A practical introduction to
Hybridising.
This must surely be
one of the most fascinating ways of growing fuchsias. Creating
something new and unique, something that no one else has, or will ever
reproduce. Of course not everyone can enjoy this facet
of growing fuchsias which, if you are to be moderately successful, you will need the
facility of a greenhouse, preferably heated, and a lot of bench
space. Patience is also an added asset.
In this chapter I will be delving into the sex life of
plants, which in its self, is one of the most fascinating subjects I
have studied. Most of the literature
available on this subject is written by academics for academics
therefore if you wish to study the subject in depth, you will need a
botanical dictionary to help you. The architect of modern hybridising
was an Austrian botanist, Gregor Mendel, d 1884, whose work and
discoveries are known as 'Mendel's Law'. I shall not
delve into this aspect of hybridising, it is applicable only to pure
species and in this chapter I shall be dealing with hybrids, far removed
from their origins. I have
seen and read many articles written on this subject, mostly theoretical.
These have lacked the practical application to encourage the average
fuchsia enthusiast to test their ingenuity.
The authors nearly always lose the plot by expounding all the theories
of Mendel's Law and delve too deeply into the science of chromosomes and
genes which can loosely be described as units of inheritance.
One such author actively encouraged readers to try and obtain the
chemical Colchicine in an effort to double the chromosomes thus inducing
mutations. This is an alkaloid
obtained from the autumn crocus. It is both
expensive and a very toxic poison. The amateur should never
involve themselves in experimenting with dangerous chemicals or attempt
to have any plant material irradiated.
My interest in hybridising was prompted by my desire to
find cultivars suitable for exhibition. Up to this point I had
been in the habit of buying in every new cultivar introduced by nurserymen
nationwide, even those imported from abroad, mostly America.
I grew these new cultivars, noted
their habits and growth and photographically recorded every
detail. Having read the glowing reports and descriptions
in the fuchsia catalogues and compared these with my own observations I
became, to say the least, a little
disappointed. I kept all the catalogues and
after three to four years, I checked back to see how many of these
wonderful new
cultivars were still available in the catalogues. I was
not surprised to find that some, after only two to three years, had been
discarded, no longer available. I can honestly say that each year only about one
in ten of the new introductions I bought were suitably different and
worth keeping.
Over seventy per cent were genetically unstable.
Ten percent had poor quality flowers, another ten per cent were no
different or not an improvement on what was already in existence, but
of course there was the odd gem among them. Two of my
favourite hybridists at this
time were the Late Cliff Gadsby and Dr Ryle. Both these
hybridists produced some wonderful cultivars which are still available and
can hold their own on the show bench today. The
skill, patience and dedication of these older hybridists, which include
many from the United States of America, Europe and indeed from other
parts of the world who have provided the modern fuchsia enthusiasts
with some wonderful cultivars with which to work.
When I first started to take an interest in hybridising
I wanted to appreciate and understand the process of fertilisation, which
included a study of the anatomy of flowers and the essentials used
in the process of reproduction. Up to this
point I, like many others, did not appreciate the complexity of the sexual
reproduction of plant life. The more I studied the
more enthralled I became. I never really appreciated
just how devious and underhanded plants were and how they are able to
exploit, manipulate and use to their advantage almost everything nature
has provided. Wind, rain, water, light,
darkness, every conceivable animal, bird and insect is used in one way
or another by flowering plants to achieve sexual reproduction, to
perpetuate their particular species. In
addition, the human race can now be added to this list.
