Camellia Seed (capsule) Propagation

If you really and truly love a gardening challenge and patience is one of your strong virtues, try propagating a camellia seed (capsule). Of the 11 camellias I have, only ONE seed was formed this year (due to the drought?) and it was on my Professor Sargent. Since I only had one capsule to form, I felt it incumbent to do my best to help this baby live.

Odds of getting a truly unique, pretty, hardy camellia run from very slim to none. My plants are polinated by nature which reduces these odds even more. The Professor Sargent is a deep red, slightly ruffled petal, fast growing shrub. Some of the blooms last season meaured 5" in diameter! Close to it is a solid white with small deeply ruffled petals and a deep pink of no unique qualitites. I don't know what I"ll get from this capsule, but, hey, I've been told that even a blind hog finds an acorn sometimes . .maybe I'll stumble on something really unique.

Horticulturist polinate their flowers in a controlled environment and they know exactly what the male and female virtures are, and even they are sometimes disappointed with the results. To increase their odds, they polinate several hundred flowers each year. But, nothing ventured is nothing gained.

Keep in mind that it takes from four to 20 years for a camellia propagated from capsule to bloom. In fact, I have one that I germinated for BS that is about five years old and I haven't seen a bloom yet! BS'll be moving into a new home this fall and hopefully I'll see some sign of a bloom this season! I'd sure love to see it bloom before I turn it over the her! And I certainly don't have 20 years to wait!!!!

In the early summer you will begin to see the seed capsule form. It will be wrapped in a dark green hull. It will be fall before it's mature enough to remove from the tree. When you see the hull begin to turn brown and break off from the capsule.. . .you'll know the time is right for harvesting.

Below is the capsule with the hull completely removed.

Soak this capsule in clean water for about 12 hours. Remove from the water and wrap in a moist papertowel.

Place the moist papertowel wrapped capsule in a bag labeled with the date and the plant from which it was removed. Place the bag in a warm area. I put mine on top of the refrigrator. In about four to six weeks, you will begin to see roots emerge from the capsule. I wait until the roots are 1.5 to 2 inches long before I transplant it to a pot. A few weeks after moving to a pot, you will begin to see the plant emerge. From there it's just wait and wait and wait!!

I love the Professor Sargent camellia so much that this summer I did three airlayerings on it. I haven't checked it yet to see if any or all of them 'took', but it's getting close to show time! PrayPrayPray!