Good King Henry

Does anybody have Good King Henry Seeds? Also known as Chenopodium bonus henricus.

I think I bought it from Chilternseeds (UK) but I guess there are several many more places to get it.

I got some from http://www.thymegarden.com/

Marianne West wrote:Does anybody have Good King Henry Seeds? Also known as Chenopodium bonus henricus.

Good King Henry is also erratic to germinate. They usually take time, about 2 months, and sometimes when you already gave up, you will notice the seedlings coming up after re-digging the soil.

Like many chenopodiums, seeds seems to need initially darkness followed by light and some temperature cycles.

Scientific studies show that chenopodium species often break their dormancy, by cycles in light and darkness, temperature, humidity and dried soil, and nitrogen variations. So, I guess you should try to simulate those changes.

I sown a few dozen seeds. I only managed to germinate a few couple of seeds (during summertime) after submitting the seeds to pre-chill for 3 weeks and alternating humid and dried soil, and cycles between indoors and outdoors, and ocasionally stirring the soil. Seeds under no change did not germinate at all. This is very different than amaranth and quinoas, which usually germinate much better.

When they do germinate, I noticed they were very sensitive to water variations if its hot indoors, they seem to grow better if soil is cooler. Only one seedling survived and this is the one I have been struggling to keep it alive during this dark winter in Iceland (indoors with artificial light). Chenopodiums seem not to enjoy artificial lightning and prefer strong direct sunlight (probably because they have the so-called C4 metabolism). Good king henry also prefers fertile moist soil, and very sensitive to transplantation.

Does anyone know where and when I can get some good king henery plants since I read they are hard to germinate?

I got mine from http://oikostreecrops.com/

They have some now! Thanks!

Germinating Good King Henry is not too difficult in a freezing climate. Left to the plants own the devices, it will spread all over the garden. Seeds from www.restorationseeds.com have detailed instructions that I used for the companies seeds initially and have followed for germination from seeds from my own overgrown patch in recent years. Fresh collected seeds from the season before have much higher germination than older batches.

The key to efficient germination is to let the seeds go through a few freeze thaw cycles. In my climate, the seeds are planted in containers placed in the greenhouse in April to allow a number of freeze thaws. They are kept moist and moved outside as temperatures rise. It is pretty easy to supply the local community at the permaculture “plant swaps” without much effort. Patches in our zone 3/4 are self-perpetuating once established.