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Programming seeds naturally. Goes against everything I learned about starting seeds.

 
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This is super logical.  I don't know that it's actually true.

The idea is that seeds started in very poor conditions have their  dna programmed to be able to survive in harsh conditions.  So it learns to live in sub par conditions.  Then, you transplant it to moderate/better soil/conditions, and it flourishes better than ever!???

I start my seeds in almost perfect conditions, and then plant them into less than perfect conditions.  It works, but now that I think about it, it might be wrong.  It totally validates the argument for starting the seeds where they'll permanently be.

It's kind of like growing up on the streets as a kid, and then you're super prepared for life vs some overly sheltered kid???

Here's the video I just watched about it.  


 
pollinator
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I like it.

A similar dynamic was talked about in Korean Natural Farming trainings, where it was compared to raising children.  If we give them everything they want - more than they need - from the beginning, then they will grow up completely dependent and not able to care for themselves.  But if we are more strategic with the intention of helping them work for the things they want, while still providing the basic needs, then they will grow up to be much stronger and more able to adapt.  

One of the things that I didn't hear mentioned in this video was microbes.  

On the Regenerative front, John Kempf and Dan Kittredge have both mentioned that the number one thing they do to get the best ROI (Return on Investment), is to expose  seeds to microbial inoculants.  This can be as simple as soaking the seeds for a short period of time in water that has been mixed with healthy compost, or a very good batch of microbial active soil from a forest, or from a base of a very healthy plant that is the same species as the seed being planted.  Or using IMO (Indigenous Micro-Organisms) from a similar/same environment where the seeds will be planted.  

The inoculants will bring their own level of "programming".  

You might appreciate this podcast:  
 
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I watched that video and it sent me looking into sprouting seeds in sand, the least hospitable "birth place" that came to mind.
This could be paired with compost tea, for that inoculation effect and just a bit of fertility.

Getting big trees fast isn't that compelling but getting resilient plants is.

I'm not sure if its worth the effort for annuals and I'm not sure how many trees/perinials I will be starting from seed, but it is very interesting.

What if we plant a bunch of seeds in a  post hole full of sand, right where we want a tree to be?
A few seasons in and any seedlings will have reached the more nutritious soil.
A few seasons more and we can select the most vigorous, and cut back the rest.



 
master steward
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I have done reading that suggests that trees can "learn" even when they are "adults". If they experience a really bad drought, but manage to survive, they will respond by growing more slowly and conserving water in the future.

This is similar to the STUN method that several permaculture people recommend, Sepp Holzer for one. (Shear Total Utter Neglect) That isn't always possible for me, but I've done what I describe as a "weaning program". The former owner of our land watered everything continuously during our drought period. I felt that shouldn't be necessary, so I gradually lengthened the time between watering, and I made sure I watered deeply when I did to gradually teach the trees to extend their roots deeper and to search for water.  That said, I also have dug in punky wood up-slope from the trees to help the crappy soil hold water more effectively.

I can certainly believe that starting straight from seed would have similar if not more dramatic effects. There was a study in southern Europe that I read years ago and fruit trees that never received any water from the time of planting, coped better during a bad drought than trees that had received a minimal level of water and then received none at all during a drought (which can happen if one's well runs dry at a bad time!)
 
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I think everyone here has hit on a piece, but I think the whole cannot be reduced to "better" or "worse"

John Kempf talks about how appropriate nutrition can affect epigentic expression. This is the same mechanism that allows Stefan Sobkowiak to "program" a seedling. And mature trees responding to drought is likely another epigentic response.

Now, John Kempf is adding microbial innoculant to allow for maximum nutrition which how he is stimulating expression, while the deprived seed and tree-in-drought are experiencing adversity stimulated expression.

As an analogy, I believe a child growing up in poverty resulting in a potentially more adaptable person is only applicable if we consider that person to continue living through struggle. Once that same person wins the lottery and finds financial wealth, they are just as lost and confused as a wealthy child finding poverty as an adult. The REAL analogy comes when you understand that both the poor and wealthy child are capable of adaptation. Wealthy people don't necessarily sit down and die when they are met with adversity. Likewise, impoverished people don't necessarily flourish when they come into an abundance they have no skills to disseminate appropriately or equitably.

