acacia germination

[sholto]

I've soaked my seeds in boiling water and tucked them under a few mm of of rather coarse, dry garden soil. I water every other day. What else can i do to maximise chances of germination? (2 weeks and no action yet)

will they germinate in the cold of winter?

should i use seed-raising mix?

does the soil need to be constantly moist?

should they be in sun or shade?

I'm not an experienced gardener, so any basic tips would help....

[Guest mulga]

Did they swell up when you soaked them in the water? Like a dried pea or something?

If not, then the hard coat on the seed is probably still relatively resistant to water. In which case it may take ages for it to germinate.

To actually see how they are going, after soaking in water, either hot, or warm but with the hard coat on the seed broken by a light sand paper. Place them on some cotton wool or similar and treat ike those pea seed experiments from primary school. If kept moist, the seeds can be seen to swell and sprout on the cotton, and they can then be carefully planted out into small pots.

Depending on the number of seeds you have, another reasonably good method for germinating seeds in situ, is to simply bury them under a thin layer of soil and then light a very quick burning small mulch fire over the top, then water. This mimics the natural process that produces acacia seed germination after fires followed by rains. They seem to germinate particularly well from this, but like many native plants don't like being moved around and handled a lot after germination.