One of their spectacular achievements in sexual exploitation is the
ability to mimic some insects by reproducing, in their petal formation,
a copy of a female to such exactness that it fools the male into
believing he has found a receptive mate. A prime
example of this mimicry and deception is the Bee Orchid which reproduced
within its petals an exact copy of one species of female wasp. A male
wasp on
seeing what appears to be a female wasp attempts to mate with it, albeit, unsuccessfully. During this encounter a sticky disk
called a viscidium laden with pollen is
attached to the wasps head. The male wasp, eventually
frustrated, flies off and is again fooled by another orchid but this time
the pollen mass, which was attached to the male wasps head, is transferred to
the stigma of this orchid and fertilisation of the orchid is achieved. The
wasp receives no reward and his frustration
continues. This is not always the
case. If we take the fuchsia for example, both the
species and varieties, have been
cleverly designed to attract the tiny humming bird as its pollinator, but
unlike the bee described above, the humming bird is
rewarded. High in the tube of the fuchsia is nectar,
a thick sweet sticky secretion. It is produced daily and attracts the humming
bird. The humming bird is uniquely adapted, having a
long beak and with its tongue is able to reach the
nectar. This, incidentally, is the only bird capable of flying
backwards. The flower only produces a minimum amount of
nectar daily which ensures the humming bird, in order to satisfy its
appetite,
will have to visit many flowers. As the humming bird attempts to feed on
the nectar it has to brush past pollen laden anthers and receptive stigma, the female organ, on the end of the pistil.
Pollen is collected on the breast of the bird and each time it visits a
flower unwittingly pollinates it. In this
instance both flower and bird are satisfied, albeit, in different
ways. It is worth noting that, although
fuchsias grown here in the U.K. are visited by our bees, wasps and other
such insects they are very poor pollinators and in their attempts to gain
access to the nectar scratch and damage the flower petals. One
particular insect, I'm not sure whether a bee or wasp, has a nasty habit
of cutting through all the filaments and the style in its efforts to reach
the nectar. A point for both exhibitor and hybridist to bear in
mind. In addition, flowers damaged by insects
in this way detract
from perfection and will be penalised if the plant is exhibited at
specialist shows.
The process of sexual exploitation by the plants,
briefly described above, was only recently discovered. In 1916 a
French Judge, M. Pouyanne, a keen amateur naturalist living in Algiers,
had, over a period, been observing the relationship between a wasp and
a particular species of orchid when he realised that the orchid was
exploiting the male wasps sexual drive for its own ends.
He published his observations and theorised the possibility of
plants using all manner of subterfuge, including mimicry, to
effect sexual fertilisation of their seed. This was at
first dismissed as fantasy and it took several decades before his
work was eventually accepted. The
sex life of plants has now been fully researched, recorded and accepted.
This subject makes fascinating reading. One point I continue to
ponder is, how are plants able to develop within their petal
structure the ability to mimic, and exploit virtually everything nature
has provided. How does the orchid know of the existence of
the wasp it mimics. The fuchsia the humming bird, the
antirrhinum the weight of one species of bee that is able to pollinate
it and so on. These feats are extraordinary and to date defy
rational explanation.
In this chapter I shall be dealing exclusively with
fuchsia cultivars and shall once again be examining and destroying some of
the myths and taboos associated with raising new cultivars from seed.
When and where to start. Quite
simply the starting point is your imagination, your minds eye.
To even consider this facet of growing your imagination must have been
stimulated by seeing and working with some of the beautiful flowers
already available, mainly created by a dedicated band of enthusiasts whose
only motivation is to produce something new and different for others to
enjoy. If your motivation is making money,
then I would suggest you choose another
hobby. The sheer pleasure and excitement in
creating a new flower, something totally different to what is currently
available, is a wonderful experience. In this instance
of course we shall be dealing with fuchsias. This will
test your patience, resolve and ingenuity to the
limit. To be successful you will require the
facility of a greenhouse, preferably heated, a lot of space and spare
time.
Once you have determined what you would like to achieve,
start by keeping notes and record your ideas on how best to achieve
them. Although we have a large number of colour
combinations and great diversity in shape and size of cultivar, there is
still progress to be made. For instance we do not have a true
white fuchsia, a yellow, a blue that retains its colour through to
maturity or a range of corollas with defined picotee edges in
various colours. There is also plenty of scope for
improvement to some of the cultivars already available. Increasing
the number of flowers produced in the leaf axils for
instance. Strengthening the pedicel of double
flowered cultivars to prevent the flowers being lost in the
foliage. The removal of some of the genetic imperfections in
petal formation. Everything can be improved the
only limit being your imagination and what nature will
allow. My ambition has always been to
produce a yellow double fuchsia.
My
Ambition?
