you’ve earned that right!
As always, motivational and inspirational stuff.

[TimS]

I just love growing anything really. I get bored and just start growing stuff, which is why the space issues occurred. I’ve got about 80 Fuchsias, 200 Dianthus superbus Fringed Pink, the maples, and next taking cuttings of flowering quince and flowering apricot

I need a big clean out, or just to put a bunch of it into green mulch. Then I can spend proper time on the bonsai. But i’ll definitely set a few maples aside for myself, the vast majority can go to good homes though, and I’ll enjoy seeing them develop!

[TimS]

Well i’ve given up on the 2019 batch, rampant powdery mildew finally convinced me to give up on them, so there will be no V2.0 this year.

The weepers will be the one and only go at seed grown maples; I’m looking at trying to nut out cutting grown flowering apricot and plum next.

[Ryceman3]

Sorry to hear it Tim ... that must be disappointing, but at least you've got a few left from last year to keep you busy while you get your head around prunus cuttings (and the weepers)!
Do you think the issue was primarily sowing too early or was there something else at play?
Thanks for updating your thread - always good to hear how things go - good or bad.

[TimS]

Sorry to hear it Tim ... that must be disappointing, but at least you've got a few left from last year to keep you busy while you get your head around prunus cuttings (and the weepers)!
Do you think the issue was primarily sowing too early or was there something else at play?
Thanks for updating your thread - always good to hear how things go - good or bad.

It’s a bit of a bummer, but no point risking spreading it to my bonsai when they leaf out, especially since the seedlings were not going to survive anyway. It seemed foolish to proceed much further.

I think that starting early didn’t help, because I had to cover them so much to keep them protected it possibly made good conditions for the mildew.

I’ve recently become very interested in ornamental prunus, so i’ll have space and time to get involved in that now

[EllenScume]

Hello, thanks!