Seedling held shut by shell please help

[Edinburgh]

Common problem, i just use a little mist bottle and keep it wet, it will eventually fall off.

 

[MIMedGrower]

I would venture to speculate that high humidity levels cause this, as roots also grow in search lf moisture.

You know that I love and respect your opinion, but to me, your statement is akin to saying that the Earth is flat. What are you basing your theory on? Or better yet, what is it that you theorize? You don't believe the science of geotropism; what is it that you believe? Positive vibes...

~nugzz

I guess i am saying that there are other factors. Like the high humidity attracting the roots to grow in the wrong direction.

And tap rooting the seed and manually planting it pre rooted could confuse things.

I sure didnt say i dont believe in gravity. ;-)

 

[JadedMarxist]

There is a bunch of scientific papers regarding the effect gravity has on seeds.

To each there own. I've tried to find a pic or something talking about roots pointing and growing above ground and science says it's extreamly rare. Now surface roots are different. But I really don't think roots look for light that would be akin of you drinking ammonia if you were thirsty.

I seriously hope no one drinks ammonia, I've seen it happen when my little brother got tricked into drinking it by someone who is no longer alive.

I've never seen so much vomit we thought for sure he was gonna die he was 2 years old. The kid was put in a coma shortly afterwards.

The kid who fed it to my brother was 13 at the time. Were going back 35years now

 

[JadedMarxist]

How would or could you be confused about gravity and which way is up or down? Even a seed? Gravity is the single greatest force in existence, its been mathematically and scientifically proven to be able to warp time itself.

 

[MGuY]

This happens for when I germinate using the wet towel method and when they root I plant them with the root in the ground and the shell out. The shell tends to dry out and becomes a problem. Now i just keep them most until the shell falls off.

 

[GrowWeedQuestion]

Thanks for all the help everyone! Not sure how it ended in a debate about gravity.. but thanks again for helping me fix my problem.

 

[Growing_Garbage]

Eh the stem/taproot grows up first then down so that the plant can get a woody(stem) and bust its head hah.
But also when Im popping beans if the shell is moistened enough and doesn't come off on its own it's not a keeper in my garden. I used to save em or help them and they never have the vigor of their grow mates.

 

[mancorn]

The point is that i dont think gravity is how they work. They can grow sideways out of a crack. The roots look for the light and then turn round and find purchase in the soil. Then they grow and search for water and nutrients. Gravity is not the guiding factor.

Recently saw the news story about the lettuce grown on the space station. Didn't look like gravity was effecting it at all.

 

[MIMedGrower]

Recently saw the news story about the lettuce grown on the space station. Didn't look like gravity was effecting it at all.

Gravity is definitily affecting them. But other factors may influence them more i think.

 

[Wee Zard]

Been doing this for 50 years.
Gravity is a minor player.

You will notice that on paper towels, and in water, the tap root does a 180 right after it emerges regardless of their orientation to gravitic "down"

The reason Mother nature does this is quite logical.
That curve provides two things,
It gives purchase while the tap root is growing, then provides leverage as it uncurls to drag the cracked seed upward.
As it does so the split husk catches on the soil and gets neatly removed almost every time.

For the occasional sticky membrane, a drop of water softens it enough for the cotyledons to pop it off as they swell.

I have done postmortems on runts and found that root knot from planting pointy end down as the cause.

So, argue if that floats your boat, but plant your seeds pointy end up, yah? :)

Aloha,
Weeze

 

[MIMedGrower]

View attachment 950446View attachment 950445View attachment 950444
Been doing this for 50 years.
Gravity is a minor player.

You will notice that on paper towels, and in water, the tap root does a 180 right after it emerges regardless of their orientation to gravitic "down"

The reason Mother nature does this is quite logical.
That curve provides two things,
It gives purchase while the tap root is growing, then provides leverage as it uncurls to drag the cracked seed upward.
As it does so the split husk catches on the soil and gets neatly removed almost every time.

For the occasional sticky membrane, a drop of water softens it enough for the cotyledons to pop it off as they swell.

I have done postmortems on runts and found that root knot from planting pointy end down as the cause.

So, argue if that floats your boat, but plant your seeds pointy end up, yah? :)

Aloha,
Weeze

I think like all weed growing myths and bro science that this is mixed up with pointing the root down the hole in a seed puck. Hydro stuff mixed with soil stuff.

 

[quirk]

I'm prepping my medium and seeds for germination on the Ides of March. I'm going to
do 1 up and 1 down, If I had a third, I'd place it horizontal to cover all bases. I enjoy side
by side comparisons using different methods. I'm soaking one seed in dilute liquid seaweed and will put the other in starting medium au naturale. Thanks for the discussion.

 

[Jimster]

One reason I like to sprout in paper towels is the root is usually long enough to show it's orientation. I stick my finger into the middle of a 5 gallon bucket of Promix, drop the seed with the tap root going into the hole, and filling it in so that the seed top is flush with the surrounding medium, and then I cover it very slightly just to help keep moisture in. The seed will sprout quickly every time unless it's gimpy... but they re usually bad from the hatch.

 

[MIMedGrower]

I'm prepping my medium and seeds for germination on the Ides of March. I'm going to
do 1 up and 1 down, If I had a third, I'd place it horizontal to cover all bases. I enjoy side
by side comparisons using different methods. I'm soaking one seed in dilute liquid seaweed and will put the other in starting medium au naturale. Thanks for the discussion.

I like your plan very much.

 

[Wee Zard]

Me too. :)

Here's a side by side for y'all.

Was having germination problems with expensive designer seeds.
Had a large bag of hemp seed and a farmer's almanac on hand.
Decided to use them to test the "moon phase" and "bad day for planting" things in the Almanac.

So, I made a 30 day chart of almanac advice and logged the growing conditions, (temperature and relative humidity), each day in a journal. I had 48 bays in the planter so ran it for 48 days.

This was an eye opener for me.
The ones that sprouted did so in 72 -96 hours.
Had 3 days worth of seeds just sulk and a run of 9 days that leapt from the coco, then another 4 days of sulking, etc.

The end result? The germination did not track with the almanac advice.

It did, however line up with the humidity graph.
Under 60% they sprouted, over that, they sulked.
And, we can have weeks of 75% RH here in the winter.
Hmmm.

So, I said to myself, (and I know it was me, I recognized my voice and I was wearing my under ware).
"Self", I said, "it looks like the nonstarters did not notice that they got wet because they were already moist."

At the end, I waited for a low humidity day when all the non-starters were bone dry, and watered them.
All but one then sprouted.

In the past, I've had seeds not sprout and just put them to the side and out of mind. Two weeks later, they got rained on and popped right up!
Looked up the initial planting time, and the days just before that rain in the almanac and they did not relate.

Knew it had to be something, hence, the testing.
It's not a proper, exhaustive test but does seem to indicate that a moist seed may not respond to getting a little wetter.

Now, I put my rare, or expensive seeds in a small jar of dry rice the night before planting day and ignore the moon and the almanac.

Turns out, I can plant on any day that works with my schedule now, an be confident that very few will fail.
And I always plant the pointy end up. :)

So, anyone out there want to run another test planting?
Or, at the least, log the RH when you plant, Then take and share notes? We might be on to something here.

Yours in science,
Weeze