Naturally they aren't dosed with GA3 in nature, doesn't mean they don't come in contact with naturally occurring giberellins and all sorts of difficult to reproduce dormancy breaking conditons in habitat, not to mention possibly germinating at extremely low rates (not so good when you only get 5 seeds in a packet :( ) over long periods of time--works fine in nature, given enough undisturbed habitat, but not very satisfying in the garden..
Don't get me wrong, my preference is for natural stratification, and when I sowed my few little violet seeds, I used native soil and added some bits of organic material that I hoped might give some natural giberellins, and stuck it outside in early spring for some temperature ups and downs.... nothing happened, but I kept the pot, and if I am really really lucky, maybe something will come up this year after a full long winter outdoors! However, this sad experience (of course with so few seeds, the sample is too small to draw any conclusions) and a very limited Pediocactus germination (cold stratification, heat treatments, piercing etc are also used with these) has led me to think I may try GA3 for some things..haven't yet.. Cohan Fulford West Central Alberta, Canada, Zone 2-3 record temps from 10-20 miles away: min -45C/-49F;max 34C/93F http://picasaweb.google.com/cactuscactus On Mon, Jan 31, 2011 at 12:20 PM, penstemon <[email protected]> wrote: > >I have not yet used GA3, but I understand that is one of the risks-- > etiolation; > > I grew some etiolated GA-3 induced (not by me) rosulate violets in the > garden here. "Out of character" meant "doom", in this case. > I doubt that the seeds really need GA3 to germinate. I've never come across > any seeds that did. > And by the way, "I've grown them" is Rock Gardener Code for "they were in > the garden for a few weeks (or days, or hours, or even minutes) and they > died, and I'm pretending like I'm not interested in them any more, and > pretending not to be jealous of the fantastic pictures." > > > Bob Nold > Denver, Colorado, USA > > > > --
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