Re: tuberous drosera seed...again

Jan Schlauer (zxmsl01@studserv.zdv.uni-tuebingen.de)
Mon, 17 Jan 1994 20:04:13 +0100

Andreas,

>My problem is that as I tried to sow these seeds in vitro I have to
>germinate them before the agar in the tubes dries too much. Therefore I
>cannot wait a year or longer until germination occurs.

I think I know this problem. I circumvent this by using agar at very low
concentrations (0.7% Sigma agar, which is close to the point of no
polymerization: you'll have to try this out with your lot of agar). This
tends to prolong the drying process (especially on the surface of the
media) considerably. Also, it is preferable to use larger amounts (volume)
of media (better surface/volume quotient) for germinating, i.e. long term
i.v. cultures. I can keep my vials unopened for one year without killing
the plants by desiccation (OK, sometimes there come these nasty
microbes...). Once growing, the plants should be "repotted" more frequently
because of release of phenolic metabolites into the media (not so with
species forming hibernacula: here, the metabolites tend to induce and
prolong dormancy and may even be beneficial to the resting bud, but be sure
to give them new media as soon as the first new leaves are formed!).

Of course, there are still some species which do not germinate at all or
not every year.

Kind regards
Jan