On one occasion, in my quest to achieve this, I was offered
the opportunity to have a batch of seed irradiated in an effort to induce
mutations, hopefully a yellow fuchsia but, after careful consideration and
mind searching, I felt this was both
ethically and morally wrong to subject living tissue to the rigours
of radiation. I declined the
offer. The resultant
plants would most likely have been sterile and of little use for future
reproduction purposes, therefore nothing would have been achieved.
Having determined what you wish to achieve
the next step is choosing suitable cultivars. This may not
be so easy and could involve searching through catalogues, viewing
photographs and visiting specialist
nurseries. A visit to a specialist fuchsia
show may also help. If all this seems
a little too complicated and is ignored then your chances of real success
will be remote. Just selecting ripe berries
from your current stock and searching for the odd seed will, in nearly all
instances lead to disappointment and a lot of wasted
time. Remember one thing, you are the worst judge of
your achievements. Your chance seedlings will appear far
better than they really are. Fuchsia folk may be
friendly folk but they are also very discerning and fickle about what they
like and grow.
Assuming you have found the plants
best suited to your needs you must now nurture and pamper
them. They will be at their best for breeding purposes at two
or more years old so take extra good care of
them. Whilst these are growing away it
is now time to examine and understand a little about the different parts
of the flower and their role in the reproduction cycle of their
species.
These are essentially the ovary, the seed
pod between the pedicel and the tube, the stamen to which the anther is
attached and contains the pollen sacs, the male reproductive organ and the
style, a long slender stem which connects to the ovary at one end and
the stigma, the female organ, at the other.
Photograph of a dissected flower.
Firstly, the ovary, more commonly known as the seed pod, houses the
placenta to which the ovules, unfertilised seed, are
attached. I shall be describing the fertilisation process
of these ovules a little later
on. The other two very important
items are the anthers, top item and the stigma below, shown in the
photograph above. When the
anther ripens it divides into two then again into four
compartments, each of which contain the pollen grains. The pollen
is not a sperm as often believed, it is a spore similar to those found in
ferns and mosses. Inside each grain are three cells two
of which are sperm cells within the spore. I shall describe their
function in detail a little later. Next the
stigma, the female organ. This, as the close up photo'
shows, is generally much larger than the anthers and has a fascinating
role to play in the fertilisation of the ovules in the seed pod.
The photograph below shows a sectioned seed pod exposing the placenta and
a host of unfertilised seed. It is important to
understand the different parts of the plant, their proper names and their
functions. It makes learning much more fun and adds
a further dimension to your hobby.
Close up of an anther and stigma.
The seed pod, placenta and ovules.
The next step in the quest for a new
fuchsia cultivar is when to start cross fertilising the flowers on your
selected plants. From many years experience
I have found that the most productive time to start is the later part of
August and into September. At this time of
the year the natural fall in temperature and reduction in light
intensity and daylight hours seem to be more amenable to the fuchsia in retaining the seed pod
whether it contains fertilised seed or
not. During the early part of the
normal flowering season, late June, July and the first part of August, the
plants are quite happy flowering and making new growth and will, for the
most of this time, abort the old flowers including the pedicel and seed
pod. It is therefore a waste of time to start hybridising too early,
impatience must be curbed. Once into August, do
not supplementary feed your plants or pot them up into larger
pots. They must at this time be root bound and
aware of the onset of winter. The lower temperatures and light
factors triggers the urgency for them to reproduce
sexually to produce fertile seed, the means by which the species
is perpetuated and strengthened.
Use this knowledge to your advantage and you will be more likely to
succeed.
It is now time to understand a little more
about sexual behaviour and taboos of the fuchsia cultivar. Very
little has been written on this subject and what has been written has been
more assumption rather than fact.
I will not delve too deeply at this
juncture. As we progress into the subject it will be self explanatory and
easier to understand. One simple and very
important point to bear in mind at this stage is that in nature nothing is
absolute.
Starting with the fuchsia flower, the
essential parts having already been described above, it is now time
to examine its behaviour from the bud opening to the spent flower being
aborted, hopefully with a seed pod containing a percentage of
fertile seed. The fuchsia flower generally has a life
of about ten days. It starts to degenerate after five days but of course
this can be variable depending on the time of the year and the weather.
