AusBonsai

Hi Does anyone have any black pine seed ?? Looking to get about 100 - 200 cheers in advance

John

I was at Kokufu in Feb this year chasing JBP seed - Japanese JBP seed in very short supply this year due to the 2019 typhoon.
Suggest you try European sources?
I have a few, but not in the 100's.

I think pine seed is still on the AQUIS prohibited list due to a disease called pine canker.

Check to see if registered sources can legally get through quarantine.
You may be lucky and get some past quarantine inspection. You may also be unlucky and import a new disease that wipes out our softwood industry.

I was sure Neil was right, but even though i deal with quarantine plant material for work we don't do pines so i looked it up to confirm just now and yes JBP seed (in fact all JBP) is banned entry from the following countries due to pitch canker:

"Chile; Haiti; Honduras; Iraq; Italy; Japan; Korea, Democratic People's Republic of (North Korea); Korea, Republic of (South Korea); Mexico; Philippines; Portugal; South Africa; Spain; Tanzania, United Republic of; United States of America; Uruguay."

Now you may rightly point out that there are a lot of countries not included in that, and you would be absolutely right. Therefore you can import JBP seed from let's say the United Kingdom, however you would still need permits for any JBP from anywhere that is not affected by pitch canaker. The seed would also have to go through a heat treatment for anywhere from 8 hours to 86 hours depending on the temperature of the heat treatment, or immersion in sodium hypochlorite for 10 minutes. Sodium hypochlorite is really just household bleach, so you can imagine what that is likely to do to the viability of the seed..

All in all, not really worth it.

Well done for checking and finding out all that good info.

or immersion in sodium hypochlorite for 10 minutes. Sodium hypochlorite is really just household bleach, so you can imagine what that is likely to do to the viability of the seed..

I've actually used bleach to sanitize seeds and it does not seem to affect germination. I'm pretty sure it is used to sanitize orchid seed before sowing in flasks. We also dip plant material in bleach solution to minimise pests and diseases when doing cuttings so it has minimal affect on living plant material. Once I washed chook eggs in the bleach solution to reduce the possibility of diseases coming onto the property and those eggs hatched perfectly well so maybe sodium hypochlorite is not so bad after all.

Thanks for that clarification Neil, I appreciate that Not sure what treatment the department does I was thinking of that occasionally nukes our material, but good news for anyone with the desire to import seeds.

Edit: I just remembered it is the methyl bromide fumigation the Department does that can cause us problems from time to time.

Hey Grainer,

I see you are in Melbourne somewhere. I have a few Black Pines in my neighbourhood (I think). I might go for a walk over the next few days and see if I can find any cones. (Perhaps it's too late?) I am not interested in the seeds myself so I am happy to collect cones and get them too you somehow. No skin off my nose.

Actually - I'll take a photo of the trees as well. I am not a pine expert ... but I think the ones I am thinking of are Black pines.

Anyway -- I'll go for a walk with Hadley and we'll sniff out some cones ...or not.

Cheers,

Mark

You may still be lucky with cones and seed. Mine opened later than usual this year - the first started to open about 4 weeks ago and others about 2 weeks ago so I've now picked them all.
Pine cones are deceptive because the ripe cones open on a nice dry, sunny day and drop almost all the viable seed. When the cones get damp from dew or rain they close up again and look perfect but most of the seed is gone
From experience there will still be some seed in there but if it did not drop initially nearly all those seeds will be empty husks and infertile.

Good luck with the seed search.

I got some of eBay I didn't have a huge success rate but some is better than none

I think t would be irresponsible to import JBP seed from any source overseas as the vendor would most likely have sourced the seed from Japan or another country where canker is endemic. I agree with Neil, you could import the disease into Australia.