Japanese black pine cones development

[daiviet_nguyen]

Hi,

I put a mature Japanese black pine down to ground in the Winter 2007 -- no cones in 2008 and 2009. There were quite a few from last year 2010. The tree itself is very healthy. Some of the candles are about 50cm long.

Till right now, 04/April/2011, they still look very green. The diameter of each cone is about 30mm, and about 50mm long.

Are they dud? Or I still have some hopes?

Thank you and best regards.

[alpineart]

Hi Daiviet, i've been told that they take 2 seasons to mature . Mine were green for close to 18months then as they began to turn brown the Mountain Parrots had a field day and raided the tree .They should be good .Cheers Alpine

[shibui]

Pine cones take 2 years to mature. Female flowers appear on the ends of fresh candles in late spring. If they are fertilised they grow to full size during the summer then continue to mature during the winter. They ripen and go brown the following summer and the cones open in warm, dry weather to release seeds. The cones usually close up again in cooler weather so cones harvested in autumn look perfect but usually only have a few seeds left. I have noticed that the seed that is left in these older cones is not viable so try to pick the cones as they first start to open up.

[Bretts]

Glad the others said two years as that is what my propagation book states. But I collected my cones from a Japanese garden and the gardener said they where only one year old as he was told to remove the cones for aesthetical reasons. I could not leave hem as he would have removed them so had to take my chances. Maybe I picked the ones that he missed the year before or something, from memory most where very green but looked a decent size for JBP which is not very big. The odd one might have had a slight dulling or browning in the colour in parts. Left them as is in paper bags over Winter and as usual with JBP I got great germination rate after soaking for about 48 hours come spring.
Unless mistaken I don't think the red pine seeds sprouted.

[daiviet_nguyen]

Hi alpineart and shibui,

Thank you for the information. There are still hopes for me I will report back back next season of the outcome.

I hope you have better luck with the Parrots next time alpineart, I work in the vicinity of a wild life reserve, there just so many of them, especially the galas.

Hi Bretts,

It's great to hear you have good results. I am looking forward to that too

Best regards.

[daiviet_nguyen]

The Easter weeks had been warmer than usual in the south-east of Melbourne. On the last days of the Easter break, all of the cones opened. I had no choice but to collected all 37 of them.

Out of the 37 cones, I got 88 seeds: 31 are black, just like the radiata seeds that collected eons ago; 57 are whitish. During the process of breaking the cones, I crushed a few of the whitish seeds -- they seemed hollow!

I do not hold much hope for those 57. My plan is as follows. Around middle of June/2011, I willdump the seeds into water overnight. Then I will put those that sunk into the fridge, for 15 days. And plan them in July/2011. If any of them are good, they should germinate around middle of July/2011. It should be warm enough from thence onward for the seedlings (:)) to grow.

I would be ecstatic with one seedling out of those 88 seeds!

[shibui]

Empty seed sees to be common with young black pines. My last harvest (the first from this tree) was 99% empty seed and no cones this year. Hope for better as the tree gets older. Good luck with germinating the seed. Stratifying it in the fridge will not hurt but we have found that black pine seed does not need this.

[daiviet_nguyen]

Of the 88 seeds, only three sank, I planted all 88 without stratifying in the middle of July 2011. Six weeks have passed, no seedlings! The pine once again has a lot of flowers. I hope for better luck next season

Black seeds that do not germinate:

[Webos]

I have both male and female organs developing on my black pines. Does anyone know when I should shake the males all over the females in order to help pollination?

[shibui]

Black pines are still some way from ripe up here but might be earlier down there.
When they are ripe the male cones open on warm days, usually in the afternoon to release puffs of pollen into the air. You will probably pick it by watching the flowers closely each day but a light tap on the branch will shake a little cloud of pollen if the flowers are open. This would obviously be the best time to try pollinating the female flowers.

A couple of weeks ago we saw a mass pollen release from the radiata plantations up here so they obviously flower much earlier. Huge clouds of yellow billowing up from the trees and drifting off in the breeze. Looked like there was a car rally up there raising a dust cloud!

[daiviet_nguyen]

I think I was a bit hasty. Last night (09/09/2011) got home from work at about 7:30PM, I have noticed about three germinations.

I have got what I wished for and more! I do not know how they will fare yet.

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Hi shibui,

They must have harvest the pollen somehow?

Regards.

[shibui]

Good to hear that your pines are coming up. Well done.

They must have harvest the pollen somehow?

The pollen clouds we saw was just the trees releasing pollen naturally to fertilise the new batch of cones but it was an awesome sight.

[daiviet_nguyen]

Nearly six months have passed, I would like to update on the development of the seedlings.

In total there were 26 germinations. And 5 were eaten totally by the snails and slugs. A few died. After transplanted them into bigger pots, another few died.

I transplanted the first that germinated on 08/10/2011, I cut about 1/3 of the main root off. And two weeks after, I progressively transplanted the rest between weeks.

Those photos were taken on 17/03/2012 of some that are still alive.


Group 1 -- strongest

The one on the left, with a branch in the pot is the first one that germinated and transplanted. There are still 5 in this group, the average height is about 12 cm.


Group 2 -- not strong

Shown against one of the strongest. There are still 5 in this group. Their average height is about 6 cm.


Group 3 -- weak

Also shown against one of the strongest. There are 2 in this group. Their average height is about 3.5 cm.


Dying

It has been withering for nearly a month now. It starts to get yellow. I do not think it is going to make it.


Survival

These two had most of their needles eaten by about half, but not the top. I just did not have the heart to chuck them away, so I just grouped them in this little pot waiting for dead. They stayed still for nearly two months, but did not turn yellow. Finally in the past few weeks they show sign of life again. I remain hopeful that they will survive. If they did, I would train them together for as long as they are in my care.

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I hoped for 1, but currently have 15 with one dying, and possibly another 2. So I am happy; but I am still sore about the ones that got eaten.

As alpineart and shibui have pointed out, mature pines might give better seeds. So I am hopeful that in the later seasons I can get better seeds from this tree.

[NBPCA]

Hi,

When I first moved to a rural property in 1990 I planted 6 black pine in the ground to give me seed for my nursery.

They all grew well and gave seed from about 3 or 4 years on.

Of the 6 there was one that was by far the best at producing seed and I also found the seed from that particular tree were also the most vigorous.

I used to net the entire tree to keep the Cockatoos out and in one particular good year I got about 5,000 seed from that one tree and i did not use the others at all.

I trimmed the tree to keep it somewhat compact so I could still collect all the seed from a medium size ladder.

Grant

[shibui]

Daviet, It is about the stage your seedlings are at now that i usually pinch out the top to get some low branches on the seedlings. If you leave them too long you will just have tall, thin saplings with no low shoots. With young, vigorous seedlings it does not seem to matter what time of year you pinch.