As the flower bud develops it encloses the petals, style, stigma,
stamens and anthers. Once the bud reaches a
certain stage of development it divides into four sepals to expose the petals which form the corolla.
The style stretches lowering the stigma to a point below the anthers.
From the moment the sepals open, the stigma, within a matter of hours
becomes receptive for pollination, but the pollen contained within
the four segments of the anthers remain inert for another five days
after which they burst open exposing the ripe pollen grains.
The question I wanted answered was why, when the stigma was ready for
pollination, did it take five days for the anthers to produce ripe
pollen. The answer of course was
simple and obvious, the flower did not want to be fertilised by its own
pollen. If, after five days, pollen from the
anthers did adhere to the stigma there would be insufficient time for
the pollen to germinate and fertilise seed in its own ovary before the
stigma degenerated effectively prohibiting fertilisation of its
own seed. This does not mean that pollen from
another flower on same plant will not be allowed to germinate, far from
it, It can sometimes be prudent to use pollen from
a sister flower to fertilise seed. This is commonly known as
'selfing'. It can sometimes result in latent recessive
genes becoming dominant inducing the characteristic or feature you are
looking for.
A little understanding of the process of
fertilisation and a closer examination of the
anthers and stigma is important. This knowledge will almost
certainly increase your chances of being successful in your quest to raise
a unique new cultivar.
Firstly the anther, which is the male
organ, is situated at the tip of the filament and is known as the
stamen. These stamens can number between six and eight per
flower. Each anther, has two sections held
together by what is known as a connective. The pollen is
formed inside four compartments. Each grain of pollen has
three cells, two sperm cells and one pollen tube cell. The photograph
below show both unripe and ripe anthers smothered in pollen.
If you are in any doubt as to whether the pollen is ripe use a
magnifying glass.
The pistil, of which there is only one, is
the female part of the flower and consists of a stigma and
ovary. In fuchsias these are connected by a style which
include the tube and nectary. The stigmas of fuchsia vary in size, shape and colour and are coated in a sticky glutinous substance
which has an extremely complex chemical structure. It prevents the
germination of 'undesirable' alien pollen which may have attached itself
to the stigma. This is known as tasting, only allowing
desirable pollen to germinate. Even after germination,
there are many other devices constantly testing the reproductive nuclei as it makes its
way inside the pollen tube towards the ovary. Of the many thousands of pollen
grains adhering to the stigma only a tiny percentage ever reach the ovary
to fertilise ovules. The photograph below shows two
pollinated stigmas
fully coated
with ripe pollen.
.
As previously explained, the best time to
start hybridising is from mid August through to late September.
Several days before you start hybridising, carefully remove all the open
flowers on the plant /plants selected to be the female parent.
This includes seed pods and pedicels leaving only unopened buds.
The plant/plants to be used as the male parent must not have the open
flowers removed, some will
already have anthers sporting ripe pollen ready for use. To recap,
it takes approximately five days for the anther on a fully open flower to
produce pollen. Only when this is available can you start.
Once your plants are ready choose a
warm sunny day and check the air temperature. Ideally,
it needs to be above 15 deg C - 60 deg F for best
results. Have to hand a notebook and pen, a pair of
tweezers and some means to identify the seed pod of the flowers to be pollinated. I have used various methods in the
past including small sticky cassette labels. I have also used coloured wools
tied to the pedicel. Once the flower is aborted
leaving the seed pod and pedicel behind it may take another week or more
before the seed pod containing the seed falls from the plant onto the
bench. These need to be collected before they degrade or are
devoured by slugs, snails and even wasps.
One other essential before you start
hybridising is to have in place some form of code for plant
identification. For example it is extremely difficult to
write on a tiny label attached to a pedicel all the information you need
to record regarding the identify and fertilisation details of each seed pod. This
code must essentially include the names
of the plants used in the fertilisation process. The method I
use is very simple. Having selected the various plants I
intend using I use a single letter in place of its true
name. If I intend using Ting a Ling I would use
the letter 'A' to identify it. Joy Patmore would be
'B' Frank Unsworth 'C' Katie Elizabeth D and so
on. Therefore if I crossed a flower of Ting a Ling using it as
the female parent with Joy Patmore as the male parent on 1st. September,
2004, the tiny label attached to the pedicel would read A X B. 1.
