Well, another first for us transplanted Yanks: yesterday on our walk thru the neighborhood I noticed the brilliant red seeds on some magnolia trees. I pocketed a few, boy, are they pretty!! I've found some bits of info about planting the seed, but would like to hear from other folks who have done it. Someone said to soak the seeds to make it easier to work off the red coating, but it seems to peel off easily anyway. Another poster said to scarify the seed and wrap it in damp peat moss and keep it in the fridge for three months before planting. Anybody with any other info out there?
Magnolia seeds, how to grow?
You already have the info you need. The seeds have to be fresh and not dried out, the red coating removed and the black seed washed in something like Dawn dish liquid to remove the oily film. After all this put in in a plastic bag with some moist but not wet peat potting mix and keep it in the fridge for a few months then plant it in well drained, slightly acidic soil.
The bottom line though is that Magnolia take a long long long long long time to get to the flowering point. The second bottom line is that tho beautiful trees and flowers, I'm sure you noticed on your walk what a mess they make .. also note in a few weeks the zillions of hard sharp leaves that will cut you if you walk barefoot on them.
X
Thanks X, good points!!!!!! It really is a gorgeous tree, especially when they're nicely shaped!! I'm sure I'll never have a huge sized tree, but I wouldn't mind trying to grow one, just for the fun of it!!! Thanks for confirming the info I found.
Thanks for asking the question thea611--I, too, have admired those seeds greatly, and wondered if I could sprout one. Might be a fun, albeit, long project! If your's sprouts, let us know, ok?
I read this so I thought I would sprout some for fun. I took off the red coating and mine aren't black? My trees are DD Blanchards. Any ways I'll try to sprout some fresh ones and try a few in the spring. I'm going to keep the red coating and few and see if I can get them to grow this spring too. Just a little project and next year I'll know the answer if this gets asked again.
Yup, Yote and Core, I'm going to try it!!! I can't have seeds in my hand and NOT try them! I had put my beautiful red "beans" in a little jar til I figured out what to do with them, and see that that's not the thing to do, they started getting moldy! So I'm going to go ahead and get the red covering off, and proceed with the project. Core, my seeds, under the coating, are a light brown. Maybe they turn black as they age? This will be fun!