Sulcorebutia crispata seed germination

[habanerocat]

I'm having poor success germinating crispata seeds.
Over the last few years I've tried 36 packets from various specialist continental suppliers, and bar some success with one packet of LAU390 it's been a poor return on my efforts. About 20 seedlings.
I'm getting much better success with other types of seeds, mostly South American cacti. About 25%. So I think my baggy method is fairly OK.
The propagator is at about low 20s degrees. It gets hotter on sunny days. I sow in March and dry them out before their first winter.

Is there something different I need to do to get a higher success rate with the Sulcorebutias?
I've obviously read articles of collectors in the field collecting seed that turns out sterile. Could a lot of this specialised seed be sterile?

One thing that did happen this year is that I got a lot of late germination. I noticed this when I opened the bags a few weeks ago. It's unlikely they will survive the winter as they are all drying out now.
This didn't happen with the Sulcos of course as they didn't germinate at all. But it might help diagnose my problem.

On a separate note I wonder does anybody know where I might get seeds of Willi Gertel collections, namely G245 to G255 approximately?
Does Willi himself sell seeds?

[ralphrmartin]

I sow in March and dry them out before their first winter.
One thing that did happen this year is that I got a lot of late germination. I noticed this when I opened the bags a few weeks ago. It's unlikely they will survive the winter as they are all drying out now.

I reckon that of all C&S seeds I sow from a variety of sources, I get at least one seedling up in about 75% of packets, with many packets giving close to 100% germination.
I sow at the start of March, (except for winter growers) and leave the propagator set at 20 C during the day, and off at night.
I use purely mineral compost with fine particles, soaked in acidifed water with added fertiliser and fungicide,
I spray the seeds every day with the same solution as I do not use baggies - I think this helps to wash off any inhibitor in the seed coat.
I prick them out when big enough to handle, usually in July-August.
I also keep seedlings growing throughout their first winter, as they seem to develop quicker this way, and are less likely to fade away due to lack of reserves. Losses may occur when procking them out, but most survive the winter at about 5C (special cases like Melocacti are kept warmer).

The trickiest part with Sulcos is finding seed in the first place - most are self-sterile, unlike say many Aylosteras. For most of my seed, I tend to go back to seed suppliers whose seed I find reliable, such as Succseed, ADBLPS, Ladislav Fischer, Ralf Hillmann for South American cacti.

[SimonT]

I was wondering about the temperature for germination of sulcos? I seem to have most success when it is a bit warmer than
20oC -maybe 27 or 28oC daytime. I've not done a proper side by side comparison though- but when I checked the Sulco-passion site they also recommend a similar warm temp. I don't use fungicide so if it is too cold the seed might rot before germination at the lower temperature? Fungicides that won't disrupt germination are difficult to obtain these days!

[habanerocat]

I did some excel wizardry there with this years sowing only.
It stands at.

Aylostera 38%
Echinocereus 30%
Sulcorebutia 11%

So I think I'll try up the daytime temperature and try introduce a night-time swing.
I'm not setup to achieve that automatically so I'll have try remember to do it manually.

I don't know what possessed me to sow 20 Trichocereus seeds this year. They're at 158%

[habanerocat]

There's a pdf available on the SulcoPassion website that cross-references the Sulco field numbers.
I'd seen it years ago, but had forgotten about it. Takes a bit of work but I generated the below from it.

https://www.sulcopassion.be/pdf/3262_2011.pdf

There seems to be a few pages missing (invisible print). If anybody has the complete visible pdf I'd appreciate a copy.
A pdf editor might be able to make the print visible again.

G245 ~RH2366a langeri ca. 8km nördlich von Vallegrande 2000m
G247 ~RH1639 langeri ca. 6km nördlich von Vallegrande 2100 m
G248 ~RH2379 crispata fa. 1km östlich von Pucara 2650m
G248a RH2380 crispata fa. 1km östlich von Pucara, weiter nach Norden 2650m
G249 RH1630 crispata 500m nördlich von Nuevo Mundo 2280m
G250 AG029 crispata südlich von Nuevo Mundo am Weg nach Villa Serrano 2580m
G251 LH1219, LH1229, LH1475, MS426, VS982 crispata 4km nördlich von Villa Serrano 2520m
G252 None gemmae südwestlich von Redención Pampa 2570m
G253 ~HJ858, RM340 gemmae südlich von Redención Pampa 2500m
G254 LH1125, LH1477, RM339, ~RMR0611, VS433 gemmae (gelbe und viol. Bl.) zwischen Redención Pampa und Mojocoya 2580m
G256 VZ230 gemmae nordöstlich von Mojocoya 2500m

I'm not sure what the ~ means. Probably approximate......

[Tony R]

There seems to be a few pages missing (invisible print). If anybody has the complete visible pdf I'd appreciate a copy.
A pdf editor might be able to make the print visible again.

I've extracted all the text into MS Word and re-saved as the attached pdf.
You can now see the 'white on white' text eg the Brian Bates etc numbers.
Sorry it has lost the original formatting, but it has all the data.

Kompendium.pdf

(1.06 MiB) Downloaded 50 times

[ralphrmartin]

I was wondering about the temperature for germination of sulcos? I seem to have most success when it is a bit warmer than
20oC -maybe 27 or 28oC daytime.

20C is what I set the thermostat to during the day, but the sun often warms the propagator to higher temperatures, which may indeed be helpful to germination. In summer, I've even had it up to 60 C which hasn't killed the cactus seedlings- they are kept permanently damp.

(I take succulent seedlings out of the propagator soone after germination usually, as they tend not to appreciate the high humidity so much).

[habanerocat]

I did some excel wizardry there with this years sowing only.
It stands at.

Aylostera 38%
Echinocereus 30%
Sulcorebutia 11%

I just totted up my crispata seedlings for 2023, as this is the title of the thread.
It's only 4%.

[habanerocat]

There seems to be a few pages missing (invisible print). If anybody has the complete visible pdf I'd appreciate a copy.
A pdf editor might be able to make the print visible again.

I've extracted all the text into MS Word and re-saved as the attached pdf.
You can now see the 'white on white' text eg the Brian Bates etc numbers.
Sorry it has lost the original formatting, but it has all the data.

Thanks for your efforts Tony.

Long story short I found this online editor that sorted it out. It was a bit of a manual effort but I'd say it's fairly good.
Keeps the original format intact.

https://www.sejda.com/
.

FN_Repaired_3262_2011.pdf

(2 MiB) Downloaded 38 times

[SimonT]

Looking at the Sulco-passion Gertel Gallery images I'm always surprised by the variation in plants appearance even within individual field numbers.
When I get decent germination rates (or lots of seed) it sometimes seems every Sulco seedling looks a bit different.
Has anyone tried crossing similar plants from a series of 'clones' to see if you just get stable appearance after the first cross?
Just wondering...