My 70 year old female Sago Palm has been blooming for years but this year, in amongst the hundreds of infertile seeds, I found 3 I think are viable. First clue, they are the size of walnuts instead of the usual almond size. Second clue, they sink instead of floating. So BIG question: How do I get them to germinate?

Congrats! Those do sound like good seeds. When I sprouted one that was given to me about 10 yrs ago, I just stuck it an inch or so under the soil.

Did you treat and scarify? Hartmann & Kester's says soak in water for 2 - 3 days, soak in gibberellic acid for 2 - 3 days and then soak in Sulfuric acid for 1 hour.

I didn't do anything but stick it in soil. Then I forgot about it until about a year later when I noticed some new foliage in that pot and remembered the seed.

Scrape the 'rind' off before you plant and it might sprout faster. As you know, sagos don't do anything fast though.

After breaking my brain trying to read scientific papers... I have soaked the seeds for a couple days and plan to scape off the orange stuff today. Then I'm putting the seeds in a tray of Kanuma soil, putting seran wrap over it and keeping it on a heat mat in the kitchen window.

Although lots of articles mentioned gibberellic acid soaks, no one agrees on ppm and everyone warns of the weird results with too much. Sulfuric acid for an hour... I don't think there would be anything left of the seeds to plant.

One of the things I did learn is the seeds continue to mature for several months and won't sprout until they're mature enough. I should have done more reading before soaking as now I have to keep them damp so the rest of their maturing will have to be in the kanuma.

After reading an article on Academia, I soaked them in 500ppm gibberellic acid overnight. Today into kansuma.

Another way of propagating is to separate the offsets growing at the base of the mother trunk. I've used a small shovel to "pop" them off then planting them. I've also found seedlings at the base of the mother plant and potted them up, found 3 this year, none some years….. good luck with your propagation!

I guess I should have posted in my own thread...

The seeds sprouted a couple days ago.



I have separated offsets and planted them all over my yard. But when you get seeds... a new challenge.

The third seed has sprouted. Three out of three! They all took just a couple days over 5 months to "hatch." I had them in about an inch of kanuma/perlite so when the roots appeared, I moved them to cactus soil/perlite so they had more foot room. Moving them didn't seem to harm them any.

Very exciting! : )

Two of the sago seeds now have little tiny shoots. This is the bigger one:

Update: two of the 3 seeds have grown into nice little plants. The 3rd has never moved beyond "green bump on nose" stage.

Very cool!!!

I hope these are still doing well. Any udates?

They (and the one and only swamp palmetto) have moved outside. Three leaves each. Hubby was going out to try to pry a sago puppy off the side. I asked him to look for more seeds.

Those look good : )