Scatterbrain said:
Catherine, one of the seed sellers on LA advises that some seeds can take a while to sprout and quotes an example that in one case seed was sown in April but not all sprouted but they were kept watered and then suddenly later in September two more came up and all the seeds were from the same pod.
That is exactly the reason for stratification (damp chilling). It's because many daylily seeds have seed dormancy. Seed dormancy means the seeds will not germinate immediately even when provided with normal germination conditions and if the seed dormancy is not artificially or naturally broken, they can take weeks or months to sprout.
I've several times heard of people assuming some seeds were no-shows and re-using the seed starting mix for potting or in the garden only to find daylily seedlings coming up in it months later - I've had that happen to me too. The result of inadequate or no stratification is erratic and staggered germination, some seeds will germinate immediately, some may take a few weeks, some may take months all from the same batch.
Stratification gets around that by making the seeds germinate all together but it has to be done right. They seeds need to have enough internal moisture for the chilling to work - stratification does not mean just storing dry seeds in the fridge, nor should they be floating in water. It also does not mean they should be left in the fridge until they germinate.
I know I've posted this link to an article on daylily seed dormancy and stratification that explains this is more detail before, but perhaps it would be useful reading for anyone who hasn't seen it previously:
http://www.ctdaylily.com/files...