I saw Stefan's video a couple months ago and have been thinking about it since, with the context of John Kempf's assertions, as I listen to his podcast regularly. If Dr. David Johnson (of johnson-su compost acclaim) is also to be considered, the best results come from microbial innoculation of seed.

Aaaaand this is the point where I think about Masanobu Fukuoka, who might ask why you seek to "improve" the seed in the first place? If it is given the chance at a natural life without intervention, might it tell you through it's growth habit and disease/pest/drought resistance, whether or not it has the appropriate genetic expression for the ecosystem?
 
gardener
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Good it's out there. A bit of a one size fits all story though. I don't think we're ready to get to the bottom of this for a century if ever. Our brains are just too small. His example doesn't contain a tree that gotten everything it could wish for, just one tree no programming, one tree poor programming. It could be that it worked only there only then. I mean it makes sense, but that doesn't mean there are no other truths or great methods out there. Who says the tree didn't fall over because it grew too fast? Or that the fineer was of very poor quality. It is bigger so better story. Not always true at all. On the contrary. Maybe the tree thought, just get big and make seeds to wait for after the soil gets build back up by pioneers.. Who knows?

It's a bit like taking cuttings, then people "know" how to do it , because they saw a youtube of how it's done. Or it worked for them.
But it's all BS, because every variety is different, even what one nursery calls a variety another calls different, depending on what's a la mode, because they need to sell... My friend found comfrey by the side of the road and later claimed off coarse it was a Bocking 13 or 14. People are full of it. Even from little ego, imagine if money is involved...
But back to the example of cuttings, it doesn't only depend on variety, but also humidity, how is the moon, the season, whether it's green or hardwood, whether the soil is good or bad or low pH , high pH, full of mycorhizal fungi and beneficial bacteria or devoid, whether the soil is warm, hot or cold, whether it's shaded, partially shaded or full sun, whether this that and the other. It's a bout cracking codes for the plant you have in your soil.

It will be the same with this story. I'm not saying do not try...
To come back to the cuttings topic, the wise conclusion someone came with was " there are people who take many cuttings and there are people who take none."
 
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I'm no expert but watching YouTube videos on David The Good's channel had really inspired me to try for "land race" ie: crops best suited to your growing climate and conditions. It's very much a survival of the fittest situation.  
The ones that grow are happy and the ones that done are not THIS TIME. But don't give up easily. Sometimes it takes a few tries to get a good crop then let them sort themselves out. In a few yrs you'll have your own strains that survive and thrive in your area.
I had never ever heard the term "landrace" so this is pretty new to me and I'm really happy to try new things to get the strongest strains to handle our brutal summers.
 
pollinator
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Gives me plenty of experimentation up here on the LLano Estacado/Permian Basin area to grab seeds and just plant around basins I dig and see what grows on it's own.
 
master pollinator
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Here's a link to Joseph's landrace book. I haven't seen that mentioned here yet.
 
Rusticator
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This is pretty interesting, and falls in with a decision I made back in January, not to start my annual seeds indoors. It seems that the 'hardening off' & transplanting processes are where I've lost most of my plantings, in the last several years. The rain has become near torrential, early in the planting season, then with fair suddenness, switching to drought - and the winds have been higher, the last 2 years, to boot. My theory is that if I just plant them where I want them, they'll sprout & grow though enough to deal with it (or die),  with far less time and work, on my part. I'm not so concerned about close succession planting - I'd rather focus on intensive concurrent/ overlapping companion planting, anyway.

I haven't the time, energy, or inclination to spend babysitting or coaxing wimpy gardens into flourishing ones. 'Set it & forget it' is far more appealing.
 
