Tree Seeds - Storing and Stratifying for Winter 

Yay! Happy growing!

I'm going to try this!!

Thanks. Figured I'd share my process. Hoping Akiva puts one up, too, to get his notes and specifics.

I hope so too, he and I have been talking by email, and he was saying that he is now "pretty obsessed with drainage and avoiding mold." He does "about 50/50 sand and seeds mixed together."

amleo.com is where I get mine. Nursery Marking Pen.

If you are reactive to those things and concerned, maybe you want to skip it altogether. But I haven't encountered that. You could plan to interact with long sleeves and gloves and make a compost pile of it for a year first to cook down whatever there may be...

Should work great for them. Just remember the colder the place you live, the more liberally you want to provide mulch to protect from freezing.

The more time goes on, the less processing I tend to do. As long as there is a mix of absorbent, carbon rich mulch around the fruits/seeds I don't worry too much about super clean seeds going in. The only issue is the smaller the seed gets the easier it is to lose them in a coarse media (for example serviceberry fruits packed in with wood chips, you'd have a VERY hard time figuring out where the seed went come spring...)

I wouldn't put any seeds you want to grow in the freezer, WAY too drying to them. Fridge is OK, but yes, I think this approach buried outside with a fair bit of mulch over top is reasonable.

@@edibleacres I think I'll try in the fridge then. The ground here will be frozen until mid May so I won't be able to check on the condition of the roots. Thank you.

That seems like a reasonable idea to me. Worth trying for sure.

That could be reasonable. The tiny seeds are a challenge. What I've done before is taken the container I may want to start them in (generally a 10 gallon and wide container with holes in the bottom), put a layer of wood chips, then the compost I want to grow them in, and then sow the seeds on the surface as I would in the spring. I then cover that container and bury it in leaves/chips and take it out in the spring. This seems to work pretty well for mulberry, serviceberry, etc...

Much smaller seeds can be stored in moist sand in the fridge

I wouldn't mess with cleaning husks off if they are for planting.

@@edibleacres Well that's good! Thank you for all your hard work

@@edibleacres If some husks have some mold fuzz on them, is that going to effect germination? Or will the seed remain viable while the husks decompose over winter? I realize the natural process is that of decomposition over winter... But storing a pile of molding walnuts together over winter is scary when one doesn't want to lose the potential to grow trees

I don't have any experience with that part of the US. Hopefully others can comment!

hackberry or sugarberry mulberry

Worth trying. My issue with lots of tiny tiny holes is that the very small holes seem to be able to plug up with the compost. If the bucket can't let water through it freezes solid and that is the number one way to kill the seeds. If you have a mild winter or have a soil mix with lots of sand/perlite (well drained) it is very worth while to experiment. By no means do I want folks to think this is the number one way.

Not sure about the bin you mention but I would make sure there is drainage allowed and gas exchange... If you don't have any rodents now you may once you bring in enough nuts so be careful!

I think a little bit of ventilation is a good idea, or at the very least to monitor them in the fridge once a month.

Thanks.

Well then there you go, you answered your own question! I think you can spread out rotting fruit in the fall and cover with mulch and get success, too! This is just one of many ways to go about it. I would keep doing whats worked for you...

+EdibleAcres thanks for the response , I thought I had performed some kind of garden Miracle at the time lol , based on information I found on the internet it seemed necessary. Thanks for the videos buddy

Yes, you do need to clean the husks off.

@@edibleacres Actually I meant for growing, not eating. Still the same?

Seems just a reasonable assumption I guess. I see worms and bugs and whatnots in there hanging out around the seeds, I figure they are eating the soft husk juices and whatever else they can get at. The seeds don't have to be clean to work out, but it's nice if they can get a little massage and pedicure while they wait over winter :)

EdibleAcres that logic seems sound to me. I'm hoping to try that myself this winter.

If they dropped that early, they may not be viable and healthy nuts. I would crack a few of them open to see if they have healthy looking nut meats inside. if they do, you may consider burying them soon. I suspect that was a pre-harvest of nuts that didn't fill out.

Ronald Bernhard hello from NWPA lots of shagbark hickory nuts still holding high in the treetops.. red oak’s have an amazing yield this year and are falling steady.. white oaks have been gobbled up by wildlife already.. walnuts seems thin this year, and chestnuts, as always, will be good

EdibleAcres I will do just that, thank you.

Ideally in a condition like a root cellar, but outside, buried a bit, and/or covered deeply in mulch can be helpful.

You can plant in the spring as early as the ground can be worked... Storage for winter depends on your climate, but you want to keep them from freezing too too much... Cold climate: bury pot at least most way in soil and mulch deeply over top.

@@edibleacres I see. I’m in zone 5. I will have to cover them with more than 3 inches of soil then. It gets nasty here.

