TOPIC: Stratification box and Questions

Ok I am going to make a box for my seeds but I have a few questions. I went back quite few pages to see if any of them were previously answered and I couldn't find the answers I was looking for. I'm sure they're there but my dumb self couldn't find them.
Here goes and thanks in advance

1. How far in advance can I pick the seeds off the plants and what is the best way to hold them?
I have a few green plants still and would like to add them to the box.

2. I have some plants with dried shriveled seeds, Are these any good or should I just let Mother Nature take her course with them and leave them be?

3. How should the seeds be laid in the box and how close together should they be? (Example 1\"sand, then 1 layer of seeds 1\" apart, then 1\" sand then repeat? or just throw 'em in there and cover with sand)

4. Should the box be buried below grade and if so is it ok that ground water will penetrate it and soak the seeds?

5. Should I pinch the seeds first?

My box will be 18\"x18\" 2x6 Doug fir with screening and stucco wire for the floor and the top is that ok?

Hi Nugget,

I wouldn't pick seeds until they are fully red.

Go ahead and take the dried up seed also...nothing to lose there.

Normally, you will depulp the seeds, if you are going to treat them with a fungicide, now is the time. Then mix the seed with a little sand. When you go to put them in the box, have a couple inches of sand in the bottom, then put in a layer of seed/sand mix then another layer of sand, and so forth.

Unless you can control the temperatures, below ground is a good option. I used to put a box of seed under the pool deck and left it above ground. it got plenty moisture from the wet kids running back and forth and the temps never got too warm under there. Never had disease issues either.

If I'm making a box, I normally use treated 2x lumber. However, for a smaller amount of seed, just mix them with sand and put them in a pouch made of window screen material seamed and stapled around the edges....then bury that in your ginseng patch.

Thanks.

I made a box from 1x6 rough cut white pine. It was only about a one foot square. Dug a hole in the woods so that the top of the box would be under about four inches of forest floor and leave when buried. I put sand in the hole set the box in and put an inch and a half of sand in the bottom of the box.
I put a layer of red berries on the sand not a solid layer just spread around what I had for the weekend, covered those berries with an inch of sand. I put the mesh lid on and covered it with some big flat rocks to keep coons and whatever out. The following weekend I added another layer of berries / another inch of sand. That went on for about five weekends.
Once my last berries ripened I scattered them on the last sand layer and filled the box to the top with sand put on the mesh lid and buried that with dirt and forest floor mulch. I circled it with small rocks to locate it the following year.
I dug it up in mid July of the following summer and the seeds came out fine.
I have found personally that the depulping step is added work which I don't want to spend time with and there was no sign of any pulp at all when the seeds came out of the ground.

I will report in May what the germination rate was on my 750 stratified seeds
Hope this was helpful.

I think on a small scale, depulping isn't necessary at all. After all, if I only have a handful of berries, I just push them whole into the ground near the base of a tree in some soft dirt. I was noticing the other day all the little patches of a dozen or so plants growing between the roots of big trees


The rational in depulping is to prevent the decaying of the pulp from contaminating the seed through the air hole (too lazy to look up the technical name). After all, fungal pathogens are what rot away the pulp, and I don't want that anywhere near my seed.

On the other hand, there is a line of though that the pulp protects the seed in some fashion -perhaps with antifungal properties. I'm not aware of any studies being done on that one. Most of them are on the medicinal properties of the pulp.