Wow I'm Impressed or repressed!

[wildmanmaxx]

I'm 55 and Learning that I'm not alone in this. I'm growing some "OAXACA" a Good Friend Had But away 25 years ago. Does any one Remember those Times,HEE HEE I hope they Sprout and if they do I will post Picture's of them. Hey any Ideals on the best way to sprout these old seeds? wildmanmaxx

 

[Hydroguy]

I would say Bin them and get some diffeent seeds,, 25 yrs is a long time my friened

Peace

 

[TorturedSoul]

25-year old seeds? Wow, that's a tough call. I would be in total agreement with Hydroguy except... I smoked sativa from that southern Mexico state 25 years ago. If you can save those genetics it would be well worth the effort.

I once grew out a different landrace sativa from seeds that had been stored. If I remember correctly, I only got four seeds out of 20 to germinate. They had been "stored" (more like neglected and forgotten) only 11 years, but conditions they had been in were rather poor. That included five years in a detached garage (peak summer temps hit 100 degrees a couple of times, low winter temps hit -13 degrees that I know of and possibly a little colder once or twice) and two moves. Hopefully your seeds were stored with more "sinse" than mine were.

As I got three females out of those four viable seeds, I do not believe that the F:M ratio was affected. Nor was plant health (they still grew into beautiful - but horizontal (scrog) - trees).

Any time you are germinating a sub-tropical or warm-climate strain, you would want to ensure warm temperatures. And I would not expect your seeds to germinate overnight. Mine took two days, four days, and the last one to show a root tip took seven. Had I given up and tossed them after three days, I would have screwed myself (the two-day germination was the male).

I sprouted mine in a folded damp paper towel setup with plastic-wrap (such that I could open the fold to check on progress without disturbing the seeds). This was placed on a small plate so that the small amount of water that I placed with them would not form a puddle for the seeds to rot, yet still keep things damp through wicking action. I placed the plate in a zip-loc bag so that things wouldn't dry out and set it on my top oven rack. The pilot light kept the temperature at a constant 85 degrees.

Germinating seeds before planting requires one to be very careful as the young rootlet is easily damaged - accidentally squeezing the seed shut on the emerging root would likely prove fatal to it. But it allows you to be certain that you are not planting a dead seed. It was much easier for me to plant the four germinated ones and care for them than it would have been to plant all 20.

The final results were a long time coming (as with most any true sativa) but well worth the wait (also as with most any true sativa, lol). In fact, had I known then what I know now I would have allowed the male to flourish and I would have grown the strain many times instead of just once.

Good luck!