Hugo Morvan
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@carla. That sounds like STUN what you're planning to do. Sheer total utter neglect. You'll for instance slowly select for deeper rooting plants with the added possibility to create connections with bacteria which travel inside fungi, and maybe you'll select for the possibility to absorb more dew due to a slight change in leaf shape, or which emit a chemical slowing down naturally occuring weeds, or which by co existing with not naturally occuring soil bacteria incorporated by the motherplant into the seedcoating of the babyplant get multiplied in the rootsystem and liberate foodsources not naturally abundant like trace minerals or nitrogen. And hundreds if not thousands other factors we have still to discover....
Modern landracing tries to aim for maximum diversity in the population. It's called a grex or hybrid swarm.
You'll be seeding widely differing variety which will all contain micro adaptations to your situation. By letting thèm cross freely, these micro adaptations will lead to super adapted plants over time much quicker then when you try to select within your current genetic variety.
Once they are established you can start crossing them with the most 'tasty'ones from abroad (if you want to sell) or simply select within your population.
In short you can help adapt plants quicker by diversifying. Breeders make seed packages send through the country.
 
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Many folks program organic seeds to their DNA by holding them under their tongue for 8-15 minutes so they soak up the saliva. It is said that the seeds then know what nutrients they need and work to provide them. If we program seeds for poor soil, low moisture and our own DNA, we can grow practically anything anywhere for our best health. Sounds cool!
 
pollinator
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It seems like the exception to this reasonable approach would be root constriction, as plants like squash apparently sense their growing space at a certain age (13days I believe) and will be programmed to only grow proportionally to that size rooting area. If using soil blocks or air pruned beds, root binding and tap root disturbance stress would be mitigated by air pruning, but I do not think it would help with the squash growing to its rooting space and water/nutrient availability at 13days. I have just read this, not done any extensive experimentation on it myself, but it explains why the smallest squash plant in the flat often does best when transplanted.
 
pollinator
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That puts a bunch of puzzle pieces together for me!
Every time I plant a tree of any type, I have to dig a huge hole and fill it with good soil because my ground is not the best.
Over the last 4 years my garden soil is improving to where I feel it is decent for plants.
I have always known that the starts I have, whether ones I start from seed or ones I purchase, are going into soil that is not as good as what they are grown in.
I am going to try this, starting seeds in poor soil, then transplanting to better soil.  I am starting some seeds today.  Won't be trees, just veggies, but will see how it works.
 
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Tina Wolf wrote:Many folks program organic seeds to their DNA by holding them under their tongue for 8-15 minutes so they soak up the saliva. It is said that the seeds then know what nutrients they need and work to provide them. If we program seeds for poor soil, low moisture and our own DNA, we can grow practically anything anywhere for our best health. Sounds cool!


That sounds like magical thinking to me. Though I'm not a biologist, I can't imagine how seeds would do that, or how you could show objectively that it is really happening.
In fact, some of the ideas in this thread remind me of Lysenkoism (the idea that you can "teach" plants to withstand conditions that would normally kill them). Reader, in most cases, you can't.
 
Tina Wolf
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John Rynne wrote:

Tina Wolf wrote:Many folks program organic seeds to their DNA by holding them under their tongue for 8-15 minutes so they soak up the saliva. It is said that the seeds then know what nutrients they need and work to provide them. If we program seeds for poor soil, low moisture and our own DNA, we can grow practically anything anywhere for our best health. Sounds cool!


That sounds like magical thinking to me. Though I'm not a biologist, I can't imagine how seeds would do that, or how you could show objectively that it is really happening.
In fact, some of the ideas in this thread remind me of Lysenkoism (the idea that you can "teach" plants to withstand conditions that would normally kill them). Reader, in most cases, you can't.



Are you able to access the Cider Press? I can post more about certain entities soaking seeds in certain liquids for certain purposes. They have been doing it for years.
 
pollinator
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Tina Wolf wrote:Many folks program organic seeds to their DNA by holding them under their tongue for 8-15 minutes so they soak up the saliva. It is said that the seeds then know what nutrients they need and work to provide them. If we program seeds for poor soil, low moisture and our own DNA, we can grow practically anything anywhere for our best health. Sounds cool!



Did you learn that from the Ringing Cedars series?  I think it's amazing!
 
