Collecting Morning Glory seeds (are they any good?)

I was away from home for two weeks - and in that time we got quite a bit of rain and a little bit of snow. When I tried my usual "crumble the seed pod over a cup", the pods were firm and some of the seeds squished. I pulled off several dozen pods and am drying them out to sort.

I'm in a little bit of a quandry - I was going to send out a couple dozen packets to people who had requested them through the seed trading forum, but I don't want to send bad seeds.

Questions
Are the seeds still good?
Can I test for germination now?

Any help would be greatly appreciated. These seeds were free so it's not a trade, but I'd still like to make sure I'm sending good seeds. Or if the seeds didn't make it, I can always send a note saying maybe next year.

Thanks in advance,
Sandra

sbarr,

I don't have the answer to your question. Just wanted to say, "Welcome Back To the Good Old
U.S.A." Glad you had a safe trip home.

Honeybee

A lot of mine were sorta squishy after I had a frost and I didn't get to them soon enough. I gathered up all the ripe pods and let them air dry for a few days. Once they were dry and I broke all the pods open and I was able to tell which ones weren't any good. Some shriveled and a few got moldy. It's just a matter of sorting out the bad ones now. I'm sure the good ones will be okay.

I would be tempted to try a germination test on a few of them. Since they are annuals they would sprout or not.

I'm coming in late on this question -- I just came across the thread, but I've had similar experiences and doubts.

For one thing, parts of morning glory vines will live on long after separated from the main vine. One year the deer ate every bit of morning glory leaf, bud and stem from the bottom of a trellis that was just coming into full bloom. Except for the bottom two and a half feet, the trellis was still well covered. The leaves did wither fairly quickly, but not the blooms. In fact, two weeks later, buds were still forming and new blooms were still opening every day -- with no roots. The blooms that opened soon after the attack formed pods and good seed.

This year, I did ultimately have to cut several vines of wild mini blue morning glories off of a climbing rose that they were taking over. The vines went into a heap within sight of the patio, where they continued to bloom, and where I found plenty of seeds later.

When I moved a couple of container-planted MGs inside just before first frost, about half of one vine clung to a railing as I walked away with the pot. I untangled the severed vine and put the tangle in a large paper bag to dry. The seedpods were still fresh and white, and there were buds that I thought might still open, self-pollinate and form pods.

A month later, leaves and buds were dead, but the vine was still green and the pods were still ripening. Over the ensuing two weeks, the strength of the vine slowly drained into the pods, and I clipped the dry vine from the green pods and put them in a bowl to finish ripening and drying -- which is where they are now, in December! I have no doubt that, when the pods are dry and I crumble the seed covering away, I'll find healthy seeds.

If dry, ripe pods are in a humid environment, they will, like most dry vegetable matter, absorb water from the air. Here, in AL, it seemed to rain incessantly from Labor Day to Thanksgiving. I didn't rush to collect the pods just because of a few frosts -- seeds endure that in nature all the time. But when I got around to collecting the pods (most of them, that is; some still need collecting), many were clearly ripe and brown, but were soft from the humidity.

I put them in a bowl or bag to dry, stirring them a little every couple of days to keep the ones on the bottom from molding. When they were nice and crunchy, I shelled them out and suspected that the seeds that gave a little when I squeezed were not good. I ruined quite a few by pushing a fingernail into them. Then I realized that they were still holding humidity though the external pods had dried. So, I stopped killing good seeds and shelled them all into a flattish bowls and left them to dry, again stirring whenever I passed. Naturally, they shrunk a little as they hardened, but generally they looked great the next week as I poured them into packets.

So, I expect you had some humidity issues. I'm sure it's too late for this to do any good, but if, in the future, you find that visibly ripe, brown pods are still soft, just put them in a dry place and wait. The dryer the place the better, because, if they dry slowly, the seeds will be more likely to mold in the pod. The mold/mildew will break down the seed casing and then start working on the insides, also letting in bacteria that will speed the rotting of the seeds.