1.9.04. If I did the same cross with more than one flower the
second label would read A X B. 2. 1.9.04 and be attached to the
pedicel. The third would read A X B. 3. 1.9.04 and so
on. Each seed pod having its own unique
identification. Again, if I crossed Ting a Ling with Katie
Elizabeth the first cross would be A X D. 1. 1.9.04. A simple
and easy method. One important point to bear in mind, always
identify the female parent first in all your records. Its
importance will become obvious when comparing any sibling back to its
parents. All this may seem a little complicated
but once you start using it, it becomes very easy. The
photographs below illustrate the method I use. The
labels on the two flowers below have been written using waterproof
ink. They are wrapped around the pedicel, the date is on the
reverse. These labels can also be printed provided
the ink is waterproof.
The next stage is how?
All the literature I have studied regarding plant breeding, in particular
fuchsias, recommend starting by emasculating the flower to be used as the
female parent. This, quite simply, means removing the anthers
leaving only the style and stigma. The reason proffered
is to prevent pollen from the same flower fertilising seed in its own
ovary. This is totally unnecessary.
What had not been realised by these authors is the fact that
nature has already taken care of this point. They have just
copied or reiterated what they have read elsewhere. The flower does
not want to be fertilised by its own pollen therefore does not allow the
anthers to produce ripe pollen until five days after the stigma has become
receptive for pollination. With this delaying mechanism
in place there is insufficient time for pollen to fertilise seed in
its own ovary. Quite simply, forget all about
emasculation, nature has already taken care of
it. An example of an emasculated flower is
shown below, the anthers have been completely removed.
The next point also recommended is
encapsulating the stigma once pollinated. This quite simply is
covering
the stigma with a small capsule. The reasoning
behind this is supposedly to prevent pollen from other flowers germinating on the
stigma and fertilising seed in the ovary different from what you had
intended and messing up your records with regard to the male
parentage. This again, in the confines of an amateurs
greenhouse can be completely disregarded. What was not
realised was the fact that the pollen on the anthers of the male parent is
probably already contaminated with pollen from any number of different
fuchsia plants. This is circulated by air movement and
visiting insects. Of course this
contamination of the pollen can be to your
advantage. It may well be that the pollen from the
male parent you wished to use to fertilise the seed of your selected
female plant, is sterile or that the two plants, for many and varied
reasons, are just not compatible. Therefore the
foreign pollen contaminating the male parent pollen may well fertilise
seed on the female parent. It could well produce a
better cross than what was intended. The use
of contaminated pollen must bring into question all the records regarding
the male parentage of many of our
cultivars. The only occasion when the
male parent can be established without doubt is if the cross fertilisation
process is carried out in a controlled environment, a laboratory, where
only the two plants co-exist and there is absolutely no chance of
contamination. Only then can it be established that
pollen from plant 'A' fertilised seed on plant 'B' and that all the
siblings are the direct result this cross. It is only
under these controlled conditions that emasculation of the female
parent could be an advantage preventing flowers from being
pollinated by sister flowers on the same plant. In the photo below, the flower on
the right is still attached to the plant whilst the flower on the left,
the male parent, has been removed and taken to the female flower.
A safe and simple method of cross fertilisation.
There are many ways to pollinate the stigma of the selected
flower. The one most hybridists advocate is to use a small
brush to collect the ripe pollen then brush the receptive stigma ensuring it
is completely covered. I have used this method but
now prefer the simpler more positive method above which is to remove the flower
selected for the male parent and take it to the plant whose flower is to be used as the
female parent. Select a flower with fully developed anthers
covered with ripe pollen. This is easy, simple and very
positive. Just gently coat the receptive stigma with pollen from
as many of the anthers as possible until it is completely covered.
See photo below:-
It is more effective than using a brush which can easily
damage the delicate surface of the stigma. The brush must
be thoroughly cleaned before and after each occasion it is used.
