acorns to oaks

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stihl189

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My daughter and I collected varity of acorns this fall.
we put them in a frig in our garage in zip lock bags and dampened the peat.
its now Feb 22nd and we have what I think is tap roots on most of them

Whats next?:help:

from what I have read we can leave them in the frig for a while until spring comes to NJ.:blob5:

I have also read i can plant them in cups on the window sill to start growing:jester:

any suggestions would be great.:rock:
 
thx

Ray
thanks for the advice. we are getting hammered with snow here:jawdrop: so we may start moving then today. I am sure it will be a while before we can plant them. hopefully each kid at her school will get one to take home.
thanks again
Stihl189:greenchainsaw:
 
Plant them in the fall

Kids really seem interested in stuff that grows. Next fall you can turn your daughter into Johnny Appleseed and plant acorns and other seeds in the ground right away instead of overwintering them in the fridge. It can be her own little tree garden for the next 5 yrs she can tend to. Don't forget the mulch. I'm not much of a container gardener and would probably lose most of the germinated acorns you have started. The acorn and walnut plots I started years ago have 8-12 ft trees.

Brian
 
I've germinated hundreds of kilograms of acorns but in Europe with European oak species. My suggest is to seed the acorns right outside during the fall when you collect them. Seed the acorns horizontal, under 3 cm of soil. You can protect the areas you plant with a net cage or something to avoid rodents to eat them. You can also signal each acorn with a small stick or a bamboo. Later on you can dig here and there and check on the development of the seedling. Let nature take its course and irrigate once in a while if you see soil is drying out. And don't forget, post some pictures !
 
A few years ago I was walking through the local woodlands and picked up a pocket full of acorns that had a little sprout coming from them.
I chucked them into a few pots with a bit of compost in there thinking not many would survive and its pretty surprising just how many little oak trees i ended up with in pots.

I wouldn't worry too much about them, just water them and they manage fine.

After the first year I removed all the Turkey Oak (you can tell by the shape of the leaves as Turkey Oak have pointed lobes) and left the Pedunculate Oak as I don't want knopper gall wasps getting a foothold.

It was dead easy really, and just recently I gave them to a bloke who was planting some woodland he bought with money from his deceased brother.
 
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