Larry,

Seems you are really busy this time of the year. At least we have some enjoyable temps to get it all done in. The mercury has dropped here all the way down to 46°F this morning. Oh course, being a gimp now, I cant get much of anything done other than getting on the DW nerves. I did start Physical Therapy last Thursday on my foot and I can put some weight on it now. So one day soon, I'll have a honey do list the length of me and then I'll have one from to take care of for the DW.

I do hope the stress test goes ok and that you are in better shape than the Doctors think.

100 cups of seedling is a lot of seedlings. I started 3 cups a couple of weeks ago. Guess that will be one of the items atop my list.

Take care and happy digging.

Stan,
Glad to here you are making progress. I was out inventorying some more seedling cups this morning and am up over 170 and still counting. Of course some of those cups have no seedlings showing. But, almost each day I find another cup with a new seedling, and seldom find one (but it does happen) where a seedling has died. Some of the cups have several seedlings and some only have one.
So whether or not the cup has a seedling showing I write the cross down and the location on a diagram so I can keep up with them. With so many it was taxing my poor memory trying to remember which ones did and did not have seedlings. I put a dash "-" out by the name if nothing is showing in the cup then if and when something does sprout I turn it into a "+".
I have spent a lot of time lately hauling in materials (leaves, grass, pine straw) for my new seedling bed. It is going to be about 10 feet wide and the length is yet to be determined. It is really starting to shape up, and I plan on planting the next seedlings into it in the early spring, if they don't outgrow their cups before then. I am thinking with the cooler weather they will not grow that much more till spring....that's what I am thinking, we shall see.

I was thinking the other day how good it would be to be able to rake the neighbors leaves. They have a couple huge sycamore trees that are dropping and the leave are plentiful. but the wind and other things will make them disappear before I could. I really need to explore the road gathering adventure to see what could be picked up in my area.

My seedling adventure has been rather small this year. I attempted a lot of crosses but not all took. I do have a few that I am particularly interested in seeing how they turn out. Those are the ones I started a couple weeks ago. I think I may have posted a couple of the crosses in my blog a few post ago. Guess I will have to go take a look to see. If not, I have an idea for the next post.

As for the growth on your seedlings, I would agree for the most part. however, I know Fred pushes his with along all winter as long as the temps are above 50 at night. I try but haven't found the key yet...still I try.

I just finished the inventory and had just over 200 cups of seedlings planted. Of course not all of them actually have plants and some may never have a single seed to sprout, but I would say the great majority will have some seedlings. I now have an actual count of the cups and the ones with nothing so I could do the math and come up with the exact percentage, but that is likely to change by spring.
I did several crosses that made no seeds, but that is to be expected. What I did not foresee is that the ones that did not make any seeds seem to be the ones I now seem most interested in ( I think that is some type of mind game going on in my head).
I do have lots more seeds to plant but I am thinking of waiting till spring (maybe when I get desperate this winter for something gardening to do I might give in and plant some indoors). But, growing seedlings indoors is so much more work compared to growing them outdoors.
My seedlings are all planted in my homemade compost with sand on the top (I did add some fertilizer to some of the cups but forgot to make a note of which ones). I think the compost should keep the seedlings growing till spring.

How many seeds per cup? All those seedlings will add to your busy spring. It seems that I have titled this thread right "Busy Times"
I look forward to seeing your seedlings when they bloom.

As for the crosses that didn't take and produce seed, it would seem that its always the way. I did however get lucky with some producing. I had some that I didn't think were going to be viable. I looked at them yesterday and they are germinating. I plan to get them planted in some sheet type trays and then move them into pots when they get some size. I then plan to set them up next to the house in an area where they will get direct sun. The house is brick so the radiant heat should help keep them warmer this winter. I plan on foliar feeding them as long as the temps remain above 50° at night. I want to push them like Fred does. that they do well. I'll keep you posted.

The great majority of the cups were planted with 5 seeds, sometimes if I only had a few seeds per cross then 1-4 seeds. Then there were times when I had an over abundance of seeds and I planted up to 10 per cup.

I am so easily swayed! I read your post and could not stand it, had to go out and mix some compost with fertilizer and add to one of my beds of seedlings. It was lagging a little behind the bed next to it. I know the best bed of seedlings I have the seeds had been kept in the refrigerator for several weeks and that might also be the bed I did add some fertilizer to the compost, this is what that bed is looking like now. Sorry for the blur I did not notice that on the lens till a few photos later. I was afraid if the fertilizer was just added to the cups it would just wash out the next time the cups were watered so I mixed in the compost and fertilizer and filled the cup to the top, I think that will stay in place better with a gentle watering.


These are the daylilies I dug up and raised that were too deep down in the bog.


