Flower and Native Plant Seed Production. Thomas G Chastain CSS 460/560 Seed Production

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1 Flower and Native Plant Seed Production Thomas G Chastain CSS 460/560 Seed Production

2 Flower seed production is a small component of the seed production industry. Seed is often blended and used in wildflower mixes for home gardens, parks, roadside and revegetation projects, and golf courses. Wildflower mix at power sub-station

3 Flower seed crops grown in Oregon include California poppy, black-eyed Susan, larkspur, Shirley poppy, bachelor buttons, garden yarrow, oxeye daisy, African daisy, blue flax, wild thyme, coreopsis, snow in summer, and columbine. Seed companies and producers must do experimentation to determine the best flower seed crops to grow and to develop production practices. Columbine (top), flower seed trials (bottom)

4 Prices range from $1.25 per pound for bachelor buttons to $20 per pound for wild thyme. Production costs are quite high because of the great amount of hand labor involved. Costs range from $250 per acre for bachelor buttons to over $1000 per acre for snow in summer. Growers can expect to have net earnings of about $900 per acre with blue flax and $2,250 per acre with coreopsis. Fields are small: 1-30 acres. California and Shasta daisy seed fields near Silverton

5 Planting - A clean seedbed is important since few herbicides are available for weed control. A fine, firm seedbed is produced by using a cultipacker. Flower seed can be sown with a double disk drill or a Planet Jr. (row or plate planter). Small row planter (top), closeup of planter unit (right)

6 Irrigation - required for most flower seed crops since most bloom in summer or early fall. Some annuals with strong tap roots do not require irrigation. Fertilizers - Vary because there are so many species. Fertilizer is incorporated into seedbed prior to planting and the crop is topdressed with fertilizer later in the growing season. Columbine seed field near Brooks

7 Weed Control - Need to start with weed-free seedbed. Apply roundup to fallow field intended for the flower seed crop. Treflan is often applied prior to planting. Once the crop is established, it can be cultivated 2-3 times. Hand-hoeing in flower seed crops is done and can cost up to $300 per acre. Disease Control - a common disease of flower seed crops is damping off caused by Pythium spp. This is controlled by fungicides. California Poppy and Shasta daisy seed fields near Silverton (top), California poppy seed (bottom), Shasta daisy seed (right)

8 Harvest - There are annual, biennial, and perennial flower seed crops; each has a different harvest strategy. There are also indeterminate and determinate types, further complicates harvest. Three harvest strategies have emerged: 1. Direct combining - used for annuals. Desiccant sprayed on field, then combined. 2. Windrow/Combine. 3. Windrow on paper - used where shattering is a problem. Swather lays paper down, then crop is cut onto paper. The windrow is dried in field on paper and combined when dry. Costs may increase by more than $5/acre. Swath on paper harvest method: Shasta daisy near Silverton

9 Seed Yields. Snapdragon lbs./acre, Wild Thyme 75 lbs./acre, Bachelor Buttons 1400 lbs./acre. Seed Cleaning - is an expensive part of flower seed production. Many seed lots are small and seed is often contaminated by weed seeds that are difficult to remove. Custom cleaning costs for flower seed ranges from $0.25 to $1.20 per pound. Since there are many different species there is not any one generally accepted method for cleaning flower seed crops. Blue flax field (top), seed (bottom)

10 Seed Cleaning - Hand winnowing of seed and winnowing mills were once common in cleaning flower seed crops. The air-screen cleaner is now the most important machine used in flower seed production. Indent cylinder and gravity tables are also widely used in cleaning flower seed. Flower seed growers in the Pacific Northwest consider the spiral separator to be an essential part of the seed conditioning process. Blackeyed Susan seed (top), columbine seed (bottom)

11 Native Plants Use of native plants for restoration, re-vegetation, and in landscaping is increasing. Native plants are often better adapted to local conditions than introduced plants but are sometimes more expensive because of limited seed availability. Challenges in producing seed of native plants: 1. Low and variable seed yields 2. Limited knowledge of management practices and few, if any, pesticides are available for use 3. Seed shattering losses, low seed quality, seed dormancy are common problems in producing seed. Lewis s Monkeyflower (Mimulus lewisii)

12 Native Plants Many native seeds are collected in the wild and sold or used to grow native plants to sell at nurseries. But there are only small amounts of native plant seed being produced as a crop and harvested for sale. Some native plant seeds are collected, plants are grown and seed harvested without any breeding while in other cases, selections are made and the improved native plant material is released as a cultivar. There is also controversy regarding the use of non-local native plants and over the definition of native itself. Native grass seed field in Utah (right)

13 Native Plants Some native plants grown for seed production in Oregon Common Name Scientific Name Blue wildrye Elymus glaucus Bottlebrush squirreltail E. elymoides Tufted hairgrass Deschampsia caespitosa Slender hairgrass D. elongata Broadleaf lupine Lupinus latifolius Riverbank lupine L. rivularis California oatgrass Danthonia californica Tufted hairgrass seed

14 Native Plants While shattering of the seed and spike is a desirable trait for dissemination of bottlebrush squirreltail seed in the natural environment, these seed shattering losses are a serious obstacle for effective harvesting in seed production fields. Bottlebrush squirreltail spike and spikelet (top), seed (left)

15 Native Plants Certification of native plant seed can be a different process than for domesticated crop seed. The natural track provides a path for certification of native plant seed. The seed is representative of natural populations in the wild. Seed is increased through the production system with no breeding or additional selection. If the native accessions are bred or further selected, then the native is assigned to the manipulated-track. The classes of native seed are: 1 Source-identified class 2 Selected class 3 Tested class Native plant seed generations within certification classes Generation G0 G1 G2 Collection of wild seed or plants 1st generation seed harvested from G0 2 nd generation seed harvested from G0

16 Native Plants Like cultivated grasses, some native produce more seed when the crop residue is burned while others do not. Blue wildrye shows no need for field burning while native red fescue yields are greater with burning. Residue management effects on seed yield of two native grasses (Darris et al, 1996) Species Burn Nonthermal ----lbs/acre---- Blue wildrye Red fescue Roemer s fescue (Festuca roemeri) seed field

17 Native Plants Seed yield of tufted hairgrass was best at wider row spacings than would be employed for similar domesticated grasses. Row spacing and tufted hairgrass seed yield (Darris and Stannard, 1997) Tufted hairgrass (Sally and Andy Wasowski photo, wildflower.org)