Once your selected combinations of cross
fertilisation have been completed and your work recorded it is now time to
make sure your female plants are not neglected. A
variety of conditions such as your plants drying out, an attack by wasps
which will cut away both style and filaments to gain access to the nectar
or a rapid fluctuation of temperatures can cause your fertilised seed pods
to be aborted before the seed is ready to
harvest. Take precautions and
pamper your plants, any
mistakes at this time will take a further twelve months to
rectify.
Once the stigmas have been liberally
coated with fresh pollen, the pollen, like a seed will attempt to germinate
on the surface of the stigma. This surface is so sensitive that
only a very small percentage, if any will be allowed
to germinate. In this initial stage the acceptable pollen
will germinate with the pollen tube nucleus growing through the stigma to
the style where it continues to wend its way to the ovary.
As the pollen tube wends it way the two male generative nuclei follow close
behind. On reaching an ovule the pollen tube
ruptures allowing both male nuclei to enter the ovule.
One will fuse with the egg cell whilst the second fuses with the endosperm
cell. See my line drawing below.
After fusion, the embryo plant develops within the protective outer shell
called the testa. Once fertilisation is achieved the
endosperm feeds the developing embryo until the new seed is fully developed
with a full complement of genes from both parents. It will now remain
inert until the conditions are right for it to germinate.
These are fully described below. Study the
second line drawing below to appreciate and understand the composition of a
newly developed seed which now undergoes a dormant or resting period.
If you have been successful with your
fertilisation the seed pods should start to ripen and become very plump
within ten to fourteen days depending on the weather
conditions. The cooler the weather the longer it will
take. Don't be impatient and attempt to remove the
seed pods from the parent plant too early, allow them to fall
naturally. You must check your plants daily and
collect the seed pods from the bench before they are eaten or damaged,
especially by slugs and snails. The
ripened seed pods can vary in colour from black through red to pale
green. The pastel flower shades seem to be dominantly
green.
The collection of seed from the seed pods
is not as easy as it may seem. There are various methods
such as crushing the seed pods in a glass of water. The ripe seed
should sink to the bottom of the glass leaving the placenta and other
material in suspension. This can be poured away
and the ripe seed recovered from the bottom of the glass. I
have used this method but favour gently crushing the seed pod in the
palm of the hand and extracting the ripe seed with a pair of tweezers.
If you gently rub the placenta with your finger you can feel the ripe
seed. Remove them with tweezers and place
them onto a
fresh tissue remembering to include your identification code with
different batches of seed. The photo below illustrates just
how few ovules are actually fertilised within the ovary.
The top two placentas have only eight viable seed between them whilst
the bottom pair have none. It therefore pays to
duplicate, even triplicate your work, by pollinating several flowers on
the female parent plant with the pollen from same male parent.
If these crosses are all successful then you will have a much greater
chance of achieving your goal.
There is always the off chance that the
parents you have chosen may not be compatible for one reason or another.
This is true of all human, plant and animal life.
Nothing is absolute therefore it pays to add several options and
variations to your plans. Change the female then the male
and always try 'selfing'. This is where pollen
from one flower pollinates the stigma of another flower on the same
plant. This has the tendency to allow recessive genes to become
dominant and produce some interesting results. Again, try
crossing two or more flowers from the resulting seedlings this can also be a
viable proposition.
Once all the seed has been harvested, it
must be dried naturally. Ignore any advice advocating
the use of a radiator, airing cupboard or warm oven to dry the
seed. I have heard this advice advocated on more than one
occasion. It will reduce or destroy the viability of your
valuable seed. Dry your seed as
naturally as possible, on a tissue in a warm room out of the reach of
children or house proud wife. I have lost seed to
both these causes.
