Here's a thought............

[Snadger]

Here's something that baffles me! (as well as fluff in the belly button!)

Most plants flower and set seed in the Autumn.
Most seed needs to be sown in the Spring! Why hasn't evolution equipped plants with a holding device so they can drop there seeds in the Spring???

What prompted this thought was that a short while ago I harvested some Brussel Sprout seeds but missed quite a bit because the seed pods had already opened and dropped there seed. The seed would have been better dropped in the Spring methinks where it would have germinated very quickly. As it is, all manner of wildlife will feast on the seed, it could also rot or suffer from fungal attacks.
I know some seeds need stratifying but these, as far as I know, are the exception rather than the norm!

[rustylady]

But if the wildlife didn't get some of the seeds to eat, we wouldn't have so much wildlife. Birds eat seeds, and greenfly and caterpillars and slugs and snails, so we have to provide for them too. Also most plants produce loads and loads of seeds (weeds seem to produce far more than desirable plants, though) so there should be enough for the birds, the beasties and for growing on into new plants.

[Snadger]

But if the wildlife didn't get some of the seeds to eat, we wouldn't have so much wildlife. Birds eat seeds, and greenfly and caterpillars and slugs and snails, so we have to provide for them too. Also most plants produce loads and loads of seeds (weeds seem to produce far more than desirable plants, though) so there should be enough for the birds, the beasties and for growing on into new plants.

Mmmmmm!............ What I am basically wondering is whether fresh seed germinates better. If it does, the winter will kill the plant? Or has the seed got a delaying mechanism?

I don't think the plant feeds the birds and animals purposefully! And I still think the plant would be better off setting seed in the Spring!

My head hurts!

[rustylady]

Yes, it's complicated. Most seed that is shed by the plants in autumn just sits around on or in the ground till spring and then germinates and grows into new plants. Fresh seed does tend to germinate better, but if you collect and germinate it indoors you then have to tend the plant throughout the winter - can be very difficult - far better to collect the seed and sow in spring when it can grow into a viable plant with fewer setbacks.

[Shortie]

Snadger, I guess the delay mechanisms are the temperature and light levels, being that when they both increase in Spring, they seeds germinate...

A bit like poppy seeds stay viable for decades underground and just need the earth to be turned and put them in the light to germinate

[Paulottie]

There was a school of thought that said you should dig at night as 'flash of light' germinators foiled...either that or your neighbours will call the men in white coats.

There are various tricks to achieve distribution and get their seeds germinate at the right moment.(eg. some need a period of cool) but then often we are 'artificially' growing hybrid veg plants that come from other climates so i guess eg beans will just rot in the ground while native might be successful. Some of those are biennial though- leeks or parsley, for example, do set seed in spring. I thought brussels flowered in spring too?

[Snadger]

....................... I thought brussels flowered in spring too?

Maybe some brussels do? but mine flowered about August and have just set seed now!
They are just another brassica which all seem to look the same in their flowering stage, quite pretty really! Although some would say those fields full of yellow rape are an eyesore, especially those who suffer from hayfever!

PS I take your point about Hybrids and non indigenous (cor, what a word for Sunday morning!) plants!

[Paulottie]

My memory fails me as to where and why, but I'm sure I read that brussels don't come true anyway. It will be interesting to see if you have any self sown ones that don't get grazed off by snails!

Did you mean that they have bolted?.. isn't it normally planting is not firm enough? Have they all flowered? Is there any solid button formation? Maybe I've misunderstood and these are in their second year and you've kept them for the seed after the harvest?

We have light soil here, but I've found if I don't dig before planting-just lime- and I stake each one, I have more luck. A bit of netting to keep off pigeons and deer helps. I sow in modules in Feb. Probably preaching to the choir here!

With such a long growing season, I would want to grow seed with guaranteed results. (Doing well with the purple Falstaff that GYO gave away last year and also Fi Montgomery.) You don't need much seed, and it's viable for a few years.

[Snadger]

My memory fails me as to where and why, but I'm sure I read that brussels don't come true anyway. It will be interesting to see if you have any self sown ones that don't get grazed off by snails!

Did you mean that they have bolted?.. isn't it normally planting is not firm enough? Have they all flowered? Is there any solid button formation? Maybe I've misunderstood and these are in their second year and you've kept them for the seed after the harvest?

We have light soil here, but I've found if I don't dig before planting-just lime- and I stake each one, I have more luck. A bit of netting to keep off pigeons and deer helps. I sow in modules in Feb. Probably preaching to the choir here!

