How to Germinate Tet Trumpet Seeds and OT Seeds.

I have found that the following procedure works great on Germinating Tet trumpet Seeds and OT Seeds,
I soak The seeds in 5% bleach solution for 20 min . I then soak for 7 to 10 days changing water frequently. I plant the seeds in flats and and water then throw them in the refrigerator for 6 to 8 weeks . I pull them out and let them germinate at 65 degrees and when I start getting a fair percentage showing I place under lights.

This message was edited Mar 15, 2009 3:24 PM

Seems quite elaborate for plain trumpet lily seeds. They shouldn't need ANY pretreatment, although OT's may . Have you done any comparison testing with just planting at 75F, or just in frig for 6-8 weeks then 75F?

Soaking for a week plus seems way overkill too. Was there some place you got this idea from?

Rick

Hi Rick
What happen was a few years ago When I started growing lilies from seed in a big way (For me) 50-60 flats. I noticed a lot of my flats with poor germination( 5 weeks). Most turned out to be tet trumpets and Ot's. I researched and found a article by Robert Griesbach > I am sure you know of his work on Tet Trumpets and OT's . Here is his Suggestion for Germinating Tet Trumpets.
1)Soak for 5 days Changing the water Daily
2)Refrigerate for 6 weeks. place fully imbibed seeds on a moistened paper towel within a closed plastic container during cold treatment in refrigerator.
3) plant and keep close to 65 degrees.

The article has been in the lily journal a few times and most recently in 2004. If you have the yearbook page 17-31.
But after reading the article i throw all the flats that I had of tets and ot's in my refrigerator for 6 weeks . I pulled them out, within a couple weeks 75% to 90% germination. I have adjusted through experimentation . Not saying that Treating them like regular trumpets does not work but the germination increase is drastic. Tet Trumpets are So slow in everything they do. They seem like there in the cotyledon stage forever before they push up there first true leaf. Most regular trumpets I can get to bloom in 2 years some earlier. But tet trumpets take 3 year at least . I dug up 2 year tet trumpets about 100 plants that have not bloomed yet but there bulbs were big plus they had dozens of stem bulblets hanging on. Hopefully the will bloom this year. By the way sometimes with OT's I have to give the 2-6 week cold treatments to germinate.
Dennis

Thanks for the info, Dennis!

Dennis I bought some seed from Buggy, mainly orientals, Is this the way to go about germinating these as stated above, she has directions about soaking and outting in refrig for 6-8 weeks, and says they may need two cold cycles? Thanks Steve

Hi Steve
The Orientals are Hypogeal . This means they will need 8 to 12 weeks warm then 8 to 12 weeks cold to put up leafs.
Here the national Lily web site on growing lilies from seed. http://www.lilies.org/growingfromseed.html
Dennis

Thanks thats very helpful, looks like I am in for long haul.....LOL