I have a row of Sattelmeier seedlings down at the back fence in the bog that are being taken over by poison ivy and bamboo plus other weeds. I plan to dig them up as soon as possible and clean them off good, then work that area to get rid of all the problem weeds then replant them. I have this area of the vegetable garden free to use temporarily.


I am thinking that writing all this out will help me decide in my brain what it is I want to do and actually get it done.
A long view of the new seedling bed.


Part of my new seedling bed area, a close up view.

Again, that is a lot of seedlings. They are looking great by the way, and I wouldn't be a bit surprised to see them bloom next year.

Funny you said that about being easily persuaded. I think it was seeing a post you had about the seed you had started, and the progress that got me digging in my stash of seed in the fridge. That's why I started these three cups of seed.

Each set have some 7 up to 11 seeds in all. They were kept in the fridge since July if I remember right. When I started them, I did so in the H20 and H202 solution as I always do, but this time, I put them back in the paper towel dampened with the solution. Don't know why other than trying to get 100% germination. This weekend, I plan on getting them in the trays I mentioned. I'll try to remember to take a picture or two.

Your comment about mixing fertilizer in your compost reminds me of something I do. I add lots of blood and bone meal to my compost when I first start it. I also add some Epsom salts into the mix. I am sure a lot of the nitrogen from the blood meal is consumed by the bacteria breaking down all the mater in the pile but, I think its beneficial to the process. I add some horse manure too, when I can get it. Even having horses, its not as easy to get. We board our horses and the owner use it to fertilize the fields. Do you add anything like those to your composting leaves?

Stan,
I do not normally add anything to my composting leaves and grass. When I really needed compost fast and had the energy I would add something if the urge hit me. Now I guess I still have a need for even more compost, just not the energy to turn it like it really needs in order to get fast hot compost. Now I pretty much just let it do its own thing. I think I get more benefit from fertilizers by placing them around the actual plants. I let the grass clippings be the nitrogen source for all the little critters in the pile.
I went though my log book last night after entering all the names of the crosses in the cups and finished assigning a number to all the seedlings. All the cups but about a dozen got a number (those might get a number but I did not know either of the parents and most of those cups have no seedlings in them yet. I ended up with 89 numbers so you can see a lot of the 200 cups contain the same crosses. Due to my poor record keeping and lack of knowledge when starting this process quite a few of them only have a pod parent named.
I am hoping for sure the seedlings I grew from seeds I got from Hemlady will nearly all bloom next year, They are way further along than the ones I did crosses of. I would love it if most of my own seedlings would bloom next year but maybe at least some of them will.
I was checking the seeds left in the fridge to see if I had missed any of the crosses, I think there were two I had missed. I will try to plant them this week. I did find a few that were already sprouting so I planted those yesterday. I had placed cotton balls soaked in peroxide in each little plastic baggie with the seed. I have been removing them as I found a few occasionally that had mold on it. So I removed all the cotton balls as I sorted through the seeds, the seeds still appeared fine, just took a precautionary set.

Thanks for the info Larry. I was just curious if you did or let nature do its thing. I have a small tumbler type composter on a rack with wheels. and I usually turn it a few times when I add material and kitchen scraps. I make sure to turn it a couple times every week. I understand your need for compost with that bog consuming a lot of the material you add.

I can echo your comment about other growers seed crosses and the seedlings being further along. I have experienced the same with the seedlings grown from Fred's crosses that I bought. I think it just shows the genetics in some of their CVs being further along that some of the plants that I am using for my crosses. anyway, seem to be rambling here.

I did manage to take a couple pictures of the seeds that I have germinating. I will post them in my blog soon.

Thanks again for the info and happy digging!

Stan

Stan,
I think you misunderstood what I was saying about the crosses from Hemlady being much further along than my own. I just planted her's earlier than mine. I fully expect my seedlings to do as well when they are as old (false hope, maybe)?
I am very new to this hybridizing business but hope springs eternal as they say! I have a few crosses with some parents that were selected for the superior traits they showed in my garden, I think that is a big plus over anyone else's crosses. I will be able to select from seedling in the future that show superior results in my garden, I think that is what is going to be so great about doing the crosses. I am not trying to develop plants that will do well across the country or even out of the state, or even further north in state, so plants breed for performance here should give me a much narrower goal and hopefully better results.

It looks like I did misinterpret your meaning.

I haven't been hybridizing long either. In fact, the majority of my crosses have been in the last three years. So far only 2 different crosses have produced blooms. I do not have a real goal or direction I am crossing, but it would seem that I have made a lot with red for some reason. I was glad to get some of the patterned genetics and have made some crosses using these with red CVs. I tend to grab what's blooming and what strikes my interest at the current minute. I haven't registered any, but do have a couple names reserved and perhaps will within the next year or so.

Good luck with your seedlings and will look forward to seeing them mature and bloom.