Tina Wolf
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Gina Jeffries wrote:

Tina Wolf wrote:Many folks program organic seeds to their DNA by holding them under their tongue for 8-15 minutes so they soak up the saliva. It is said that the seeds then know what nutrients they need and work to provide them. If we program seeds for poor soil, low moisture and our own DNA, we can grow practically anything anywhere for our best health. Sounds cool!



Did you learn that from the Ringing Cedars series?  I think it's amazing!



That's where I first heard about it. Then, I have read real-life accounts of others experimenting with the DNA seed soaking. Have you read other accounts, too?
 
Gina Jeffries
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Yes, I believe it was here...

Anastasia Foundation — Ringing Cedars of Russia on YouTube
 
John Rynne
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Tina Wolf wrote:Are you able to access the Cider Press? I can post more about certain entities soaking seeds in certain liquids for certain purposes. They have been doing it for years.


Having looked it up, I see I do not have access to the Cider Press.  I find Permies very interesting but clearly don’t contribute enough.
 
Tina Wolf
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You'll find your way around permies. My impression is that many more great posts are in your future.
 
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I didn’t watch the video yet.  I just want to comment on the STUN method.  It might have been Mark Shepherd who started the idea-method, and when I first heard of it, Mark was calling it Sheer Total Utter Neglect.

He subsequently switched his usage to
STRATEGIC total utter neglect, and what I took out of that was that sometimes we may need to help a plant over a rough spot…. we don’t want to baby them because we want them to be strong and independent, but if we want them to survive to be strong and independent, with working relationships with soil microbiome, and the rest of their environment, we might need to protect them from a very late and unseasonable frost- for example.  Or put a bale of straw beside a seedling tree if a week of strong DRY wind is coming.

The idea of strategic neglect has been really helpful to me!  I protect the plant just enough for it to get established, when it will be perfectly able to survive the conditions I protected it through when it had no mass, hardly any leaves, shallow roots because it was a beginner!
 
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Iv been experimenting with cloches in pits, to get plants started super early in native soil. I use 5 gallon jugs with the bottom cut off buried deep into the sub soil (with just the shoulder and top of jug letting sun in) where the it is not so nutrient rich. An additional advantage to starting seeds directly in there permanent location, is that their tap root goes straight down and follows the natural winter moisture, this allows for dry-land no watering gardening in most cases. With the buried cloche the additional heat allows for earlier planting when there is natural moisture.

Before trying this new cloche idea we have already had great success with planting many seeds in the same hole very deep (12-16 inches deep with 7-13 seeds in each hole for corn(spacing clumps 5 feet apart)) and can plant more than a month earlier. Most seeds traded with native dry-land farmers should be resilient enough to be planted 12 inches deep if done in clumps and we also offer seeds from our rainbow corn https://vibrantearthseeds.com/collections/corn . Many modern corns will rot if planted too deep or in cool soil.

I think the combination of planting so deep, and planting in pits below the top soil, and planting so much earlier in cool soil, is developing resilience in our corns





 
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Letting a kid grow up on the street won't end well for 99.9%. Every seed has different needs/traits
 
Jay Angler
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Roman El wrote:Letting a kid grow up on the street won't end well for 99.9%. Every seed has different needs/traits

Letting that kid grow up in a growing community of like minded people with microbes and fungi supporting them, may improve the odds considerably. Mark Shepherd (Restoration Agriculture) grew swaths of trees/shrubs/plants from seed, with alleys between that he could plant with annuals to support his farm while waiting for the trees to grow. I believe his success rate was well above 0.1% productive trees. I admit that for me, trying to direct seed lettuce in most spots on my land, may well be in that percent range! Swiss Chard, on the other hand, frequently tries to take over the universe!
 
Thekla McDaniels
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Direct seeding doesn’t work bery well for me either.

With lettuce, I start the seeds in containers on heat mats etc, or buy lettuce starts.  Then I plant them out.  I am careful to let some of them go to seed.

With thousands and millions of seeds in my garden space, they come up on their own.  They germinate under the snow.  They germinate in such abundance and so early that by the time warmer germinating weed seeds want to germinate, the soil is shaded and there’s no room for them.
 
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