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Ephedra Jamboree!!!!!!!

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Hi everyone,

This is my first post here :D I've had Ephedra major & Ephedra sinensis seeds in warm water (27C - 31C) for the last two days. NONE of the seeds have bulged or split yet, I'm a bit worried. How long should I wait before giving up? If they open up, I intend to put them in a seedling mix consisting of perlite, vermiculite, peat and coarse sand. This is my first attempt at growing ephedra, can someone more experienced make any suggestions?

Squiz

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i did put my seeds straight into the medium.

guess it's not good to soak them too long.

i totaly agree with your super free drainage mixture. germinating ephedra is the easy part, making them to continue growing strong and fast is the tricky part. :cool:

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Since when should desert plants be drowned before planting??

I put my seed in barely most sandy mix and keep it hot. They usually germinate in a few days. If the mix is too wet then they usually don't even come up. Plain water would probably classify as 'too wet'

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Thanks for the advice Torsten, I'm actually going on an old Reville post from oct 2000 where he said he had soaked the seeds for two days in water and they germinated. But I'll transfer them over to the seedling mix today, I hope I haven't damaged the seeds.

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just realised you're from WA.

Reville and i constantly differ on methods, usually due to the fact that the fungal spore load in WA is minimal compared to the subtropics. ie, things are much less likely to rot over there.

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quote:

 

germinating ephedra is the easy part, making them to continue growing strong and fast is the tricky part.

 


Exactly. Any clues on how to get the buggers past

the 3rd week? Is mass planting the way to go?

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I bought a couple of plants approx 4 months ago and they're still looking good and have also grown...

I treat them like cacti, and they're in perlite/soil mix...

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i ve tried transplanting pieces of an ephedra with roots,they can take over a year to re-establish themselves,seeming dead sometimes before putting up new shoots.i hope to eventually get at least 50% success rate.dont know which species it is though.seems to root very shallowly.

t s t .

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somnif - with a bit of tweaking you can get more than 50% to survive. The trick is to start hardening and drying them off as soon as the shoot appears from between the cotyledons. Also, using mostly inorganic material as a medium is essential for the first 6 months. Transplanting also isn't a good idea , so germinate in at least 3" pots. Once they fill this pot they don't mind transplanting.

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