Once the seed has dried, package it in
small envelopes with the details of its parentage recorded on the
front. Add the date it was packaged for
future reference. Fuchsia seed, if not
properly packaged will degrade rather quickly. On the one hand it
may dehydrate if kept too dry and on the other hand, if kept damp it will be
prone to attack
by fungi. Its viability
will also degrade with time therefore don't delay too long before
sowing. It can be sown almost immediately, but I
prefer to sow about the second week in January in a closed thermostatically
controlled propagator with a bottom heat of 68/70 deg F - 20/22 deg
C. Sow the seed sparingly in seed trays of
damp compost, I use ordinary potting compost, passed through a fine
riddle, mixed with some fine perlite
for sowing and cover the seed with finely sieved compost, just sufficient
to cover the seed. Water the seed in using a small spray
containing Cheshunt fungicide diluted in warm water as recommended by
the manufacturer. Use a fine spray to minimise
disturbance of the seed. The
seed should be sown at least 3 to 4 cm. apart if using seed trays or
better still sown individually in one of the manufactured micro cell
trays which are now currently available at most Nurseries.
This minimises root disturbance and damage when potting up, a major
cause of losses. Always bear in mind, if you are
propagating cuttings from an established plants it matters not if you
lose the odd cutting these can always be replaced, but it you lose just
one of your seedlings, it is a disaster. It could well be the one
that is absolutely unique, the true yellow, the perfect blue or the pure
white. You will never know. The
lesson to be learned is to be meticulous in everything you do.
It is a distinct advantage to use a covered heated propagation frame.
I have found that 20/22 deg C. - 68/72 deg F gives the best results.
But here again a word of warning. If your seed
is sown during the early part of the year, January or February you must
be aware that once your seeds start germinating they must be
individually removed, preferably planted into another seed tray or
small 5cm pot to be hardened off and allowed to acclimatise to the lower
temperatures of your greenhouse. This must be on a daily basis.
Place them as near to the glass as practicable to ensure they have
access to maximum amount of light but avoiding direct sunlight.
Increase their exposure to the lower temperatures progressively
returning them to the heated propagator each evening until you feel they
have been fully acclimatised. The complete transition, being
removed from the heated frame into the lower temperatures of the
greenhouse, without first hardening them off, will almost certainly cause the demise of some of your
seedlings. They will undoubtedly succumb to botrytis
which, with a little knowledge, can be avoided. The other
factor to be reckoned with is the imbalance in temperature and light.
High temperatures and low light will induce unwanted elongation of your
seedlings and make them weak, more prone to attack by both insect and
fungi. My
line drawings below illustrate and describe the process of seed germination.
Don't be disappointed if your seed does not
germinate as quickly as you would expect.
Seed from annual or biannual plants can germinate in several days but with perennial
plants such as fuchsias it is a different matter
entirely. The germination of fuchsia seed, if properly
sown, can vary from as little as one week to six months.
This is normal. In its natural habitat the seed
enclosed within its berry will, when ripe, fall to the ground.
If not ingested by browsing animals or birds it will await for the right
conditions to germinate. Germination is
controlled and regulated by three factors, heat, oxygen and
water. Any imbalance in these three essentials will
inhibit germination. Too much or too
little heat, too much or insufficient moisture or over compacted compost
excluding essential oxygen are the main causes of failure.
Once these three factors are in balance the process of germination can
start. With fuchsias. similar to many other perennial
species of plants, germination of seed can be very erratic.
There is of course, a very good and valid reason for this behaviour. Inside
each tiny seed, protected by its outer shell called the 'Testa' is a
genetic blueprint covering all aspects of growth and development of
a new cultivar. In addition, each tiny seed has a built in timing
mechanism, a virtual clock, which predetermines when germination should
start. This is different in every seed and can vary from as little as one week to six months.
This germination differential is absolutely critical for the survival of
the species. If all the seeds germinated at the same
time they may well be eaten or destroyed by browsing animals, destroyed by
fire, flood or drought. This built in erratic germination
factor is a safeguard which ensures survival and perpetuation of the
species should the initial seedlings be destroyed. One
interesting point I have observed over several years is the fact that
the first seeds to germinate are usually very vigorous and more prone to
be single in various shades of the dominant fuchsia colours red and
purple. Those slower to germinate tend to
be doubles and lighter pastel shades. The lesson
here is simple, continue to care for and do not discard your seed trays
for at least six months. The first photograph below
shows seedlings in various stages of growth being acclimatised during the
daytime.
This second photograph emphasises the
erratic germination of fuchsia seed.
The photographs below are examples of
what is primarily required from any new seedling, the development of lateral
growth without having to physically induce it by removing the growing tip.