I'm not sure it would, as most of those nuts have been super dried down and/or sprayed... That said, it may be worth a little experiment.... OR, reach out to twisted-tree.net (our good friends nursery) to see if you can buy healthy seed!

I would think so

I recommend you consider storing black walnuts over winter in a refrigerator and plant in the spring. Husk/wash/float/bag as they fall and refrigerate immediately. I like refrigerators over outside/inground storage because germination is more predictable. If you get a late-winter warm period before you're ready to transplant outside-stored nuts they will break dormancy, crack partly open and begin to root. You can't handle them at that time because they'll split in half no matter how careful you are and the seed will die. When stored in refrigerators they stay dormant until planting time. Store in quart ziplock bags (25 bag) or gallon bags (100/bag) and it's easy to keep track of inventory. No need to take out early to force germination, just take straight from refrigerator the day of planting and you're fine. I used to plant in early spring, now I plant in mid-May in prepared spots in fields, three nuts to a spot, using grow tubes. Later plantings work for me in Missouri because if I plant earlier squirrels will raid the spots. Planting from mid-May thru mid-June in moist soil conditions works best for me overall. You'll likely want to plant a bit earlier as you're in a warmer zone. Good luck.

@@marknussbaum8394 Sry for the late response, thanks for the excellent advice! I have a few specific questions if you have a second to share your experience! What is the ideal temperature range for stratification in a fridge? What is the minimum amount of time necessary for stratification and does this vary widely across species? How do you keep your seeds moist in the fridge without causing them to rot? Just to clarify, do you soak seeds until they hydrate and fall to the bottom of the soaking vessel then bag right after? Thanks!!

@@kerem7546 I store them at about 38 degrees Fahrenheit. Concerning stratification time, you'll pick up walnuts/acorns as they fall in autumn, then clean/float them, then let them air dry in the shade for no more than a half hour, then bag in freezer bags, then place in the refrigerator until late spring. The minimum time necessary for stratification is much shorter than the time between nut fall and springtime, so when you store overwinter you inherently satisfy the minimum stratification time. Planting nuts in the fall is generally a waste of time because of squirrel predation. Not always, but generally. Store your filled bags in a disposable aluminum cooking tray in the refrigerator as a few of the bags will leak and you'll never get the walnut stain off of a white plastic interior. Washed/floated walnuts and acorns won't rot when stored 6 months in a refrigerator in this way, in my experience. Minor mold may develop on single nuts, and odds are those nuts are bad anyways. I don't know the science behind that but it certainly happens. If you store nuts in this manner you won't have problems with moisture, they'll be fine for the six month storage period. Watch the nuts inside the bags, if they start to split (germination) turn the refrigerator temperature down to 32-34F. A little frost won't hurt and it beats germinated walnuts. As to your last question, gather walnuts as they fall, then husk, clean and float. The high-floaters are bad, so pitch them. The light bobbers might be good, crack a few before throwing them out. The floating process doesn't hydrate nuts/acorns, it just identifies bad ones. Crack a sample of nuts, even the sinkers, before bagging. Make sure you're bagging viable nuts and not wasting your time. Good luck!

@@marknussbaum8394 Hey Mark! So I've stratified some Chinese chestnuts and hazels in ziplock bags between 33-36F for a few months this winter (at least 2-3 months) and I have not yet seen sines of germination. I did leave the hazels in with a wet cloth, but the chestnut were just thrown in gallon bags with no moisture. I've seen videos that chestnuts begin germinating in the fridge when in damp moss or woodchips. Should I have moistened my chestnuts? Last frost isn't here for another two months anyhow so I wager I have the time to try a different treatment. Or do you think planting them outside in caged airprune beds now will trigger germination with the waves of spring moisture and warmer weather I've been getting.

@@kerem7546 I'm sorry but I don't have experience with chinese chestnuts or hazel nuts. In my experience with several species of red oaks and with black walnut, both of which require cold stratification, take the approximate calendar date from nut dropping to the calendar date to early spring, and length of time is the very earliest at which the very first red oak acorns and black walnut nuts begin to visibly germ. With red oaks, a radicle (root tip) slightly emerges from the acorn. With black walnut the seeds visibly crack open just a bit but no radicle emerges at first. In my area, oaks/walnuts drop about October 15 and the very first signs of spring are about March 15, or six months of stratification. If you can't find better info on the web or at the library, my stab in the dark is that you are to early to be seeing nut germ unless your almost at the Gulf of Mexico. As far as moisture goes, my guess is your chestnuts are dry and need moistening. Add water to the bag, shake it to wet the nuts, pour out any extra water and leave the ziplog bag just barely open, so you can stick a pencil through the hole. In my experience if I can't see some condensate at all times on the stored bags I add a little water. Hope this applies to chestnuts. Let me know your germination later this spring, and if it doesn't go right the first time, I hope you try again. Good luck!

He forgot. Still waiting....