With such a long growing season, I would want to grow seed with guaranteed results. (Doing well with the purple Falstaff that GYO gave away last year and also Fi Montgomery.) You don't need much seed, and it's viable for a few years.

You're correct in your assumption that I have kept them the second year for seed! I only kept the ones that had given me the best sprouts...........they aren't an F1! Evesham Special I think.........heritage variety!

[Paulottie]

I think it said that even open pollinated varieties don't come true? not sure why tho...got me thinking now...I'll try and find the book.

[bazzaboy]

Hi Snadger, You’re not the only one to have got a headache from this question, Darwin did too. It probably is the way it is for a variety of reasons. But to move from the sublime to the ridiculous for a moment, the question (or the related suggestion that done differently nearly every seed might survive which would be “better”) reminded me of the sperm song in Monty Python’s “The Meaning of Life” which, if logically applied, would obviously lead to impossible population growth and Tony Hancock’s prediction that humans will end up standing shoulder to shoulder and “it’ll be the person with the biggest hooter that survives”. Whether an individual is Creationist or Darwinist it’s unlikely they’d support that as a designed outcome. So a degree of wastage of seed, and more controversially, competition, seems to be built into the process. In short the plant may, by autumn dispersal, be doing what all gardeners do, “thinning” to enhance the chances of the strongest. And also of course seeking to create a situation which can engineer wider dispersal.

The suggestion that fresh seed is best is not necessarily the case, nor is it true to assume that seed dispersed in autumn is lifeless until spring as it may be going through various changes including the full development of the embryo. So with some seeds there may be a necessary time-lapse factor. I read that the longest surviving seed that’s successfully been germinated was over 1000 years old – that is the exception, but of course many plant seeds including our veg seeds can survive more than one season and some up to a decade or so. You mention stratification and in one way of another this evidently applies to most seeds (and if you count light, temperature and humidity amongst those processes, all seeds). We see a little tendril emerge but of course there are essential chemical and physical processes going on before that happens…. Stratification may involve the seed being scarified to break the seal, or floating/water, or being eaten, or chilled, or being immersed in fire (and some theories now that it’s particular gases in the smoke that prompts germination) etc etc. There’s always a rationale behind that in terms of survival and locating best conditions, all of which will require a process of time. And although dispersed into hostile (e.g. winter soil) conditions may seem chancy, to be left hanging on a stalk throughout that period may be even chancier! Plants that do that might tend to recede rather than dominate, having backed the wrong horse.

One other explanation to your question - and maybe this one gets closer to brussels and our veg and certainly to Darwin - which is the effect on vegetables of the development of horticulture across thousands of years. If you were totally dependent upon collecting seeds from this year’s crop to create next year’s it would be entirely natural to collect the earliest seeds that appear in case for some unforeseen reason later ones failed or became inaccessible. Repeated time after time after time this will tend to give pre-eminence to early seed producers (i.e. greater prominence given to those that mature earliest) not so much for the contemporary economic reasons but the more basic one of simple survival. This course of action, repeated sufficient times by human “interference”, will influence the dominance of certain traits such as autumn seeding. In most cases it’s taken the plant the processes of spring and summer to produce the seeds and they must now take their chance and it's at that point (and every stage up to it) that horticulture might have a longer-term influence on selection.

Whatever and whichever, when that seed pops it’s a process that never fails to amaze me.

Hope something there eases the headache! There's probably a simpler explanation to fluff in the belly button .

bb

[Flummery]

Hope something there eases the headache! There's probably a simpler explanation to fluff in the belly button .

bb

It crawls up your belly hairs so it can hide in the warmth. (Or did I dream that? )

[Snadger]

Just to re-kindle this thread a bit. I only allowed one heritage brussel sprout plant(who's name is lost in the sands of time!) to set seed (my best one!) and I live about 2 or 3 mile away from the nearest veg plot.
I have an envelope full of gathered seed but was a bit worried that sprouts weren't supposed to be self pollinating! It is reccommended to let about six plants set seed to cross pollinate, but if I had done that, apart from the space requirements , I would have had enough seed to plant up an area the size of a football pitch! Apart from that I didn't find this out until after the event!
Because I have enough seed I did a germination trial with damp tissue paper and had 100% germination!
I look forward to sowing the rest of the seeds in the spring, but may try an autumn sowing indoors, just out of daftness!

Isn't gardening interesting?