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GROWING FRANGIPANIS AND ADENIUMS FROM SEED
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GROWING FRANGIPANIS FROM SEED
WHY GROW FRANGIPANI TREES FROM SEED?
I am often asked this question, as I am an avid seed collector and grower myself, and have been for a number of years. Actually there are lots and lots of good reasons to grow frangipani from seed, and below are just a few facts regarding this hobby that you may not know.
Given the right conditions, they grow much, much faster than cuttings. This is because they start off their life with a proper root system, so can feed themselves from the word go. Cuttings take some time to root, especially at certain times of the year, like when going into dormancy. A cutting can sit there looking fine, because it can ‘feed’ from itself for months, and will show signs of new life at the tip, even shooting up what appears to be a healthy inflorescence, prior to flowering. Then, for no reason it will die, and you will wonder what you’ve done wrong. Well, perhaps you’ve given it too much water and it’s rotted. This means that it will die at the base or from part of the way up the stem (goes dark and squishy-looking) because without a root system it cannot ‘drink’ properly. Perhaps, though, you’ve done nothing at all that you can blame yourself for. It just never made a root system in time to become viable. You’ll find no root system at the base when you finally dispose of it.
The following paragraph is a quote from Richard and Mary Helen Eggenberger’s excellent book ‘THE HANDBOOK ON PLUMERIA CULTURE’ (page 56) regarding the plus side of growing frangipani from seed. “Seeds are easily handled and a large number of plants can be started in a small space with relatively little expense. Most important is the fact that all new cultivars must be produced from seed. Plumeria seedlings have more variability than any plant we know. Plant twenty seeds from the same pod and you are likely to get twenty different combinations of colour, size and form, some resembling the female parent, others exhibiting totally different characteristics. If you have collected seeds from a superior parent with a number of desirable qualities such as size, colour, shape, fragrance, and substance, you have an excellent chance of producing a hybrid of merit...” (Plumeria is the correct botanical name for frangipani)
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WHY???
- Australians spend many thousands of dollars annually, importing different varieties from overseas, when these new varieties are simply hybrids, created from seed themselves. With a bit of forethought, time and effort, we could be creating some fantastic new varieties here in Australia, to be admired by (and sold to) other frangi-lovers around the world, for years to come.
- Blooms can be expected from around two years onwards, and in fact going back 30 years, my old common pinks always used to flower in the second year. The shortest period I’ve had from seed to flower so far is one year and four months, but blooms were tiny. I get many blooming in under two years, thanks to our mild Carnarvon winters, and other new growers in our society are also getting blooms in under two years, now. You can also wait longer than this though, so remember this is a ‘pot luck’ situation, when growing from seed. A friend of mine who lives in the south-west of WA (Mandurah) has got blooms on frangipani grown from seed at only 2 ½ years.
- Every single frangipani flower has both male and female reproductive organs! Seeds from a single pod can produce quite different plants, in fact they do, all the time for me. That’s part of the excitement!
- Remember, some will grow more rapidly than others, even though planted in the same planter, in the same conditions, growing side by side, from the same single seed pod...amazing! Very briefly, this is because with open pollination, the pollinator, may either transfer pollen from the male ‘antler’ to the female stigma of the floret within the same single bloom, or bring pollen from a different frangipani growing nearby. So we can get self-pollination within the bloom, or cross-pollination from bloom to bloom. The pollinator could be a bee, a small spider, even a tiny hummingbird or certain type of moth in some places.
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HOW???
I find the best way to germinate out of doors is in an oblong planter with matching sized tray, bought cheaply at any Woolworths store. Fill with seed raising mix or well drained potting mix, combined with a little clean river sand if you have it on hand, to ensure maximum drainage. NEVER USE ANY POTTING MIX WITH A WETTING AGENT ADDED, OR YOU WILL SURELY ROT YOUR SEEDS!!! Fill planter to about an inch or so from the top. Moisten the mixture and fill the tray with water. If you have a warm sunny sheltered spot in the garden with gravel or cement flooring, which absorbs the sun's heat, that's ideal. Hold seeds by their ‘wing’ at the top and poke into the soil so only the brown wing protrudes. Keep seeds moist but not wet. They will germinate usually within a week, though I have known some take two or three weeks. One lot of seeds from a friend of mine didn't look like they were going to germinate at all, and suddenly after rain they all popped up at once! A gentle spray is all that is needed, so that the soil is not disturbed in this early stage. Soon you will notice the soil around the seeds begins to part and a tiny green shoots emerge, usually with the remains of the brown husk attached.
As long as the seeds are moist the husks will usually fall off themselves. However, if they appear to be stuck to the cotyledons, spray with fine mist to loosen them and very gently remove them. The cotyledons can then open out, and in the next few days the first two tiny leaves will emerge above the cotyledons. If the husks are allowed to dry on the cotyledons, and are not removed, after a few days the tiny seedling will rot, so it is REALLY important to help things along if they get stuck, and is something to look out for and be aware of. There are many methods of seed germination, but this is probably the simplest way, especially if you want to grow lots at once. Do not fertilise until seedlings are quite large - around the time you decide to pot them up individually.
I can't give an exact time, as they grow so much more quickly in some areas than others, and of course, the time of the year is also a big factor. I have found that a handful of clean river gravel put around the base of each seedling when you transplant it helps stabilise it after it is re-potted and also the heat of the sun on the pebbles warms the soil and encourages faster root growth. Your seedlings will be at least half a metre tall by the time they are a year old, as long as they are kept in a fairly warm environment. Seed-grown frangipanis start their lives off with a root system, and seem to grow much faster for me than cuttings. Seeds can also be more interesting, because of the variations created. If you can get hold of "The Exotic Plumeria (Frangipani) by Elizabeth and Sharon Thornton, or "The Handbook on Plumeria Culture" by Richard and Mary Helen Eggenberger, you will see some amazing hybrids created from seeds. One of the newest, and best books yet is “Growing Plumerias in Hawai’i and around the World” by Jim Little, and it is still in print. Jim has created some truly amazing new cultivars. Frangipanis actually have more pairs of chromosomes than we humans do, giving them an amazingly large gene pool. Happy growing..... Paula
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GERMINATING ADENIUM (DESERT ROSE) SEEDS
Germinating Adenium (Desert Rose) seeds could not be easier, and is quite fun to do. Get a clean plastic container with a well-fitting lid (recycled large Woolworths coleslaw container is perfect). Lay a couple of sheets of kitchen roll, folded to fit, on the bottom of the container. Moisten this base. Then take your seeds, and after removing the silky kapok ends, if they are still attached, lay them over the kitchen roll. Then take two more sheets of kitchen roll and moisten until damp but not dripping wet. Lay on top of the seeds, and seal the container with the lid. Sit in a warm sunny spot, indoors, say like maybe a kitchen window where you can watch them grow. After a few days they will swell, throwing down a hairy white tap root from one end, and tiny green leaves from the other end. They will slowly push up the top layer of kitchen roll, standing proud and tall, like lots of tiny green men, at about two weeks. See picture. From here, you just transplant them into a larger planter, the same oblong planters used for germinating frangipani seeds are perfect. They DON'T like to be planted individually, at this stage, for some reason. They thrive much better in a mass-planted situation - an oblong planter will take 50 seedlings easily - ten rows of five - or even more. You can gently remove each 'little green man' with your fingers, or even better, if the tiny tap roots have attached themselves to the paper base, just cut around each root with a small pair of nail scissors, and plant up into your planter with the tiny fragment of kitchen roll still attached. This way there will be no damage to those tiny root systems.
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