Ravenala madagascariensis seeds

[Pine landscape]

Hello

I harvest ravenala seeds from several mother plants, the problem is that size of 80% of seeds are small like lentils, not sure if those seeds would germinate, the 20% are large like 1 cm length. 

Appreciate your advice

[John hovancsek]

Cut it open but doesn't sound good. Is there both male and female palms there?

[PalmatierMeg]

Ravenala may be known as "travelers' palm" but it is not a palm - related to genus Strelitzia. Photos of the seeds might help.

[GDLWyverex]

16 hours ago, John hovancsek said:

Cut it open but doesn't sound good. Is there both male and female palms there?

Ravanelas are monoecious and therefore do not manifest in male of female plants such as cycads, which are dioecios, do.

 

Richard

[John hovancsek]

3 hours ago, GDLWyverex said:

Ravanelas are monoecious and therefore do not manifest in male of female plants such as cycads, which are dioecios, do.

 

Richard

I instantly was thinking of ravinea then it occurred to me.

[NOT A TA]

On 10/15/2020 at 6:46 PM, Pine landscape said:

the 20% are large like 1 cm length. 

The viable seed look like this.

[Frond-friend42]

What is that blue substance? It looks like the denim that teenagers are wearing.

[Silas_Sancona]

2 minutes ago, Frond-friend42 said:

What is that blue substance? It looks like the denim that teenagers are wearing.

Is what is called an "Aril"  ...a Fleshy covering that covers the part of/ entire seed of some plants to aid in being dispersed by Birds/ other animals..  The bright colors attract more attention. 

Did not realize these were bright Blue, cool..  Aril coverings that are Red or Orange are much more common in other things.

[NOT A TA]

The aril is kinda fluffy and pulls apart easily when trying to remove seeds with tweezers.

For those who've never seen them in person the inflorescence is big as you can see in pic below of one on a car trunk. It's kinda like a giant bird of paradise flower on steroids. Weighs probably about 10 lbs and is stiff and hard as a rock when dry like the one pictured, the viable seed is usually tucked way down inside and the blue you see in the pics is on the tiny "seeds" that aren't fully formed. It's difficult to get the viable seeds out without damaging them and hard to get a pic of because they're deep in the white woody flower tissue. I'd been looking for ones with viable seeds for over a year when doing trimming jobs or seeing flowering plants while driving that weren't over maintained.  Here it's really easy to end up with a huge clump that looks like a big mess and takes a lot of time to trim and haul away the trimmings.

The clump I got these from has at least a half dozen trunks and is well over two stories tall. It's a huge job to trim and has to be done over several weeks because the weekly bulk pick for landscape trimmings in the particular HOA has quantity limits. These flowers were up about 25'. While the white part looks like it should be soft in the pics it's hard like cement. Can't bend it and have to break or cut it apart to get the viable seeds. Got about 10 seeds out of each inflorescence like the one above and it took probably 20-30 minutes for each 10 seeds. Will see if I can get more seed off some perhaps more recently matured flowers when I go back to continue trimming this coming week.

[quaman58]

I was alway under the (perhaps erroneous) assumption that there was no real effective germinating critter outside of their native habitat.  Can someone weigh in on that? Mine flowers annually; they are one of the biggest flowering structures there is in the plant kingdom. 

[Silas_Sancona]

39 minutes ago, quaman58 said:

I was alway under the (perhaps erroneous) assumption that there was no real effective germinating critter outside of their native habitat.  Can someone weigh in on that? Mine flowers annually; they are one of the biggest flowering structures there is in the plant kingdom. 

From what i just read (  Adopt a Seed, Kew article ), Lemurs are supposedly major pollinators in habitat, and apparently also disperse seed.. so, unless Squirrels, or some other animal capable of pollinating them here are also attracted to the seed, you'd have to have some pet Lemurs around. 

Another article from NYBG: https://www.nybg.org/blogs/plant-talk/2013/03/around-the-garden/shades-of-blue/

Also, something else i found.. Use of Sulphuric Acid < maybe something similar instead as well? >  ( chemical scarification ) helps to break dormancy of the seed/ speeds up germination ( Scarification in Sulphrc. Acid for 9 min = 90% germ. rate at 15 days for treated seed, vs. 36% germ rate at 39 days for un- treated seed, per the summary )  Full abstract summary is viewable here: https://www.ingentaconnect.com/content/ista/sst/2013/00000041/00000001/art00017   ( toward the bottom of the page ) There is a pay wall on the overall article though.

Edited December 12, 2020 by Silas_Sancona
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